Hawaii Update! We Love It Here!

Hanging out at the pool with a bestie and our kids! 

  My last update was sort of an introduction to Hawaii for my family and our friends that are far away.  I have to admit, I was pretty down on Hawaii when we first got here.  I was lonely and missing Virginia and all of the friends we had left behind.  Moving is hard!  Duh!  Anyway, we have been here in Hawaii for almost five months now and we have done a COMPLETE 180 on opinions here!  We LOVE Hawaii.  We still miss Virginia, yes, but we have made some fantastic friends here and we have been able to really exploring the island and creating our own NEW routine.  We are finding what works here and what doesn't and we are finally embracing it. 
  So what works here in Hawaii?  Um... the pool and the beach, of course!  How many people can schedule weekly play dates at the beach?  How many people can go to the pool... um... every day if we want to?  So what if westbound traffic in the afternoon makes a person want to gouge their eyes out, we can just hang out in the neighborhood and go to the pool!
 Lilia and Ivy are starting swim lessons this coming week.  Lilia has been taking Hula lessons too.  We have a membership at the Children's Discovery and we spend a lot of time there too.  It's AWESOME!  I have never been to such a cool Children's Museum.  The girls beg to go all the time, which is great because it means they aren't tired of it yet!  There are SO many fun toys and imaginative play stations that I never feel like I need to buy toys because we can just drive 15 min to the center and VOILA!  Play time and no mess for me!!!!   

Homeschool art project and lesson on Van Gogh

 I decided to homeschool Lilia for kindergarten and the remainder of our time here in Hawaii.  I felt a little apprehensive at first and doubted whether she would take instruction from me or whether I would have the abilities needed to keep her learning and engaged.  We have certainly had a learning curve, (pun absolutely intended,) but I feel like we have had so much success this year that I feel encouraged to continue!  We will continue to homeschool in Hawaii and maybe even beyond.  Lilia AND Ivy have come leaps and bounds in their math, reading, and writing and we are able to explore other subjects and topics that she would never be exposed to in a regular kindergarten classroom.  Another things that I have really loved about Hawaii is that there are MULTIPLE homeschooling organizations and even facebook groups that coordinate field trips and learning activities together.  Lilia has been to a Dairy Farm, a gardening and decomposer workshop, and a butterfly conservatory just in the past two months!  There are so many trips planned and available that we have to say "no" to a lot of them just so that we don't over-schedule ourselves.  Lilia and Ivy have both made some really awesome friends that will be homeschooling this year too.  We are really looking forward to getting together with these families and exploring and learning together. 
  I have also enjoyed teaching the girls about art and music.  We have been learning about different instruments and listening to different composers.  Lilia REALLY enjoys listening to different kinds of music and loves to reflect on how the music makes her feel.  We've watched Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 as a starting point and branched out from there.  Ivy is quick to point out what music she does NOT like.  She does not like Mussorgsky and honestly, who can blame her.  Night on Bald Mountain is probably the mommy fail of the year right here.  I had totally forgotten about that part!!!! 

Little Man!  Sweetest little blondie boy you have ever seen! 

 Little Joel-y man is mischief incarnate.  He lures you in with his white blonde hair and twinkly blue eyes and then BAM! He's bitten Ivy or is at the top of a 5 ft bending ladder at the playground and is falling through the slats.  He's a little devilish.  We love him, but seriously.  Terrible twos all the way and he isn't two until June.  He is VERY vocal and has well over 100 words now.  He loves to say "I don't want it!" when he doesn't want to do something.  Then he will shriek and run the other way.  If you chase after him the shriek morphs into a cackle and he flees with glee.  He's a stinker.  He is also a snuggle buddy and can be sweet and gentle... sometimes.  We love him.  I am hoping this is just a phase.  

Laie Temple with Cliff

  Cliff and I have been able steal away a number of times now that we have met a couple of wonderful babysitters and we have been able to see and do some amazing things already!  We have been able to go to the Temple a couple of times on our own now and it's been really great.  We had a night away in Ko'Olina for our anniversary and we got to spend some kidless time at the beach.   We loved exploring the area as just the two of us.   We also LOVE the drive up to Laie.  It may be one of my favorite things about living in Hawaii.  It is just so dang beautiful.  I have never lived somewhere where the ocean is just FEET from the road.  You feel almost like a big wave could come up and just wash the road away, but it doesn't.  The water is actually pretty shallow along the road due to a far off shore break and the water is crystal clear.  It's usually a little rainier on the windward side and this makes for luscious green jungle and lots of rainbows!  Seeing a rainbow over the ocean is pretty much the best.  We have also been able to try out some great restaurants.  We've found katsudon JUST like we had in Japan and we've also been to Roy's.   We went to Roy's for our 8th anniversary this year and it definitely ranks in the top 3 restaurants that we have ever been to.  SOOOO good.  We've also found great barbeque, great Hawaiian food, great Korean, and somewhat decent Mexican.  We've yet to find really good Greek and Indian, but we'll keep looking :) 

Lilia and Ivy with their new friends! 

 Lastly, the kids and I have made some really wonderful friends over the past couple of months.  We really love our ward and actually had over 30 people over for Easter dinner this year.  I have also been invited to a wonderful playgroup and the kids are so excited to have new friends.  I think that makes all the difference when you move.  Settling in takes time and we knew that it would.  Now we just have to get busy enjoying our time here because our past tours have taught us - it all goes by so quickly!!!

