Our first week in Hawaii

Hawaii travel day finally came! Up until the moment we landed in Hawaii, it just didn't seem real that we were moving here. 

We packed 10 suitcases (lots of them duffels so it would be easier to store in Hawaii). They each weighed 50 lbs, so that was a lot for Brent to be lifting for all the different parts of our travels. We also had 5 roller bag carry ons, 5 backpacks, 2 car seats, one stroller, and one iMac that Brent packed ever so carefully in its box. Brent's dad drove Brent and me in his truck with all the luggage in the back, and my dad drove the three kids in his car. We had to leave for the airport at 6:10am- thanks to the grandpas for driving us!

Here we are at the airport once we were all checked in and ready to embark for our adventure! There were so many missionaries traveling this day and we asked a sister missionary to take our picture. She asked if we were moving because she saw how many bags we had haha. We told her we were moving to Laie and she said "that's where I was just living! I love it there, you are going to love it!" I felt like there have been so many little assurances like this to keep us moving forward, that we are doing the right thing. 

As we were taking off from SLC, I saw Ava and Coen holding hands. Moving across the world is a scary thing, but having a built-in friend makes it so much easier.

At our layover in Las Vegas, I very nearly missed the flight to Hawaii. Ava and I had a turkey sandwich while we waited, but no one else wanted food. Then just before it was time to board, Audrey decided she was SO hungry. It was a 6 hour flight, so I decided I better buy one more turkey sandwich for Audrey and Coen or else we were going to have hangry children on the flight. The line for the sandwiches was so long though when I went back! Brent kept texting me updates about which group was boarding, and was telling me I should be OK, people were still getting on in a steady stream. Finally it was almost my turn to order and he said, "OK, you should be good still, but you're going to need to run." ACK. It felt like snails were working at the sandwich shop and I finally got my food and then made a run for my gate. They had just closed the door but the lady opened it for me and said "we were just about to have you go on a later flight." Not our smartest moment. 

Luckily the flight went really well- lots of us napped, and the flight attendants came around about 4 or 5 times for drink orders (since it's such a long flight) and the kids had a lot of fun choosing new drinks- Ava got hot chocolate twice.

Landing in Hawaii- Ava was impressed with the color of the water! And so was I.

We landed at about 2:20 Hawaiian time, which is 6:20 where we were used to. We had allll that luggage to get to our rental car. Brent found two luggage carts in the parking lot (because paying $6 a cart is not how we roll), and he loaded like 7 suitcases on each cart, plus car seats balancing on the stroller. We made it out to the curb, and he went to pick up our rental car (which was a pick-up truck). 

The line was so long at the rental car place- he said there were probably 30 people in front of him. Nooo! By this point, we had been traveling for 12 hours and the kids were tired, hungry, and hot. We couldn't go anywhere because I couldn't handle all that luggage by myself. I found snacks for them in our bags, and finally after almost two hours, Brent got our truck (it was 5pm by this point). 

He loaded all the bags in and off we went to Costco to buy essentials and get dinner! I stayed with our luggage while Brent went inside. Our truck was already full, but we packed it REALLY full now. Notice Ava had to hold the eggs:

It was a 70 min drive home from Costco, so it was about 8pm and dark when we arrived at our new house. It's always an interesting feeling arriving to a new house that will soon hold so many memories.

The house had been closed up, and has no air conditioning, so it was HOT. Like 90-95 degrees inside hot. We immediately opened all the windows to get a breeze going and took off the kids' clothes to have them sleep in their undies (Audrey and Coen were already asleep). In the morning Audrey woke up and said "Daddy, why us sleep naked?" Although she pronounces naked with an m. Haha. 

The house feels a little bigger than I thought it would be and we are liking it so far! It's an awesome location- we are 5 houses down from our church, and both Brent and the kids can walk to their schools. We live in a tri-plex and share the backyard with our two other neighbors. The first morning Ava said, "Audrey, I see a little girl wearing a Belle costume in the other house!" The girl's name is Velzy and she's 5. She and Audrey became immediate friends and now run back and forth between our houses playing all the time.  

An evening stroll to cool off outside (see the temple lit up?) Our house is on the right side of this picture.

