The Boys and Their Bikes

The days have been so beautiful recently - super sunny and warm enough for short sleeves. Yay for late Alaska spring! Thanks to the gorgeous weather, we've been spending more time outside when we get home. Since his birthday, Thomas has pretty much asked to ride his bike as soon as we get home every day!

Notice the safety gear is a little toned down in this photo. He held his feet up while going downhill the other day and started making some speed. He thought that was pretty cool and so the next time, he held up his feet and let go of the handles... Crash! He was wearing full gear then, so it wasn't a big deal, but since then he has clarified whether or not he intends on lifting his feet up or not. If he isn't planning on it, then he just wants to wear his helmet and not full safety gear. Seems reasonable to me!

Henry has graduated up to the tricycle that Aunt B and Uncle D bought for Thomas back while we were living with them. He can't pedal it, but he has done great at holding on and tries to climb on it every time we walk past it in the garage. Side note - Thomas picked out these super cool Thomas the Train shades for his little brother. 

Thomas leading the way around the yard! The yard is even turning green! The first few times we went around the yard, it wasn't freshly mowed and there were tiny pine cones all over the place. Thomas kept refusing to keep biking because "there's poop!" - I finally had to show him one up close to convince him that it wasn't poop. Now he points out the pinecones to me "It's not poop, momma!" 

These two! They both like their bikes and each other. Can't wait until we can hit the bike trails for real. :)

Thomas Turns Three!

You might have noticed we did the cupcakes at his school a day early - which was because we had fun plans for his actual birthday that didn't include school! 

I bought a handful of presents for Thomas because we always find ourselves muttering "Why are there so many toys in this house?!?" at least once a week. So I was a little surprised when Matt got in the present game and bought him this super awesome balance bike. I think someone at Tom's wedding was talking about how amazing they were and their kid went from balance bike to pedal bike in no time at all.

I can at least claim credit for the Thomas shirt and sweatshirt. :)

Henry did have to go to school for a little while after a late breakfast at the bagel shop. I gave Thomas a few options for his birthday and he went with seeing his first movie in a real theater. We didn't figure Henry was up to a movie, so he got to hang with his other buddies for a few hours. 

Thomas seemed pretty excited about the movie. We had a total of one option (Home) and it wasn't that exciting, but he sat through it like a champ. There may have been a slight incident with his jacket and the red Hi-C he was drinking, but it came out in the wash (whew!). 

Back home after a short nap, Thomas was ready to tackle the balance bike. I figure the learning period might have it's fair share of falls, so we went proactive on the safety gear. Also note his new shoes - that was unplanned. We just happened to walk by the shoe store after the movie and his dad couldn't pass up these super cute Vans. He's now referring to them as his "skateboard shoes".  

He's so proud of himself and his new balance bike. Lovely day for his birthday too! :)

And my best contribution to the day - his birthday cake! I sat down with him and looked at cake photos to let him pick out his favorite. He couldn't really choose between of two of them, so we ended up combining them for his awesome #3 racetrack cake. He was so concerned when I was putting the two cake rounds together - he was worried that I was giving him a 8 cake and not a 3. I promised him it would be a 3 once it was decorated!

The second cake Thomas liked was a combined "3" bundt cake covered in M&M's. So I figured I would just cover the sides of his Cars cake with M&M's. Waaaaaay more tedious than I planned... I didn't even get it finished before I had to go get Henry. Thankfully I had back-up and Brittney finished it off for me - so good to have friends with the same interests/talents! :)

Thomas loved his cake! He was still not convinced it wasn't an 8, but he was super excited about Mater and Lightning McQueen. (What are the odds the cake we copied had the exact same two cars?) And he did a great job of blowing the candles without spitting all over the cake - progress!

I'm so glad that Thomas loves chocolate cake. Because it's my favorite and I'm selfish like that. :)

Henry lost his shirt for cake time. It was a proactive move because he was wearing his super awesome shirt and he's not the neatest eater. He's learning to use a fork though, so that's exciting! 

