Hawaii

When I was a little girl, my grandmother and I spent the summers in Hawaii with a million aunts, uncles and cousins.  We worked, played, and never seemed to run out of food!  From early June until late July we were completely immersed in their lives and in the Hawaiian culture.  
I ate POI for the first time on one of those trips...which turned out NOT to be the chocolate pudding it was disguised as...HUGE disappointment.  
I ate an entire box of chocolate covered macadamia nuts one summer...got unbelievably sick and NEVER ATE ANOTHER ONE AGAIN!  In fact, just writing the word macadamia is making me a little queasy right now...!  
I helped pull a net full of fish out of the ocean once, and scaled a few of them.  
I pried shellfish (opihi) off the rocks with a spoon and ATE the contents....right there on the beach!  
I slept in a tent on the beach for 5 days every summer!  (see how adventurous I was when I was a kid!) 
I drank Coke out of a bottle.  
My Uncle Greg always had his ukulele available for spontaneous backyard concerts.  
My Uncle Albert roasted several pigs in the pit (imu) in his backyard.  
My cousins and I, and the little girls across the street collected Strawberry Shortcake dolls and played in the middle of their driveway for hours.  And then we came home and played Space Invaders and Asteroids on their Atari system (which I did not have at my house!)  
We had SPAM and eggs for breakfast and rice with every meal.  
And when I came home from those long summers in Hawaii, my parents would have to deprogram the "pigeon English" I had picked up from my cousins. 

It was an amazing childhood.  (But I have come to realize lately that there is very little about my life that hasn't been amazing.) 

In the summer of 1984, my family moved from San Diego to Houston and my trips to Hawaii were over.   
It took 27 years to get back there...

Here are the highlights of our most recent trip...

Pearl Harbor...too windy to ride the little ferry out there

Laie, HI Temple

Polynesian Cultural Center

Our friends, Elder and Sister Rumsey from HOU who are serving a mission at PCC

view from our cabin in Waimanalo

Luau at the Park in Kona

Higashihara Park, Kona, HI

Mauna Kea...13,000 ft and snowy!

Rainbow Falls, Hilo, HI

Lili'uokalani Park, Hilo, HI

Halemaumau Crater, Kilauea, Volcanoes National Park

Lava Tube, Volcanoes National Park

Lava Tube exit...Can you believe I went in there????

Glow at night from Halemaumau Crater...that's actual lava!!

Beach at Waikoloa Hilton, Kona, HI

Hilton Waikoloa

 And this is my favorite one...

...this is how I know that even though it's been 27 years, this is home...