Everything is Awesome... except, you know, the parts that aren't.

 In case you haven't heard, we moved to Hawaii.  Honolulu, Oahu to be exact.  We found out that we had orders to this duty station in July and have clung to the Dream of Hawaii ever since.  The Dream of Hawaii got me through Cliff's deployment and a seriously stressful move, (is there any other kind?!)  Mostly this dream became a reality when we arrived on the island on November 24th, but you know how the military is.  They prefer "challenges" to dreams so we started off our tour with some (yay!) fun "challenges."  We spent just over 6 weeks in a very small hotel room and were taken on a ride by the Housing office, but... that's ok and it's all behind us now.  Despite the challenges, we've had a lot of silver linings too and we are starting to settle in.  So far Hawaii has fallen short of, met, and totally exceeded expectations and I will attempt to give a quick breakdown:

Fallen a bit short:
- So.... Hawaii has a bit of a crime problem.  This was totally UNexpectedby me.  Maybe the rest of you out there are watching Hawaii Five-O, but I sadly was out of the loop.  When we first moved here there were a couple of murders locally.  One of them was a military spouse in her home.  Car break-ins are a thing.  Everyone locks all of their doors and turns down blinds when they leave the house for any amount of time and garage doors are always closed.  Another military spouse was the victim of an attempted car-jacking at the Target that I shop at.  It was in the afternoon and she had her children with her.  Not so awesome.   I guess it comes with a big city? 

- It's hard to feel like you are in paradise when you are confronted with the reality of poverty in Hawaii.  I'll admit it.  I was terribly ignorant of the extreme poverty here and it's sad.  Really sad.  I'm glad that I am aware of it now, because we hope to do some serious volunteering here, but it's also been a wake-up call.  I wonder how many Americans on the Mainland have ANY idea?  There are homeless tent cities here that the tourists will never see.

- SHIPPING.  Shipping anything to Hawaii is EXPENSIVE.  I became an independent consultant for UBAM this summer and enjoyed my relatively inexpensive standard shipping for my products very very much.  I have also thoroughly enjoyed our Amazon Prime membership for the past couple of years.  Not anymore!  Amazon Prime is still free... but you wait and wait and wait for it.  UBAM?  Arm, leg, and future children.

-  THE TRAFFIC.  I grew up just north of Atlanta and Cliff and I have made multiple trips to DC via the Beltway.  Nope.  Not even close.

- For some reason I thought there would be beaches everywhere I looked a people dropping out of palm trees with drinks in pineapples and ukulele music.  You have to DRIVE through said traffic to get to the good beaches.  We are slowly but surely learning where and when to go, but it was a bit of a surprise.  I also thought that every inch of Oahu would look like the lush wet jungle of "Jurassic Park" or the show "Lost."   Some parts of Hawaii definitely look like that.  A lot of parts look like concrete jungle Japan only more dilapidated and more potted palms and hibiscus.  There are a TON of chain-link fences.  

- Military families are are lot less friendly than I was expecting.  When we moved to Japan we were instantly taken in and I made some of the best friends of my life very quickly.  For some reason I thought that moving to another OCONUS station would be similar, but it's not.  It's very much "fend for yourself" out here.  Fortunately I have learned to be outgoing and less sensitive, but this definitely came as a surprise.  I am very thankful to have a church network wherever we go or I would probably be pretty lonely.  I have also found a great mom's group that meets on Mondays, but you definitely have to be willing to put yourself out there more than any other place that I have lived! 

-  No Michael's Craft Store and no Chic-Fil-A.  Yeah, yeah, I'll quit whining now.  But seriously.    

 Expectations met and absolutely exceeded:  When you do get to the beaches they are gorgeous.  GORGEOUS.  Postcard travel channel gorgeous.  Idyllic.  So we try to go to the beach whenever we can.

- The hiking is varied and fabulous views are often less than a mile away on many hikes.  Quite a few are keiki friendly. 

- I will say that my expectations were exceeded in the bug department, but not in the way that you think.  The bug situation is a million times BETTER than I thought it would be.  I have yet to see a spider of any kind and the only roach I have seen was a tiny german cockroach and it was in the Navy Lodge.  I have yet to see a large centipede, but I know they are out there.  Cliff saw one while he was on his bike to work.  I am grateful for the lack of big crawlies in our home. 

- We've found a lot of good food and although we don't have Trader Joe's here, we DO have Costco and have been able to cook and eat the way we want to.  We even had our traditional "Bethlehem" dinner in the hotel room thanks to an awesome Israeli restaurant that provided both the pita bread and hummus.  We have also found excellent food at the local farmers' market.  There are a TON of Japanese restaurants and that has been super fun for us too.  The girls love their mochi ice cream too. 

 - I don't have a ton of experience with commissaries since I really only shopped at one when we lived in Japan, but I have to say the commissaries here have exceeded my expectations.  They really do save us money and if you skip the Pearl store and head to Hickam, it makes for a less crowded and more peaceful experience as well.   We love being able to buy organic chicken for so much less. 

 - My expectations were also FANTASTICALLY exceeded by the weather.  There is nothing on Earth better than the weather in Hawaii.  It is just so darn PLEASANT.  Never too hot and never too too cold.  I sometimes where a light open cardigan, but I have yet to be freezing or miserably hot.  I will have to check back in this summer, but it looks like the temps are mostly pretty consistent the year round. 

 I will try to check in again soon, but until then... ALOHA!