See what a cool shirt he was rocking? We got both of the boys Hawaiian outfits while we were there and they both seem to like them. They haven't worn the shorts yet, but they are rocking the shirts. As a side note - he looks huge in this photo. It's not misleading, the little guy is not so little these days. He's been screaming through all of Thomas' old clothes. They are going to be wearing the same size pretty soon... "/

Full disclosure, I suck at wrapping presents. Like I'm really, really bad. I had 4 presents that weren't completely covered. But it was late last night and I pretty much didn't care. I don't think Thomas even noticed. So to anyone who think my cakes look awesome, just know that my presents look awful. We all have our talents and limits! 

Thomas was so cute opening his presents this year. He would open a present and then give the present giver a hug. Ok, there was a little bit of prompting, but he was super in to it. I'm not sure he wasn't too exuberant with Aunt B...! She did give him some pretty awesome presents, so that might be why. :)

I'm not actually sure who was more excited about the punch balloons that Aunt B brought. Henry was carrying this thing around for most of the evening. It was waaaaaaay too inflated though - it popped later when Abby was playing with it. And she wasn't even fazed my it - she's a tough kid!

I think that the highlight of the evening was the play food. I bought two sets of play food in the post-Christmas discounts and have had them hidden in the closet since them. All three of the kids were so excited with all of the fake foods. The ice creams were the most popular, but the tacos were a close second. They were holding them up and yelling about "Taco Tuesday" - a reference to the Lego Movie that Abby was the first to mention and was repeated over and over and over...

All-in-all I think it was a great birthday and Thomas seemed pretty worn out from all the fun. I'll take that as a success. I can't believe he is already three, he's growing up way too fast! Though to be fully honest, I love this stage. He is full of questions and random thoughts, but still wants his momma and dada more than anything else. I'll take that as long as it lasts! :)

2 Years, 364 Days...

For Thomas' birthday last year, the extent of involvement for his schoolmates was sending in cupcakes. I debated about having a party for him, but it ended up not working out to have a party (too many birthdays too close together in his class!). Instead, I decided that having a little party at his class would probably be equally as exciting for him.

But we didn't want to skimp on awesome party favors for the other kiddos! I was getting off cheap for the party anyhow, so why not? While we wandered around the party store, Thomas couldn't decide on a theme, so we pretty much got one of everything that he is currently into. 

He also picked out the cupcake wrappers and the dinosaur sprinkles - not what I would have thought he liked, but he was very insistent. And I tried my best to not overdo it on the icing so his teachers wouldn't hate me. I found it challenging to be so restrained... But on the bright side, it meant I had some extra icing for me - woo!

We told his teacher about our plan and she covered the tables in paper and let the kids play with stickers and markers until we got there. Easy clean up and entertainment all in one! Henry got to come to the party as well - he loves hanging out with the big kids!

Cupcake time! The kids are all so different with their eating habits - some of them just ate the frosting, some refused to eat the frosting, some nibbled, some almost ate the wrapper. Henry was in the "not eating at all" camp - he was more interested in the yogurt than the cupcake. Is he really my kid??

Look at him - covered in yogurt... Not icing.

Sigh...

I love his classroom with all of the tiny furniture and artwork on the walls. And look how bright it is - they have so many windows! I think it looks like a fun place to hang out all day (they mostly seem to agree)!

The only downside to their school is also an awesome thing. Thomas and Henry have classrooms right next to each other and there is a window between the two rooms. So I can't grab one of them for lunch or a doctor's appt without the other one noticing. I've resorted to doing Mission Impossible style walks down the hallway when I need to grab one of them. 

They love being next to each other though - Henry is always banging on the window to get his big brother's attention. So it's pretty obvious why why couldn't exclude Henry from the birthday festivities! Which went off really well, yay for easy parties! I have no doubt, they will get more complicated in the future, so I'll take what I can get for now. :)

The Last Days in Luxury

I had divided our awesome Hawaiian vacation into thirds with the final third being relaxing in one of the resorts on the island. Most of our friends who vacation in Hawaii rent houses, but we were determined to spend the whole time being spoiled and not have to do anything like cooking or cleaning. ;)

We drove the saddle road (between Mauna Lao and Mauna Kea) back from Hilo. We got rained on the first part of the drive and it magically disappeared once we were on the dry side of the island. Go figure! We decided to stop in Kona for lunch and ended up sitting at a table next to the cutest little lizards. 

