8 is great!

William and his friend Oscar humored me this past Sunday while I took pictures of them for their up coming baptism. I got some great pictures for the program and for frames, so I was happy. We are super excited for William to officially become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! I think he is pretty excited too. And it's pretty special that he will share the day with his buddy Oscar whom he has been good friends with since they were 1 1/2. Looking forward to Sunday!

Hawaii Get-away

Billy and I finally did it! We took a trip together without the kids and got to have some one on one, reconnection time. It was heavenly and relaxing and rejuvenating and flat out time.
We drove the kids to Utah where my parents lovingly agreed to take them on for us- thanks Mom & Dad! After 2 days in Utah making sure Leila felt at home in Grandpa and Grandma's house, we flew out of there and landed in Oahu.

We stayed on the north shore, at Turtle Bay resort, and I visited my old stomping grounds.  We ran by the beach each morning, did some workouts in the gym, swam in the ocean, relaxed on the sand and in the hot tub, and even took an evening yoga class. We visited my good friend Julie and her family in Kailua, I got to meet her 2 kids and find out she has another on the way! We cruised up and down the north shore, ate shave ice, and enjoyed being together.

Then we left Oahu and flew over to Maui where both Billy and I had never been. We stayed in Napili on the west side of Maui. It was beautiful. Our room looked out over the ocean and this beautiful cove. We could see both Lanai and Molokai islands from our room as well. In fact, the sun set right in between the two islands from our view! We had a full kitchen in our room so we didn't have to eat out every meal, though we did venture out and eat some amazing food. Miso Phat sushi was one of my top meals! Man did they make an amazing sushi roll. We also went and found Kimos restaurant, right over the water, and ate a hula pie. Wow. My cousin Lisa suggested that one and it did not let us down. There was even a local band playing while we devoured our dessert.

Billy and I went on some good hikes in the area, relaxed at the beach, swam in the cove, and even tried out some stand up paddle boards. A sea turtle swam right in between us while we were on our stand up's, so cool! We also saw a HUGE sea turtle near the beach at the next cove over when we went out walking and exploring the area around us.

Our last day on Maui we drove across the island to drive the road to Hana. We started the road at 1pm and our flight was at 9:30 that night. That drive is crazy! It's so beautiful, but it is a crazy drive. I think if we didn't have to worry about time at all, we would have done a bit more exploring. At "the end" of the road we paid $20 to park to do some hiking only to find out that the hike was closed a mile up due to the recent storms and flooding that had happened right before we came. Ah bummer. Well, we did get to stretch our legs, see a beautiful waterfall from a far and walk through the bamboo forest. That was all good.

All in all it was an amazing trip. The days felt so long since we had no one but ourselves to take care of and nothing planned. I would love to go back with the kids and have them experience Hawaii. We may get a good chance to do that pretty soon if we plan to house sit for my friend Julie's parents next time they leave the island. I hope so!
ALOHA

Enjoying the sprinkles in Utah

Thanks Kristy for snapping such a great photo in 30 seconds!! ;)

Boy did we enjoy the rain while we were in Utah.

Pillow pet

Just a few quick photos of Leila enjoying her pink unicorn pillow pet :)
She watches her brothers reading books and likes to do the same. School has kept me busy... not too many pictures taken lately.... I will take their beginning of the school year pictures as soon as I cut their hair! :) hahaha.

Rey fire day 2

Things got a little more wild and crazy today. It really felt like we were in a war zone with all the helicopters and planes flying overhead. We even felt some water drops from the full buckets as they flew over.

The kids did great again, they didn't seem scared or affected by the proximity of the fire at all. (Zachary playing horseshoes with the fire blowing up behind him) I wasn't anticipating it dropping over this side of the ridges, but boy did it ever. It was burning trees and vegetation that I can run to in 20 minutes from the house.

We watched a lot of retardant drops from the big planes... it was pretty awesome.
I'm grateful the winds were in our favor today and we were safe at our house getting to watch it all.

Rey Fire!!

Well, our back yard has been a little exciting the last two days. A fire broke out yesterday afternoon a little after 3pm at White rock day use... it was super windy, and word is that a dead tree fell on power lines over there and started the blaze. 3 years ago a run away bbq fire in the same spot started the White fire, but this time the winds took the Rey fire in a different direction.(Basically onto the ranch we live on, Rancho San Fernando Rey) At lease initially. We were just about to head into town when the fire took off yesterday, so we opted to stick around a little longer and see what it was going to do. Billy has been gone almost the entire month on one fire or another. He is busy in Atascadero helping with the Chimney fire by lake Nacimiento, so he is missing all the local action. This also leaves me solo with 4 small children to fend for myself.  I'm used to it though, so it's okay.
My phone started blowing up with text messages and phone calls to check on me and the kids. We sure have a big "community family" here. :)
My friend Lauren sent up her husband Kevin with his truck in case we wanted to move any of our precious memories... which I did send a few bins with him. Just in case. It was mostly just really nice to have another adult there with me to look at the fire with and calm my nerves.
After about an hour and a half or so, I finally got ahold of Billy. He basically said not to worry and that he felt comfortable our house would be fine. He gave me contact info for a few of the captains and chiefs that were working the fire in case I needed anything or had any questions.

The fire went from around 600 acres last night to almost 3,000 acres this evening. It got windy back here this afternoon and it was hot. The fire spread across more of the ranch and we pretty much listened to helicopters and planes flying by and over our house all day long.  What a show though. That big DC10 really drops a lot of fire retardant!

One nice thing about being married to a fire man is that we are all used to fire and the fire world. The kids weren't scared a bit and enjoyed the air show of helicopters and planes. There only questions for Billy when we got to talk to him were "So dad, what are the medium size planes called?"

It will be interesting to take a drive on the ranch once this fire is out and see the extent of it up close. This may put a damper on our "bear hunting" season coming up.  Bummer.
It feels good to be safe even though it's pretty close and looks pretty bad.

Loving my girl

I couldn't help but take a few pictures of Leila today because she just looked so darn cute in her little Hawaiian dress and girly shoes.  I'm kinda loving having a little girl around :)

Girly shoes are pretty fun :)

And a cute moment a little later today of William and Leila reading together on the coach