On Friday we still had our pick-up truck, so we made use of it and went to buy a washer/dryer from Facebook marketplace. We also went to pick up our red car at the port and do other grocery shopping (all of this was much harder than that sentence just made it sound!). We did lots of driving back and forth on the island and Coen got car sick and threw up when we weren't too far from home. Luckily I had a bag for him! Poor buddy. So, on Saturday when we had to go back to Costco to get more food, we left Ava and Coen home alone. We had no internet, so they had no TV, and just hung around the house.

Friday night, a lady that will be working with Brent brought us dinner which was so helpful so I didn't have to cook yet! She has grandkids that match up with our kids, so we arranged a playdate.

On Saturday evening we finally made it to the beach for our first time. This is what I wrote on FB: It was our kids’ first time to swim in the ocean since we are only used to COLD Oregon ocean. Watching the kids laughing and screaming in the waves, Brent and I looked at each other with huge smiles on our faces. We made it.

I think I underestimated how much Audrey understood and was excited to come to Hawaii. As Audrey was running around the beach she yelled to me, "Mom, us in HAWAII!!!" As in, Finally!! She had been asking me every day for weeks when we were going to Hawaii. Later, as she was laying on her tummy in the sand with the waves lapping around her, she shouted, "I am Moana!!" Seeing her joy at the beach made me so happy!

This is called Temple Beach and it is directly in front of the kids' elementary school and at the end of the street of the temple. If you know me, you know I love sunsets. Every night we've getting beautiful sunsets which makes me SO happy!

On Sunday we went to our new ward. It was HUGE! Probably twice the size of our ward in Eugene, although they say they have lots of visitors each week. No one talked to us since they all assumed we were visitors, so we introduced ourselves to some people. The kids were all brave to go to their new Primary classes (well maybe except for Coen- he whined because he wanted to go with Ava). The Primary seems big- they each have about 7 other kids their age. That evening a neighbor came by with banana bread and a card to welcome us to the ward.

On Monday we worked more on putting our house together and then we tried out a new beach, that was on the other side of the point from Temple Beach. Most of our ward lives on "the point" that you can see in the background of this picture: 

It was so windy (from a hurricane that is passing by) and we learned the hard way that the wind brings Portuguese man-o-war's, or blue bottles (think jellyfish). One brushed by Ava as she was swimming and she was so confused about what this blue string was. It stings/burns SO bad, poor thing. 

On Tuesday it was Audrey's 4th birthday! We had a playdate at our new friends' house in the morning. We went outside and their neighbors have a pet tortoise which Audrey liked.

In the afternoon we went to a Back 2 school bash for the community at BYU-H, where they were giving away backpacks with free school supplies. It was not organized very well, so we had to wait in 5 lines to finally get our backpacks, but we got good school supplies! The kids tried their first teri-burgers (teriyaki hamburgers) and then we headed to Sunset beach, a little north of us. We were hoping to see some sea turtles, but didn't have luck this time. Here's our big 4 year old!

We had celebrated Audrey's birthday in Utah before we came, so we didn't even have cake. She did open presents, wrapped in grocery bags :), and she was so thrilled with her presents. 

When we were about to move here, my friend in Oregon asked me, what are you looking forward to the most in Hawaii? I told her, I'm hoping we live a more simple life. A smaller house, less stuff, and more time spent in nature I think will help us focus on what is important and make memories as a family. Every day I keep thinking about that- I want a simple life. Audrey's simple birthday at the beach and then opening four presents felt simple, and she was so happy. 

Wednesday was the kids' first day of school. I was so proud of them- each one walked bravely into their classrooms. No one complained, or compared what was different to what they were used to in Oregon. Coen's teacher is Ms. Maila- she grew up in Laie. Ava's teacher is Ms. Spring. Ava told me- mom, I'm 99% sure my teacher is LDS. I told her- I'm sure you right. Almost everyone in this town is LDS.

Pre-K:

5th grade:

2nd grade:

Audrey's preschool is about 5 minutes from our house (2 miles) but it's in another town called Hauula. Her teachers are Auntie Joy, Auntie Lauren, and Auntie Jamie. Her school is the same hours as the older kids, 5 days a week! On the second day when I was getting Audrey ready for school she said "what? Why I go to school every day??" In Oregon, she only went M/W/F.

We celebrated the first day of school with Shave Ice at Angels which is directly on the back side of our house. Brent's aunts had given him money for his graduation to use there- thank you! We were so incredibly hot and this shave ice tasted SO delicious. 