This little guy got super brave and was staring at Matt, so Matt tried to feed him. Apparently he is not impressed with human food. He's looking at Matt like "Really dude?" Matt did try to catch him a fly, but we are not adept insect hunters. The lizard finally did get an ant we found for him, but he must not have liked it because he wasn't interested in ant #2.

We finally got to the super fancy resort and it was even huger than what I had imagined. We were met with a tram that ferries you around to the different towers of the hotel! And there was also a series of boats you could use as well. Holy cow!

All of our guides we read pre-trip said the Luaus were totally geared for the tourists, but worth doing at least once. So we signed up to go to one our first night at the resort. I got a good photo of the guys providing the music, but didn't get any good ones of the dancers. The lighting was pretty low and those dancers move so unbelievably fast. I highly recommend going at least once - if nothing else to be amazed at the speed of their hips! :)

Luau selfie for the boys. Check out Matt's awesome Hawaiian shirt with ukuleles on it! What a perfect find for Matt. My dress wasn't nearly as exciting, but it was perfect Luau wear. Plus I finally got my flower lei. I kept expecting someone to give me one. None at the airport, none at any of the hotels, I was starting to despair of ever getting one. Luckily, Matt managed to get me one before the Luau started. Yay!

The resort really was gorgeous! It was so unbelievable huge, but it was all so pretty. Plus there were multiple restaurants and about 18,000 pieces of art scattered on the grounds. We spent a lot of time just wandering around. 

They even had a dolphin cove where you could swim with dolphins (for a fee, of course!). I didn't get the background on whether these were injured dolphins being rehabilitated or captives. I'm going to pretend they were as happy as they looked. The people playing with them certainly were!

But the views. The ocean looked amazing, the sky was amazing. It really was a nice relaxing end to our whirlwind trip around the big island. 

Our room was on the one side of the resort and here is a photo looking toward the other end of the resort. The beach is pretty much all rocks, so that was a small downside, but luckily the pools were all super inviting to make up for it. And luckily our room was on the ground floor, so I could retreat to the safety of our shaded patio when I had enough sun. :)

And one last cool sight before the end of our last day - humpback whales! These guys are supposed to be in Alaska this time of year, but this momma and baby were a bit behind. Someone said the baby was born late, so they hadn't migrated yet - I have no idea if that is true, but it sounded good! Anyhow, it was super windy, so the horizon was almost all dust, but you could see the two whales playing in the water and the faint outline of Maui in the background.

Finally, vacation is over... Our plane is patiently waiting on the tarmac for us (and about a hundred others) to get onboard. We were a little bummed it was over, but we also really missed our two little guys, so we were pretty willing to head home. A lot of fun in the sun was had and given the popularity of the islands, I am sure we will be back. :)

Hilo and the Volcanoes

My coworker Ethan loaned me his Roadside Geology of Hawaii book, so I had made plans of all the cool geologic places to visit. Several of these were around Hilo, so we decided to spend a few nights there instead of wasting time driving every day. We ended up staying in three different spots on the island. I think some friends thought we were crazy, but I am used to moving around on field trips, why not do the same for vacation?

First stop of the day were the Boiling Pots! These stepped ponds at the base of a waterfalls were cool by themselves, but there were even more cool geologic things once you hiked down there. I took a few photos at the overlook, then we hunted around for the trail down.

Except the trail down did not exist. Everything was blocked off with big “Danger” and “Do Not Pass” signs. I kept thinking the trail was hiding somewhere, but every option had a sign and barricade in front of it. I finally came to the sad realization that there was not going to be a hike down to the boiling pots. :(

We headed over to Rainbow Falls instead, which was just downstream. There were supposed to be trails there as well. Guess what? All blocked off again! I was starting to feel like Hawaii didn’t want us to have any fun! Ok, in full disclosure, I googled it. The trails around Boiling Pots were blocked off after several people drowned - apparently those currents were pretty stout and the trails were not very good. 

Fine, Hawaii. You win.

Our hotel was on Banyan drive and was covered in Banyan trees. They were also all around the falls. There was enough of them to form a shaded canopy and it was super cool and so alien looking. If it had been lunch time, it would have been a perfect picnic location. Next time!

