Christmas!

Wow, I can't believe Christmas is over. And to tell you the truth, I took the tree down the day after Christmas. I normally wait till the 1/2, but it had died 2 weeks ago and looked terrible. It was time for it to say bye-bye. Anyway, back to Christmas. Christmas eve we went to Byron's parents house and all the cousins were there and we had little scones and hot chocolate. We also did a little Christmas program.

Christmas morning the kids got up and made our way to the tree.  Olsen really got the hang of opening presents.  
Gabriella just kind of watched and thought everything was pretty cool
Gabriella got a new kitchen set, but I think Olsen going to be enjoying it too.
We then made our way up to my in-laws house where they got the smaller grandkids a new car.  Can you guess where Olsen was all morning?  Here he is with Nivee
While everyone else dug in the yummy breakfast buffet.  
But not Gabriella, she thought the water drain was good enough to eat. 
Rather pleased with herself
Avery and Gabriella checking out the jeep
Dad and Tim playing pool 
Gabriella and Nivee had a great time playing with the rock 
These two girls have such a great time together.
Finally Daddy got the jeep all put together and the battery charged.  Olsen took it for a spin, but he didn't really get how to turn it.  That's what Uncle Willy is for
Gabriella of course just wanted to eat it
After breakfast we went home, gave the kids a nap and then headed back for dinner.  My MIL made all us girls aprons from my FIL's old church shirts.  They turned out wonderful and here we are modeling them 

Ana, Valerie, me and Rachel

Catherine's last day

Catherine mixed up her times for her flight, so we were fortunate enough to have her an extra day!! So of course we had to spend the day at the beach. Unfortunately it wasn't the sunniest day and little girl was GRUMPY. But by the end the sun came out a bit and Gabriella cheered up.  

Olsen had to wear his cowboy hat to the beach.  (What a surprise)
Gabriella loves her shoes.  In fact, she can get them on by herself sometimes
Catherine playing with them in the water
Gabriella was grumpy and only wanted to sip my drink
Making sand castles and canals (Olsen made a friend too.  At the beach it's easy to do)

Snow you say

Amalie said she wanted to see snow, so here you go. There is snow on top of Mauna Kea right now. And people really do ski up there.


Okay, our tree really isn't leaning that bad, it's more the Angle leaning WAY forward. I just couldn't get to stand straight. Our house is very Christmas-y right now and I love it.

And Gabriella with her cute lips in front of the tree.

Volcano

Today Catherine and I went to Volcano National Park.  On the way we made a few extra sight seeing stops.  We first stopped at a beautiful coast line spot along the road side.

The second stop was at black sand beach where we ran into sea turtles.
And here we are at Volcano National Park

Parade Day

Alrighty, I'm extremely tired at the moment, but it's now or never on posting. So today was the Kona Christmas Parade down on Alii Drive. Last year no one took charge of decorating the cars, so this year we did our best to make up for it. And it turned out great. If I may say so myself.

Just picked up the flatbed truck 
Working on decorating it (Catherine was great and took the little kids to the park to play)

Finished and waiting to load up and go
Loaded and ready to go.  And yes, Olsen is in the center wearing the cowboy hat (he was not going to leave it behind)

I walked next to the truck and took pictures.  

We put my glider on the truck for Grandma to sit on.  Gabriella thought it was pretty comfortable too.
By the time we got back to the beginning Gabriella was pasted out on Grandma.  

Another busy day

Today we traveled and had fun (except for all the whining in the car). First we took the long drive to Akaka Falls and while walking down the path the clouds opened up and dumped buckets of water on us. Then we made our way to Hilo and hit the mall for a little shopping. Olsen and Gabriella had a blast riding the little carousel there. Tonight we hired a babysitter (thank you Jessie) and Catherine (oh, for those of you who don't know, Catherine is my niece going to the U of U) and I went to see Byron at the luau. And Catherine showed us all how to shake that thang. So enjoy the pictures of my wet babies, the beautiful greenery and Catherine dancing. :)