Audrey was here too- she just didn't get a picture :)

Brent got set up in his new office at BYU-H and let Ava and Coen come each day to color and hang out after school. The building is really old and going to be torn down soon. The lady helping Brent told him, "Don't put any books on that bookshelf by the window. It has termites something fierce." Haha, gross! The plants are beautiful out his window, and best of all- it is about a half mile walk from our house! As he was leaving to walk to work the other morning, down our palm-tree lined street, I thought, "Is this real life?!?" 

Cute Ava in Brent's office:

We got fans from Costco, and one tells us the temperature in the room. One side of our house gets way hotter than the other. Our kitchen is one of the hot rooms and gets up to 90 degrees in the afternoon. Audrey was so hot that I gave her a cool bath and then gave her an ice pack to hold. After her bath she didn't want to get dressed because it's just too hot. I also had to change into my exercise shirt to bear cooking dinner in the heat. Oof! 

Our laundry machines are outside, so I now hang out with the slugs and lizards while I do laundry :) It's kind of nice to be outside in fresh air!

We went back to Temple Beach on Thursday night. The kids were running around having so much fun!

This time we brought the boogie boards and Brent took Audrey out on the boogie board, when he all of a sudden started yelling, "Ow!! Ow!!" and running for shore. I knew it must be another Bluebottle, and all of a sudden Audrey started screaming in pain too. Brent got out of the water and was trying to fling the Blue bottle off of him, but they're sticky and wrap around you. It was stuck on his leg, I could see it! He kept yelling, Ow!!! and finally got it off his leg. Audrey was screaming her head off and we saw that it got her arm in a couple places and her leg in a couple places, but Brent got the brunt of it. That ruined that beach night and we hurried home. Luckily the stinging subsides after about 8 minutes and then is just a dull ache for an hour. 

Here's what his arm looked like the next day- see the red line on his left bicep? I should have zoomed in, but those are tiny little red bumps all in a row from the tentacles.

Our friend told us that the Bluebottles are really just in these few beaches in July & August, and the worst when it's windy. We didn't learn our lesson the first time, but we won't swim at sunset when we can't see so well, and when it's so windy. 

On Saturday morning Brent and I worked on our church talks, and then after lunch we left on our adventure/errands. First we went to the Judd trail, which is a little mile hike with a waterfall. It is so hot and sticky here that Ava was acting like she just couldn't go on. After about half a mile, she told me, "I think I'm dehydrated." 

This tree was pretty cool:

I would give the hike. a B-. It was pretty at the end, but some of it was just OK- especially after hikes in Oregon. 

After our hike, we drove south down the coast, toward the Costco. We stopped at a Blowhole that was so cool! We had to be patient and wait for it, and then all of a sudden the water would shoot up through the rock and create a mist. 

After Costco, we stopped at Target to get my pick up for things we still needed like kid hangers, shaving cream, etc. All the stuff you have to buy over when you move. Now, you might think these errands just took an hour or two, but we were gone about 7 hours, because everything is so far away! The Costco is about 70 mins from our house, and the closest Target is 45 minutes away. Costco is definitely the way to shop here- a good amount of the food is the same price as in Utah, with a few exceptions. Bread and tortillas are more expensive. 

To close out, I'll share some things we learned in our first few days here. I just love that so many things are different than we're used to, the culture is different, and there are new things to learn every day. Here's a few things we learned so far:

1. You have to keep chocolate in the fridge. It's too hot in our house so the chocolate turns liquid otherwise. 

2. There are SO many ants in our house (and just everywhere). They're super tiny and called sugar ants. We're still working on getting rid of them and using all the different things we've been told to use.

3. You can see the temple from our street. We discovered this the second night when we went for a walk and Boom. There it was!

4. The Honolulu Costco is the worst one on the island. There are 4 to choose from (all one hour or more away), and that is the worst because of the traffic around it. 

5. Jet lag is not fun. The second day Audrey went to sleep at 5pm and slept til 6am the next day! We keep waking up really early, but adjusted after about 4 days.

6. Chickens are everywhere, including our backyard

7. Honolulu has the most aggressive drivers. We are used to kind Oregon drivers. Boo.

8. We brought far too many clothes and shoes, and not enough swimming suits.