My last spot to try from the guidebook was Kaumana Caves - which is a lava tube that had a skylight (roof) collapse shortly after formation and was big enough to walk through and explore. When we first arrived it looked like the caves were blocked off and I was about to lose it!

Luckily, that wasn’t the case, it was just a bunch of warnings and guardrails. :) We got down the staircase and realized it was super duper dark in the caves. Luckily, I had thought to pack a head lamp, so I ran back to the car to get it. Unfortunately, the batteries were low and the light didn’t really illuminate anything!

iPhones to the rescue! We used the flashlight function on the phones to work our way into the cave. We didn’t get too far back before even they weren’t super helpful. Who knew a lava tube could be so pitch black? I noticed that the walls had a cool yellow or white sheen when the light hit them, so I took a photo. I still have no idea what it is - maybe some kind of lichen? I was trying to get a good view of the lavacicles hanging down from the roof, but most of the ones I found were pretty small. So just pretend with me that they are more awesome than they look! ;)

We headed back to the entrance once it looked like we might have to start crouching down or crawling to get through. We are not quite that adventurous! 

We then headed to Volcanoes National Park. There are plenty of trails and things to see, but I wanted to go walk on the lava that had taken out the Chain of Craters road back in 1983. It looked like just a short hike from the end of the road, so we headed down to the edge of the park.

To be met by this! What?!? Not another blocked off area!! I was muttering under my breath about just wanting to live my life and walk on some lava that had gone over the road. As much as we had picked the island for active volcanoes, there haven’t been any flows this year, so it was pretty darn safe to be walking around. Sigh…

I had to settle for walking around on the lava cliffs on the appropriate side of the fence. The views were gorgeous, the water was beautiful and while it was overcast toward the volcano summit, it wasn’t raining at the coast. 

Plus there were these super green plants dotted along the black lava rocks, so they looked especially vibrant. The terrain in the part was actually super varied. When we were driving down the Chain of Craters road, it was almost jungle-like vegetation. We were so confused as to where the lava was. Then there would be a break in the trees and a vast expanse of black jumbled rock. It was the neatest thing. They had the different flows dated so you could see how much vegetation had grown in the last 30 years or so. 

This park is almost entirely the volcano Kilauea, which butts up to the largest volcano, Mauna Loa. Kilauea is smaller, but is the most active of the volcanoes at the moment. But recent is relative, most of the lavas are pretty old. The maps show which ones that have been recorded and those range from the 1800’s to today. The most recent flows are in the East Rift Zone of Kilauea starting in 1983 and going until today. This picture is of a fault scarp (pali) of Kilauea that shows the more recent flows in gray and black, with the untouched ground (kipuka) in between. You can tell the relative age of the flows - the darker it is, the more recent it is. 

Driving back up the Chain of Craters road, I suddenly noticed an old road below us that was covered in lava! After making Matt stop the car, I finally got to tromp around on lava rock covering the road. I don’t know when this particular one happened, likely sometime in the 80’s, but they left the old road as it was and built a new one higher up the hill. 

I wonder how much lava has to cover a road before it is easier to make a new one than the repair the old one?

We figured this would be a great photo opportunity to use my new fancy tripod and get both of us in the photo. Matt sat down and I went to set up the tripod - only to realize that the connector piece for the camera was missing. We carried it all the way there and won’t even get to use it. Sigh… It would have been a good photo, poor Matt looks so lonely by himself. :(

I don’t remember all of the volcanic geology from my undergraduate days, but I did remember that there are two types of lava, which have retained their Hawaiian names. ‘A’a is the rough and chunky kind and Pahoehoe is smooth and ropy. The chemical composition is the same, but Pahoehoe is much more fluid and smooth, while ‘A’a is jagged and chunky. They are pretty easy to tell apart, even from a distance. 

The Pahoehoe was my favorite. Not only is it much easier to walk on, it had the neatest flow patterns preserved. It looks like the same patterns I see while pour cake batter, so that gives you an idea of how fluid it is. Plus the fact that those patterns are preserved gives you an idea of how fast the surface cools!

