Hukilau & Diamond Crater

One of my favorite parts of this vacation is that we had time to just relax and enjoy what day to day life. The kiddos could open the door and head outside and play with the neighborhood children - which there was always at least a little group to choose from, as the BYU-professor families living nearby all had a lot of children (5-6 and even 8 kiddos per family made for a lot of children always around!). It was so much fun for my 3 to make little friends in the neighborhood while we stayed there - and although I wasn't as relaxed as other moms to just let my children hang out all day together (seriously, these are great moms, but I must have some NYC paranoia...I couldn't just let my kids be out there for hours on end!), the kiddos still enjoyed a sense of what it would feel like to live in a neighborhood while we were there.

When Bryson got into town, I knew we would need to balance some downtime with some of our other times of hitting the beach and doing activities. I'm continually trying to calm down the type A personality in me, so that we could enjoy the part of vacation we all wanted...to relax!

Our first day of the week together, I was a little anxious to get up and going - so much for working on that Type A in me, right?! However, the kiddos decided to just head out and do their own things - such as Bryson got on his bike and finally learned how to ride on his own! He was so excited to reach one of his goals for this summer - now we just need to work on tying shoes. Although that goal is a little tricky to work on when we were wearing flip-flops most days. No worries though - the perfect part of summer vacation is that you have goals to keep you focused, but not to worry when you aren't working on them non-stop. I can't begin to express how much we needed this time to catch our breath in life!

Bryson Jr. also is our champion at playing Phase 10, and while I was still antsy to get out and do something!....he pulled Bryson (Dad) and I into a game. Isn't it always said that we learn so much from our children?....for me - it's to remember to take time to play in the moment - not to make the play time the destination of what I'm working to do. We enjoyed a fun game and few hours of just enjoying time together, and still enjoyed an afternoon outing!

And Jacob - well he is always great at keeping things real. I loved his outfit combo on this particular day....I try to let my children have freedom in dressing themselves most days. When the kiddos are in school, I'll try to help them choose outfits that match - but here, hey we are away from the fashion stresses of NYC, so why not let him live it up?!

By that afternoon we were ready for some time at the beach, and we packed up the snorkel gear thinking that Temple Beach just straight down from the temple might provide some snorkel time. Well - the surf was not cooperating, so we walked down to nearby Hukilau Beach. The waves were incredible and we got some great boogie-boarding time....almost too good & big of waves at times! {I didn't get any crash pictures, because I was in the water for those....but we did get some crazy big waves!}

Hukilau Beach {Laie}

We did have one place that was on our most-see/do list. To climb to the top of Diamond Head Crater. Bryson studied volcanoes for his research project in the spring, and he was so excited to see a volcano. Even though this volcano hasn't been active for thousands and thousands of years, it was still worth the climb. We drove into Waikiki on Wednesday the 13th - my mom was flying in that afternoon so we needed to pick her up at the airport & we realized this would be a great time to fit the hike in as well. Which took a little more effort than climbing this tree! {kiddos at the base of the crater}

Near the top they had this little "turn-out" to enjoy part of the view. It was already beautiful & helped us gear up for the last part of the hike....which was a steep climb up a lot of steps!

From the very top these were some of our views....

I loved this view above us while we were climbing down the stairs. It almost looked like you could monkey-bar your way down. Almost. :)

We were hot, sweaty & super thirsty when we hit the bottom....but we were so happy that we climbed together and checked something off our (small) list of things we wanted to do while on Oah'u. It was actually hard to get out the door on some days to work on checking things off - we were enjoying so much not feeling that we needed to be somewhere at a specific time. There were some days it seemed why not just enjoy the beach and sunshine right by us. However, it's also great to feel that rush when you accomplish something - and after we started hydrating ourselves with some Hawaii'an Shaved Ice we got to relish in the moment that we did something rewarding - and fun as well!