Sadly Thankful...

Kinda sounds funny I know but as I am sitting at home sadly missing my husband I haven't really seen the last few days, I can't help but to be so thankful. I have so many things....It is Christmas Eve and Jeremiah has been working at the Aloha Stadium the last few days, all day in Honolulu. The semester is finally done and gosh darn, he is working. But how thankful I am for such a hard working, goal oriented and motivated husband. This makes me REALLY thankful for the profession he is going into, Dentistry...all this time away will pay off! I am so happy for the opportunity to live in Paradise, nothing like the feel of sand between your toes and you can run every day year round! I have a beautiful and healthy little girl, I couldn't imagine life without her! My family who called many times today to make sure I was staying busy, love you guys! My wonderful neighbors, who brought goodies and invited us to the beach to enjoy the many rays of sunshine. To families like the Hannemann Family...the world needs more people like you guys, feeding the homeless, you guys make for such a great example to my family. I am so thankful for the friendship I have gained here, it is all around. The Hitz Clan...always having people over to share food, your beach and the laughs. It was nice to see those smiley faces tonight, you guys are wonderful! I am grateful tonight more than anything for my Heavenly Father and all he has done for me. One could not explain how happy and thankful I am for EVERYTHING in my life....wishing all my loved ones a very merry Christmas!!

Mommy and Kiddos

Ilove Mommy and kiddos beach day! While we are soakin' up the sun, we don't forget about our amazing husbands who are working hard at school. A few weeks ago a few friends and I went to Turtle Bay and had a sun filled day, lots of fun. Iuliana and her daughter Mikayla, Katie and her son Pattrick and then Ellah and I. Pattrick was our lifeguard making sure we stayed safe! Sadly these two wonderful families are leaving for the mainland and we wish them good luck and love them lots!!

SANTA....she now knows him!!

Last Saturday we had our Ward Christmas Party and Santa came for a visit too!! Since Ellah has been a very good girl this year, Santa was very nice and gave her a candy cane. She also sat on his lap with Maili, which is her best bud! You should see these two together, they can spot each other from across the room and they both get so excited. I love it!!

She is the both of us...

Life couldn't get any better...

Stef did some a fantastic job, we are so thankful for all that she did!

Just the 3 of Us

As I promised a few other pictures from our family photo shoot....

Where is a babysitter when we need one?

We had a photo shoot last week and we loved this shot!! I will post a few more later on but this one just says it all!!

Almost....

All Mommy and Daddy wants for Christmas is Ellah to walk. She is extremely close and we spend almost all day walking around but at 6'1" and 5'10" Mommy and Daddy are getting a little sore in the lower back area. Most people say, when they start walking, you will want them to go back...We are so ready! Michelle spends most of the day outside, running, walking, beach bummin' and riding bikes with Ellah. As you all know her, she doesn't really sit still much, bring it on Ellah!

Chubby The Long Lost Reindeer

Many of you know that Santa had 9 Reindeer but to a HUGE surprise, believe it or not, there are actually 10 reindeer pulling that jolly man's sleigh! Jeremiah and I found the reindeer at FoodLand munching on all the goodies in the sugar isle. So we snuggled her right up and took her home with us. Why she was told to stay back in the North Pole while Santa and the other 9 reindeer were delivering presents to all the good little boys and girls....

She weighed the sleigh down too much, Chubby the long lost reindeer stays and helps test the Christmas snacks and what a great job she does!!

Garage Sales with Grandma

When I was younger my Grandma and Grandpa would come and visit, Grandma would always take us girls to garage sales. I was never really into it as much, but over the years I have become more interested. Garage sales in Alaska or anywhere else usually last what 3 days, Friday through Sunday and they go from no earlier than 8am and no later than 5pm. Let me tell you about Hawaii and their garage sales...I think it is almost worse than the infamous Black Friday. We learned this very early on. We always find them on Craigslist ahead of time. One of our first encounters, the post said 6am - 11am, no early birds!! We thought, 6am is an early bird, we thought wrong!! Luckily Ellah woke early that morning and we all packed up and got to the sale early, or so we thought. It was packed and when asked about the items we were looking for, they said they were gone, as Miah looked down at his watch it read 6:01am. She actually told us she had people knocking on her door at 3am for the garage sale. CRAZY PEOPLE!! So we have turned garage sales into a competitive hobby and it is fun but crazy! They usually just last one day and only for a few hours. They are amazing prices because people are usually leaving the islands and HAVE to get rid of the items. But here it is not unheard of to have people knocking on your doors at night and that is why they say NO EARLY BIRDS!! I love finding treasures, our recent was Pyrex Baking dishes for $2 of all sizes, amazing. I guess garage sales with Grandma really payed off, thank you so much Grandma, Ellah even loves it!!

Gingerbread Houses

We started off the Christmas Season on Tuesday December 1st with making gingerbread houses. There was a big group of us, The Hannemann Family and The Hitz Family. I was super excited to get started because I had never made anything out of gingerbread before, Jeremiah was just as excited for me. We had gingerbread house kits, sleigh kits and of course making our own out of graham crackers....what a joy!! Of course Jeremiah taught the little guys some good ways to clean up the frosting, just lick the bag. Leaving the houses as one big community germ pool but they were still delicious! Ryan and Chandra Hitz were kind enough to let us start the season off at their beautiful beach house, thanks a ton guys!! We hope everyone is enjoying the start of their Christmas Season too.