On a related note, the cooling effect is how the lava tubes form. “Channels” of lava tend to cool on the outer edges first while the inside of the channel remains hot enough to continue flowing. Once the supply cuts off, the remaining lava drains out of the channel and leaves behind a tube of lava rock - which ca be quite large. The Thurston Lava Tube is in the park and you can walk through the length of it, plus it is quite well lit! 

But it wouldn’t be Hawaii without one more Danger sign! The roof of the tubes aren’t an even thickness and some are covered by future flows, but luckily some collapsing is good as it allows access to the tubes. Other collapsing, like the kind behind this sign, is best to be avoided. :)

The park is also littered with craters (thus the Chain of Craters road), these range in size from fairly small all the way up to the massive craters at the summit that are called Calderas. These form when the magma chambers beneath drain away and the volcanic summit collapses. The summit caldera for Kilauea has an active magma lake just below the surface - it isn’t visible from the ground, but the glow from the super hot magma can be seen at night. So we headed that way before the sun went down.

We stopped at the steam vents on the way to the caldera overlook. There is steam coming out of the ground all over the place in this park, but this particular pull off had an abundance. There were two right at the parking lot that had guardrails around them, so you can safely stand next to them. But don’t be fooled, that steam is still pretty darn hot (and stinky)! And the threatening rain finally made a pretty awesome double rainbow right at the overlook, we were all pretty excited and taking photos. When the light was just right it was reflecting up to four times - which of course was impossible to get in a photo!

Finally we made it to the caldera! The caldera was pumping out steam and smoke, but no glow is visible during the day. But the caldera in front of the sunset was quite a sight by itself. 

As an aside, Matt and I aren’t usually too into selfies, but this trip we took a ton of them and sent them to my mom to show the boys. The first few ones we sent got such a happy response that we just kept sending more and more. A good majority of these had silly faces because they made Thomas laugh. In related news, apparently everyone else in the world has already jumped on the selfie band-wagon, I think I saw about 50 different people using self sticks! 

We retreated into the Jagger Museum to wait for the sun to go down since it was raining pretty good. It was pretty interesting to see the old photos and how close people used to get to actively exploded volcanoes - with the caption of “we now know how unsafe this is”. After reading all the displays, we decided to head back outside. The glow was pretty awesome! 

It just seemed to get brighter and brighter, the darker it got outside. It’s so hard to imagine just how hot it must be in the bottom of a caldera that doesn’t seem that far away. It was well worth the wait and the rain to see. It may not have been an active flow threatening to envelop our jeep, but it was a neat sight to see! And a lot safer too! :)

Coffee, Beaches and The Southern Tip

I had initially intended on going on a tour of the only chocolate plantation in the US, but apparently those tours book up fairly fast. Luckily for us, we love coffee just about as much as chocolate, so we headed to one of the many coffee farms for a tour instead. 

Coffee looks so unassuming on the tree. These are all unripe berries - they turn red once they are ripe. We actually found one and the guide let us peel it open to see - gross! Coffee beans look like they are covered in snot before they are dried and roasted. I'll spare you a photo. ;)

The farm was an small organic one with lots of other plants and several other animals. The donkeys were the cutest of the bunch. Apparently the donkey’s were unnamed until a tourist from Canada named them. This one is Paco.

And the slightly shier donkey is Douglas. I don’t think they have any functional use on the coffee farm, but they sure were cute!

This guy followed us around and crowed quite a bit. The tour guide did not seem like he was overly fond of the rooster. Apparently he doesn’t limit his crowing to the morning hours and that has not made him many friends, He was more than happy to pose for some photos for me though!

We drove down to the southern most tip before stopping to eat lunch. The southern point of Hawaii is the southern most point of the US, so it seemed a fitting locale to stop and enjoy the day. The waves spent the whole lunch hour beating on the cliffs, so we even had some nice background music. :)

We, of course, rented a Jeep for the Hawaii portion of the trip. So we spent as much time as possible today driving off road. We also spent most of the day with the top down! We did reapply sunscreen pretty frequently, but it was just nice to have some pretty weather!

