Hawaii

In March 2014, Natali and I  decided to take a trip to Oahu while Kirk and Kari and their boys were still living there. Sadly, it's been soo long that we are not 100% sure on the names of the different hikes and places we went, but we do know that we had an awesome time and saw some awesome things.  Natali has to have beautiful pictures to really make a vacation great, and Hawaii is the perfect place for amazing pictures.

One of the first places we went to was the Pali lookout which had some amazing views. Everything was so green everywhere you looked, I can see why Kari never wanted to leave. 

We love going and looking at waterfalls. There is just something special about seeing and hearing water rushing over a cliff in the middle of beautiful scenery. Kari gave us some great tips of places to go and we headed off to find a couple waterfalls. This first one was pretty hidden, and we took the wrong trail a few times and our shoes were caked in mud by the end, but the scenery was worth it.

We continued to Waimea Falls Park.  Natali found out that this is one of the places that the jungle scenes in the Hunger Games was filmed, so we had to check it out.  If you have seen the Hunger Games series, you probably recognize the stream in the third picture below.  The whole park is beautiful and definitely worth visiting.

We were able to spend some time with Kari and the boys which was really great. We decided to head to a little beach and play in the water. Rivers was a little fish splashing in the water, while Kari and Natali enjoyed working on their tans. Kari knew all the best places to go and was an awesome host/travel agent.

Of course you cannot go to Oahu without heading over to the Polynesian Cultural Center. We caught a few shows and then stayed for dinner. It is awesome to see all the different cultures of the different islands. Each one is very unique and amazing. The boat shows were awesome, and then we were able to go and see some of the different areas around to learn more about each culture.

We also stayed and enjoyed the dinner. It was great to watch some more shows, dancing, and of course, eat some great Kalua Pork!

We were looking for something a little different to do and decided to go take pictures at the Byodo-In Temple. They had ponds full of fish surrounding the temple and some friendly peacocks that were just posing for pictures it seemed.

And look, we found another waterfall!

And what vacation is complete without food? Kirk and Kari went out with us to a great restaurant right on the beach. Yes, those are real palm trees in the background even though it looks like a painted backdrop. we had great scenery, a great ocean breeze, great company, and some great food. 

The next day Kari took us all around to different places around Oahu. We took a hike with Rivers and Eli up to the Makapu'u Point Lighthouse trail where we saw some beautiful views and got some exercise while we were at it.        

It was fun being able to go out with Kari and her kids. They kept us laughing and entertained whenever we were around them.  We bribed Rivers with Pringles to take this picture.  He gave us an extra big smile for extra chips!  We figured someone has to corrupt those kids with junk food every once in a while! ;-)

On our last day, Natali and I booked a whale-watching tour.  While we didn't see as many whales as we had hoped, we did end up seeing a few fins, and somewhat of a breach.  Below you can see the mom and baby whale we found.   

We then walked around Honolulu and enjoyed some (incredible) Ramen at this place called "Lucky Belly."  I mostly walked around and enjoyed how beautiful my wife looked.

We were sad to leave, and it was an amazing break from work. Kari and Kirk were great hosts and it was so fun seeing them and their kids.  Here's to hoping we have this view again soon:

First Winter in Dallas

After living in Provo for 7 years, it has been a very welcome change to have blizzard free winters here in Dallas!  It still gets cold enough to justify drinking hot chocolate and cuddling up inside but it's not so cold that you HAVE to do that or have to worry about driving during snow storms.  Since we no longer have to be shut-ins during the winter, we have found that season much more enjoyable.  One fun thing some of the members do in our ward is a crawfish boil (pictured below).  They used to live in Louisiana where that is pretty common so they decided to bring the tradition to Dallas with them and we were lucky enough to get an invite to the boil.  It sure is fun for us to be learning all these great Southern traditions.  Also pictured below are these amazing horse sculptures near Dallas called the "Mustangs of Las Colinas."  The water has little fountains on just under their hooves so it looks like they are actually running across the water.  It's really one of the most incredible sculpture scenes I have seen and even better that it's so close!  If you come visit, we will take you to see these for sure :-).

The two next pictures are of little black birds called Grackles that are all over Dallas.  You really never see a Grackle alone or in a small group.  They always seem to be all together at one place and mostly they are out in the early evenings.  They can get a bit loud in these big groups but it's really an amazing sight to see.  If you look closely at these pictures you will notice the phone line looks a little thick or has little black bumps all over it.  Those are all Grackles.  Isn't it crazy?! I have seen a lot of birds before but until moving to Dallas I had never seen anything like this.  Some nights if I get off while the sun is still up (which is very rare), Reed and I will wander around in the car to find where the Grackles are hanging out.  I just LOVE watching them.

One of our new favorite Christmas traditions since moving to Dallas is being able to drive around and see Christmas lights in the Park Cities. The homes in that area are already incredible but you add in the Christmas lights and it's pretty breathtaking. We call the white tree in the second photo the Tree of Life :-).  And it is really incredible to see with white lights wrapped around every single little twig of the tree.  And of course it's all the better from our warm car blasting Christmas music in the background.  We have also loved having a great view of the lights around the city from our apartment.  Especially the giant Christmas tree across the street from us.  That is going to be something I'll really miss when we move into our new home.

 And here is our 2013 Christmas picture taken on the balcony of our beautiful apartment.  What a view huh?!  And of course, what is Christmas without some Confit de Canard?  You can tell Smoochie clearly agrees with me that duck is the best Christmas dinner ;-) (notice her swinging from my necklace to steal some).

For New Years Eve, we stuck with our regular tradition of fondue and video games on the old Nintendo.

Later on in January, Dana and Jason came to visit.  We had a blast with them.  We went to the Dallas Museum of Art (the picture just below this is of the Mural outside the art museum).  And then we went to the zoo and a Mavericks game.  Oh and we ate maybe like 6 different meals each day they were here :-) (plus fried pickles as per the then-pregnant woman's request :-)).  If you haven't gained a little weight after visiting Dallas, you just haven't done it right ;-).

For Valentines day in February, Reed made a fabulous meal including this onion cheese bread pictured below.  Pretty impressive Chef BoyarReed!

 

I'm including this next picture just as a way of keeping this blog honest.  Although it may look like all we do is have fun, in reality my life consists almost entirely of sitting in front of my laptop working.  But we do try to play pretty hard on those rare occasions when I can get away in order to make up for all the hard work :-).