December . . .

December!?! What? It can't be December it's 80 degrees out. It's just weird not having to bundle up and try to stay warm. But it's just weird to see all these houses decorated with lights and hear Christmas music when it looks like summer outside.

My mom came to visit this month and I got a job. The day my mom got here I got a call saying that I got hired. Luckily the first week I didn't have to work too many days so my mom and I still got to do a lot while she was here. It's nice to finally have a job and get out of the house. So while my mom was here we got to do a lot of fun things:

"Turtle Beach"

We got to watch a sea turtle leave the water so it could come sun it's self on the beach, it was pretty cool to watch. They are such amazing creatures.

We went and visited the Pearl Harbor Memorial, what a great tribute to such a horrible tragedy.

We went to the huge swap meet the circles the Aloha Stadium

It was a long walk and it was super hot out that day

We went snorkeling at Hanauma Bay

And we spent a few days just relaxing on the beach laying in the sun

Luckily the weather was beautiful the whole week that my mom was here, the week before and after she came was a down pour. So glad that the weather was nice, it would have been such a miserable vacation if it would have been rainy the whole time. It was a lot of fun that she came, I'm glad she got to get away and relax.

Another good read

So I finished another Nicolas Sparks book, The Lucky One. Another great read, a little different from some of his other books. There were some sad parts in the book, but I didn't find it as tragic as some of his others. It had a surprising end to it though. While looking up the book on Google so I could get a picture of the cover to post, I found out that they are making a movie of it and it comes out in 2012. Excited, it's funny cause when ever I read his books I try to picture what the characters might look like. For most of the characters in the movie they look just like how I pictured them, but the main character surprised me. It's Zac Efron, I don't think he's a bad actor (he was actually really good in 17 Again), but I was definitly picturing someone a bit older than him. I'm excited to see the movie, it was a really good book.



So I came home from work to a great surprise. We weren't sure if we were going to get a Christmas tree this year, with the prices of trees being so expensive in Hawaii and money being tight. So we still hadn't decided if we were actually going to get one or not. So James picked me up from work, we get home and I'm just so tired all I can think about is relaxing and changing my clothes. I get in the house set my things down in the living room and James is acting all suspicious, but I can't figure out why and then I notice the beautiful Christmas tree set up in the living room. What a great surprise, it looked so beautiful, James did an amazing job. I couldn't believe that I walked in the living room and didn't even notice. It's a small tree but it's so perfect!

So for Christmas Eve, we went to our family friends' church for their Christmas Eve service. It was really nice, they really take pride in their productions and they treat everyone like family their. During one of their songs, all of a sudden we started hearing this loud noise thinking that it was something outside. Then we looked up and we noticed that they had put in snow machines up on the rafters and there was fake snow falling on us. It was a nice surprise and it definitely made my day. After the service we went over to our friends' house and had an amazing shrimp and prime rib dinner. James dressed up in his uniform and he looked so handsome, but it was so hot he was a little uncomfortable.

New obsession! So our friends got a Kinect and we were over at their house and got a chance to play it, we were supper impressed so we decided to get one as well. Not too big on video games, but I love the dance game Dance Central, it's so much I think I like it so much because I'm actually good at it. Plus it's a great way to work out. It's fun dancing to it and getting to watch everyone else dance to it as well. Can't wait til they come out with a new one with different songs on it and see what other games they come out with.

New Years Eve 2011! It was great even though I had to get up early the next day to work. We had a lot of fun at our friends' house playing Kinect with everyone. Unfortunately we missed the New Years count down, but I still got my New Years kiss from James. All in all the year 2010 was great and full of lots of adventures and change. I'm excited to see what 2011 will bring us! 

November . . .

November didn't seem to be too eventful, starting to get settled into our house but its hard when we don't know how long we will be here. The cat and the dog are not to sure about each other yet. Colt just really wants to play with him, but Shadow wants nothing to do with him. Colt is a handful, a lot more work than I thought he would be and it seems like potty training is going to be a long process.

Colt, he has the craziest personality

We bought Shadow a tower so he would have a place to get away from the dog

For the past 4 years I have been on the Depo shot, I thought it was great, I didn't experience any negative side effects that most people get. But after hearing about the Implanon, I was really interested in it. I did my research and thought it would be a really good option. Instead of having to go into the doctors every 3 months to get an injection, I just get an implant that releases the same hormone to prevent pregnancy. So now I have a small implant in my arm, and no worries of getting a pregnant. Getting it put in didn't hurt too much, but after the lidocaine wore off it hurt pretty bad and it left a pretty bruise.

The implant

My pretty little bruise

Thanksgiving came, but it just didn't feel right the weather was too warm and it just felt like it was just another summer day. We spent the day with some family friends and had some amazing food. For the first time ever for the both of us, we woke up bright and early to go black Friday shopping. We got some pretty good deals but never ever again do I want to deal with that drama. We ended up getting some really great deals. Now we can start to fill our house with furniture.