We spotted a rickety wooden ladder rising up out of the water and wondered if there was anyone brave enough to be jumping in? Sure enough, we got to watch a few guys jump in. The spot they were jumping in looked fairly calm compared to the rest of the cliffs, but there was no way either one of us were jumping in!

After lunch, we decided to try and find the green sand beaches nearby. There was a single sign with an arrow, but no other directions. Once you got off the actual roads, there were so many jeep trails along the coast you could follow. It was a bit of a choose-your-own-adventure! We drove along, stopping occasionally to check out the sights. And I know it looks like awful weather, but the rain held out on us until we were done exploring! :)

The beaches were mostly rocks and busted up pieces of coral. The Big Island (Hawaii!) is the newest of the island chain and therefore has the poorest beaches. There are some and they range in colors depending on where you are. Here is a big chunk of basalt with abundant olivine crystals. The olivine is what makes the green sand, being more resistant than the basalt.

Also note my fancy new shoes - I made a last minute shopping trip to REI and this awesome salesman picked out this pair for me when I told him where I was heading. I wasn’t in love with the colors, but functionally I couldn’t have asked for a better shoe! 

We finally found the green sand beach! Look how tiny it is!! There were actually a lot of people there and they had planned ahead with swimsuits. We decided we were having more fun driving than we would swimming, so we took some photos and headed back to our trails! :)

We ended up taking longer than we had originally planned to get over to Hilo, so we decided to stop and call home from the Jeep. We’ve been trying to minimize the kids missing us by spending time every day with them on Skype. Thanks to the wonders of technology, we can video chat with them even from the “remote" fields of Hawaii. Don’t they look excited to see us?? Actually Thomas saw me get my camera out to take a photo and started yelling at me not to use my flash - ha!

We are certainly missing each other, but so far they seem to be hanging in there and enjoying the time with their Nonni! :)

Doing Nothing in Kona

riginally we had planned on doing another two-tank morning dive today, but that has fallen through. Matt had a bit of trouble clearing his ears yesterday and they are not happy with him this morning. If you can’t clear your ears, you really can’t dive. I didn’t figure it was worth the risk of making them worse, but we decided to get breakfast and re-evaluate.

I was ambivalent about the dives. I thought it was fun yesterday, but honestly the Mantas were the best part - well and the out of control dolphins that were cruising around with us and literally riding along at the bow of the boat. The aquatic life wasn’t really as good as Cozumel and I was fine not going again. Matt finally decided that his ears were not going to cooperate and we decided to call it off. 

We did the tourist thing and walked along the shops on the main strip, buying a few souvenirs and Kona coffee to take home. After working up an appetite, we got way too much fried chicken at Chicken Holic - it was so cheap that we thought it was going to be tiny portions. Apparently we found the one spot that was a value - ha!

Lunch was promptly followed by a nap. After that, we decided to go get some sun and try the local favorite, Mai Tais! Since we were about the whitest people on the island, we enjoyed our sun under the shade of an umbrella. It was fun to just relax and enjoy the nice ocean breeze blowing in. We have big plans for the morning, so relaxing while we could sounded smart!

Diving in Kona

The wedding in California was only the tip of the iceberg for our vacation plans! We decided since we were already hours away from home, why not just go a little bit further and have that Hawaiian vacation we had intended on taking for my 30th birthday?? 

I think everyone in Alaska goes to Hawaii every year, so we had plenty of people to ask for suggestions. Everyone had their favorite island, so we had to narrow it down. Matt’s top request was to go diving and my top request was to see active volcanoes - the only island that satisfies these two is the Big Island! (You can see the sloping side of Mauna Loa off in the distance.)

We haven’t been diving since we went to Cozumel shortly after I was certified - almost 6 years ago! When I was making plans, the dive shop recommended doing a refresher pool dive. I tried my hardest to get a pool dive in before we left, but given the lack of pool options in Anchorage (and the triathlon training season), I couldn’t fit it in. Luckily, the dive shop in Kona was able to squeeze us in for a quick refresher dive. I’m so glad they did, I felt so uncomfortable when we first got in, but started to get excited by the end of it! I was even waving at people who were taking photos of us through the pool window.

