Christmas in Hawaii

This Christmas break I went to Hawaii with my family.  We stayed with Na and Uncle Kunane in Na's house.  (Na is my grandma.  She was deemed "Na" when I called her Na instead of grandma when I was little.)

The plane trip there was long.  They played Beezus and Ramona and How to Train Your Dragon.  I love How to Train Your Dragon so much. :)  By the time we got there we picked up the rental car and got to Na's house at around 6.  The scenery is so beautiful in Hawaii.  Flowers in bloom, mountains, ocean, trade windsblue skies and wonderful sunsets.

We went to Ala Moana and Kaneohe Mall many times in search of Christmas gifts.  We went to La'ie Point to see the view, waves and climb on the rocks.

And we all went to tons of beaches like Waimea Bay, Pounders, Kakela, Sunset, Pipeline, Turtle Beach and our beach down the road.

Fast forward to Christmas morning.  I woke Lily, Emma and Nate and we cleaned up the air mattresses then silently waited for the rest of the family to wake up.  When everyone got up we all started opening presents.  Lily's big gift from Mom and Dad was a Kinect.  Emma's big gift was that new DS.  Nate's big gift was a gym set or something(not received yet), and I got a Kodak Z981.  Nate got me Final Fantasy XIII which I love.  I got a Starbucks card from Lily, a hat, socks, tshirt and a few other things from Emma and everyone else.  And Na got me pearl earrings since I go through a pair a year.

We had a lovely breakfast of scrambled eggs, sausages and cinnamon buns. Then opened our stockings that Uncle Kunane and Na put together for us.  We got chocolates, cute soaps, gift cards to Jamba Juice, Starbucks, Itunes and McDonalds.  A hand-made flower from the Marshal Islands and an Ipod Shuffle!

Afterwards, we hit Kakela Beach to go boogie boarding and our cousin Gordon (34) and Uncle Rob showed up.  The waves were quite large and the sun was very nice.  After we had enough of the beach we went back home where Aunty Debbie, Uncle Kunane and Na were making lunch.  We had lunch and dessert which consisted of Poke, Ham, Spinach Artichoke casserole, sweet potato, Chocolate Macadamia Nut Pie and Pumpkin Crunch and much more!

New Years Eve came and my uncle had gotten tons of firecrackers and sparklers for us.  We went to the beach, another beautiful day, and arrived back home at 5pm where we found the kekis across the street were setting off firecrackers already!  At about 7pm we started setting our firecrackers off with the whole rest of the street.  Later, Emma and I went across the street to a neighbors house to eat a second dinner.

The whole night the street was lit up with fireworks, firecrackers and tons of other things.  There were points where so much smoke filled the air that you could not see the house next to you.  But at exactly 11:50, the street and other neighborhoods went quiet.  We were all setting up our strings to set off at midnight.  Midnight came and everyone set off their best fireworks.  There were at least 4 surrounding neighborhoods where they were setting off the illegal aerials.  It was so loud that you had to shout to even hear someone.  Around 12:30 it quieted down and some people set off their paper lanterns and started to clean up, although there were a few fireworks still going off at 2am.

That was quite the adventure, and I enjoy setting off fireworks so much.

One of the last days before we left we swam out to Chinaman's Hat, a piece of land jutting out of the ocean.  As we were swimming back me and my dad were noticing that there were tons of squid holes.  Finally, he stuck his spear into a hole to test it out.  Well, you can guess.  He got it!  It wrapped it's legs around the spear and my dad grabbed the legs so it couldn't swim off.  He pulled it out of the hole and we freaked out at how big it was!  Almost 2 feet!  Usually we get 1 footers.  We got that one to shore and tied it up in a bag.

Then, I decided that I wanted to catch one as well.  So, my dad and I went out and within 5 minutes of searching we found another one.  I speared it, grabbed the legs and pulled it out of it's hole.  Yet another 2 feet!  We went to shore, but by the time we got back there was a clutter of tourists with their cell phones out taking pictures. =P

After me and my dad got pictures and all we headed home to show off our prizes and freeze them.

Well, those were the highlights of the trip.  We spent tons of time with family, I met a cousin or two.  Almost everywhere we went we bumped into someone who knew my grandpa, or who was our auntie or cousin.

God blessed us on our trip.  I'm sorry that I can't provide you with any pictures.  We lost the memory card to the underwater camera and we also lost the main camera all in the same day.  We still got a few of the squid but they aren't uploading. :P

Anyways,
Thanks for reading the tedious post about my vacation. :)
Sophie