Adios October!

October was a busy month!  The best part was a visit from Emma during our Fall break.  Here are a few shots from our nearly 3 weeks together...

My beautiful (yes it's real) Hibiscus

Our delicious lilikoi (passion fruit) shave ice treat

A stupendous brunch at Mariposa

 And sightseeing on some gorgeous days...

 And of course, sunset happy hours on the lanai

Sadly we couldn't keep her forever.  Back to school and work for us and back to PA for her.  (Not before we had her whip up a fantastic Gryffindor robe for Halloween of course)

Getting all set for the big day!

Hermione Granger herself

Dad for the win with the home-made, light up, official looking wand!!

Expecto Patronum! 

School pals

Big girl didn't trick or treat, but she did wake up at 4 am to pull off this amazing Dia de los muertos look for school.  Fierce huh?

It was a fun couple of days but Halloween just wears me out! What you ask did I do to celebrate my fabulous husband on his 50th birthday?  Nothing.  Nada.  I.am.awful.  Thankfully he is a big boy and spent the weekend dealing with repairmen, shopping for basketball shoes for the newest member of the Holy Family basketball team (yes, basketball!) and handing out candy.  We will make it up to him somehow. Maybe even before Thanksgiving!!

Back to School (and stuff)

Well, when I started this post, we had in fact JUST gone back to school.  3 weeks later and I'm finally getting around to actually publishing it.  Don't ask me what I have been doing for 3 weeks - it's all a blur

We had a great summer but it was too short.  We enjoyed our home, the beaches and pools and yes, the indoor ice-rink!  It's the only time we get to wear long pants.

I had a birthday in there somewhere too, and Emily treated me to her most excellent Pot De Creme 

Olivia and I spent a morning at the DMV because who doesn't want to do that?  But we successfully renewed our licenses and she tortured me all the way home with driving selfies.

This was actually the first day of school (1/2 day) so a few of us hit the beach after a long 4 hours of teaching :)

Back to school is a drag, but it does mean one of our favorite shows returns.  Project Runway!!!  Emily is having her "make it work" moment

Oh yes, the first day of school before the beach shot.  Back to the uniform!!  At least they haven't taken away the fancy hair adornments

First day of work!!  Olivia didn't start for another week or so but she did get a local barista job this summer.  Everyone is in their polo's and out the door!

And of course, in addition to teaching, back to school means back to PTG and our personal goal of overachieving on every level.  These were left in teacher boxes for the first day.  Disclaimer: my sweet friend insisted that I not make myself cookies so she baked all 500!  

My classroom:

Here's to another year...wish us luck!

Weekend Fun

 The best part about extra days off is...extra days off!  We spent our first day of the long weekend doing some yard work.

This was an orchid left for us by the previous owners.  We are finally seeing our gift!

And our little guy was back!  Well, not so little.  Hard to tell in the photos this one from the smaller version but we spotted another Giant Madagascar Gecko.  He wasn't quite as big as the first one we saw, but still about 8" long and oh so pretty.

Then we hopped in the car and went here.  Bellows.  Quite possibly my favorite place to be.  

It was a perfect beach day.  Puffy clouds, slight breezes and warm water that didn't even make you cringe when it hit your belly for the first time.  A jump-right-in kinda day!

Emily even managed to catch a crab!  We named him Guy and tortured him for a bit before we let him go.  We joked that he went back to his friends and told them the story of being captured by a zebra :)

My Zebra

Tonight we are off to Waikiki to see the fireworks.  Enjoy your extra days and Happy 4th!