We tried to maximize the diving options by combining a two-tank morning dive and a two-tank manta ray dive that evening. The dive shop affectionately refers to such divers as dive animals - ha! We were killing time between the dives trying to calculate how close we were getting to the nitrogen limits and plan out the last two dives to make sure we didn’t hit it. Luckily the Manta Ray dive was fairly shallow. 

I didn’t end up taking my camera on the dives, so we only have a few iPhone photos from the day, but the dives were pretty awesome. Only a single Manta Ray showed up on the night dive, but it was still amazing. He was a juvenile male named Grayer who is estimated to be about 700 pounds. He didn’t care at all that we were there, he swooped right over Matt’s head several times - it was incredible! 

Plus there were several varieties of eels creeping around that were highly entertaining. One looked like it was stalking the smaller fish, but these larger blue fish would get in between it and it’s prey. The eel looked so frustrated! Haha, I don’t know if it was a coincidence or if there really are “protector” fish, I’ll have to look it up! :)

Wedding in California!

It’s been a rough few weeks in the Hoyt household, but it looks like the kiddos are finally on the mend! Just in time, too! We are headed off for a whirlwind vacation while my mom hangs out with the boys in Anchorage. It’s been a long, long time since Matt and I have had a get-away, so we have been pretty excited about it. I figured the last few weeks were karma’s way of making sure we really, really enjoy it!

First stop is California! Unfortunately there are no Waffle Houses or What-a-burgers, but they thankfully have one of our other favorites - Chick-fil-A. And apparently they introduced a new drink since I was there last year. If you have not tried the Frosted Lemonade, you are missing out!

I spent a good bit of time in advance making plans and booking tickets, hotels and cars. Since we were staying a night in San Francisco, I figured the most logical choice was a nice compact car. This got vetoed by Matt as we got to the rental car company and we ended up in a convertible Camaro. I can’t complain too much, it was fun tooting around and getting some much needed sunshine!

We didn’t have long in San Francisco, but I had a few things I had to check off my list. First stop, Boudin bakery for a quick breakfast!

I love their sourdough bread so much! I may or may not have booked hotels solely on the proximity to their flagship store on Fisherman’s Wharf…

We had a little bit of time to kill before we had to hit the road, so we walked around the wharf and bay area. It seemed like we had travelled so far, but this little shopping center made me feel right at home! :)

When I was trying to remember the last trip Matt and I had taken together (sans kids), I finally decided it was the baby-moon trip we had pre-Thomas. Ironically, that trip was also to San Francisco! I think I was about 7 months pregnant with Thomas and we walked all over the city. We then thought it would be a great idea to walk all the way across the Golden Gate Bridge (and then back!). It was fun, but not the best idea. My poor knees were mad at me the next few days. :(

My absolute favorite spot last time was Ghirardelli! I think I made Matt go there every single day to get some sort of chocolate & ice cream concoction. It was just so delicious and I was so pregnant, how could I resist??

This time we went about 30 minutes after breakfast, but it was on my list and I wanted a sundae! We opted for a slightly smaller one this time, but we still couldn’t finish it. Oh well, it was the thought (and taste!) that counted!

Finally we were off to the event that prompted the trip and following vacation. Matt’s friend, Tom, was getting married! That name should sound familiar to most of you! But for those that don’t know the story…

Matt’s middle name is the name of one of his dad’s military friends that was a pilot. Matt has always thought it was neat and thought it would be cool to name our son after one of his military buddies who also happens to be a pilot. (And a war hero!) When Thomas was born, Matt told Tom the name we picked and Tom thought it was a good name. We weren’t ever sure if he thought it was a big deal or not. Until this wedding:

Not only did we make the Trivia cards, I think Tom told everyone he introduced us to that we named our son Thomas. Ha! His whole family was a little bummed that we didn’t bring our Thomas with us, they were super excited to meet him! 

A related tidbit - Tom was named after one of his Uncle’s that was a military pilot who died and left his Aunt a widow. He sent us the article about it at one point and it felt super neat to have a chain of Thomas’ - I guess this means we need to encourage our Thomas to get his pilot’s license! We even got to meet his Aunt at the wedding and of course we showed her the most adorable photos we had of our Thomas. :)

We hadn’t met Sarah yet and she was just as sweet and friendly as you could have guessed. I think we invited the two of them to Alaska about 10 different times, so hopefully they can make the trek up there soon so Tom and Thomas can finally meet! 

All in all, it was a beautiful backyard wedding and we were glad we got to be a part of it! The best wishes for the two of you on your marriage and lives together! 

Happy Easter

I managed to get the cupcakes finished this morning. I had planned on doing it last night, so the kids would be all excited to see them this morning, but I was pretty worn out. Matt managed to entertain them this morning long enough for me to get them done.

Oh I should also mention that Matt had to go on a Peep hunt. Our grocery store was all sold out and the Peeps were a critical component! He managed to save the day. And came back with so many festive colors too!

I had initially planned on having our friends over for an Easter brunch, but cancelled that once I realized the boys were going to be disease vectors. So while I had all these initial plans for Easter baskets and egg hunts, I did approximately none of that. 

Luckily my mother-in-law saved the day! She mailed them easter baskets that managed to arrive yesterday. The baskets were Thomas the Train fabric and she shipped them along with everything to put in them. The baskets popped right back up and were stuffed full of goodies. The boys seems pretty excited initially with just the cards! Henry was even trying to read his!

We, of course, made them wait to get their baskets until we had the grandparents on Skype. The two of them are getting better about staying in front of the camera for Skype sessions, but utilizing the table seems to help - especially if they have goodies to go through!

Part of the basket was a set of matching World’s Best Brother shirts, which I thought was too cute! Although Henry seemed much more excited about the fact his crocheted Lamb and Chick were secretly hiding an egg full of candy! Look at the excitement on his face! He was shaking them (because obviously they made a ton of noise) when the egg fell out and the look on his face was just priceless! Thomas commenced to prying his out once he saw the trick.

Henry is still super excited about his. Thomas managed to get his open already and is chowing down on skittles. You can see the lamb cover in his hand - they were pretty adorable. :)

I should also confess I didn’t do their monthly photos this month. Ugh, it was just a rough month. I realized it this morning, but decided that the photos of them on the couch would suffice. Surely when they are grown up, they won’t give me too hard of a time about a missing month…?

Finally, it was cupcake time!

I cut Henry’s up into small pieces for him, but he is obviously way more excited about his fork than his cupcake… Those are *not* my genetics! As you may recall from his second birthday cake, he is obsessed with utensils lately. He’s started fussing at meal time if I don’t give him a fork. He can’t really use it yet, but he tries, then puts it down, picks up some food to eat with his hands, then tries again with the fork. It’s pretty cute, but it has made meal time a bit slower…

Thomas was chowing down on his cupcake when he came across a surprise! He watched me make them, but wasn’t there when I decorated them. I cut out the middle of the cupcake and put a mini cadbury egg and star sprinkles in the center before icing them. He was sooooo excited! He started yelling “Stars! Look, Henry! There’s stars!” It was pretty adorable, well worth the effort. (As a side note, one of the guys I work with was just about as excited as Thomas when he ate one. Ha!)

Thomas gives his seal of approval - a big thumbs up. He can’t quite do them perfectly yet, but he sure tries. :)

And I almost forgot, we had a visit from an Easter animal!

No Easter Bunnies up here in Alaska, but we did get an Easter Moose! I happened to see her across the cul-de-sac and she walked over into our yard and across the driveway. Thomas was super excited and was yelling “Moose! Moose!” Henry didn’t know what was going on, but he followed his brother to the window anyhow. 

She didn’t hang around long, but I’m sure the Easter Moose has plenty of kids to go visit! ;) Also I feel the need to point out that these tall elegant creatures look a bit gangly and ridiculous when trying to climb hills. Ha!

I should also point out - we got snow!!! Matt had planned on taking a motorcycle ride with some buddies today and spent all night working on his bike to get it ready. As he was going to bed, he let the dogs out for a potty break and found 3" of snow on the ground! Poor guy can’t catch a break…! Luckily the ski pass is still good, so he did at least get some fun out of the day. Apparently it was some of the best skiing all year. The snow in our yard, however, didn’t even last the full day before it melted.

Crazy Alaskan weather! :)