October . . .

We finished our trip to Ohio at the beginning of October. For my birthday we took a long bike ride and had an amazing lunch with his parents. It was fun getting to spend some good quality time with his parents before we left.

After leaving Ohio, we flew back to Seattle for a day and a half. Since James' and my birthday are 6 days apart and my cousin's is in between, when we got back to Seattle we went out to dinner with our family and friends. After dinner we went to do James' favorite thing, Karaoke! It was so much fun and a lot of laughs and a good way to finish our last day in Seattle.

I love being with James, he makes everything so much fun!

Singing his favorite "Kiss" by Prince

Candace and I, always a blast with her

The boys singing

We took an early morning flight to Hawaii on the 10th, we ended up not sleeping the night before and just focused on getting everything ready for the plane ride. Little Shadow flew underneath the plane in with the cargo, poor thing I don't think he will ever be the same.

Hanauma Bay

We spent the first 9 days of Hawaii living in a hotel. The hotel was a bit shabby and our room smelled gross, so we got a call about a house being available and we jumped at the chance. The house that we got ended up being an old officer's house, that will soon be torn down and then we will be moved into a brand new house. So the house that we are in  with four bedrooms, despite being older, is pretty nice. It's really big and we don't seem to have much to fill it with. Most of the neighbors have already move out, but hopefully we won't be here too long. Since we it took a few days for us to get our house hold goods delivered, we had to borrow furniture from the housing, the bed was nothing like our new bed. Our house looks so empty, we don't have much to fill it with.

We got a new edition to our family, we went to the humane society and adopted a dog. His name is colt and he is 3 months old, but he is so big already. When I thought we were getting a puppy I was imagining that the puppy that we would get would be small enough for me to hold in my arms. Nope this puppy is way too big. After leaving the humane society, poor little guy got car sick twice.

Colt

Our first holiday in our new house was Halloween, I was excited to get trick or treaters. But no one came to our door, so now we are stuck with a huge bag of candy.

Halloween 2010

Our front porch, decorated for Halloween



September!

Well September started off by saying good bye to Seattle. It was hard, but also a little exciting to see where the future is going to take us and really start married life together.

We spent most of September getting to be with James' family in Ohio, which was filled with many fun activities. It was great to get to see James be with his family, it had been so long since he's been home. Almost a year and a half since he was home last before his deployment. I'm so glad that we were able to get to spend time with his family and do fun things with out having to rush. In the end it ended up going by faster than we expected.

Some of the fun things we did:

James got to spend lots of quality time with his little brother Connor. He even got to go be a guest reader in his kindergarten class. Connor is hilarious and speaks way beyond his years.

James and Connor, getting some brother time in

Went to the country fair, the boys rode many rides

James and his dad drove up to Michigan to see a Detroit Tigers game one weekend. Becky taught me how to make James' favorite dish egg knuffels. And we made sure to spend lots of time with his grandparents.

One week end we drove down to Indianapolis, where we got to stay at the Sybaris, a wedding gift from James' sister Mint. The Sybaris, was amazing, our own hotel sweet with a 22 foot pool with a water slide, hot tub, steam room, massage chairs, waterfall and fire place. It was great to just relax and spend time together.

Our beautiful bed covered in rose petals

The pool and water slide

After spending a night at the Sybaris, we went to stay with his mom Mintia and Nikki. We had lots of good food and spent the nights sitting around a bonfire while James got to catch up with old friends. One of the days that we were down there we went canoeing down a river, which was a lot of fun and filled with lots of laughter and stories.

Since James and I have been together he's been talking about taking me to a real apple orchard. One year for my birthday he took me to an apple orchard in Washington, it smaller than the ones he was use to and the trees were fairly new, so he promised to take me to a real one when we went back to Ohio. So with his family we went to MacQueen's Orchard, to pick apples. It was a lot of fun and the apples tasted the best straight off the tree.

James and I, high up in an apple tree



James and Connor

James' wish of getting a Harley Davidson, came true. After taking the motorcycle course, James found a bike that he really liked and decided to purchase it. First time ever riding a real motorcycle for me, it was so much fun.

August!

August was a bitter sweet month, with summer ending and being packed full of events. Summer program ended and it was hard since it was my last one with all the kids. This summer seemed to go by so fast, mainly I think because time seemed to go by so slow while James was gone, that now that he is back it has seemed to just fly. We had a great group of kids this summer, which made the summer a blast.

My girls and I

Vincent, one very funny little boy, who became my shadow

Love this picture, Jordan, she is such a character

The kids practicing for their play

Love these girls, Lily and Lynn, summer wouldn't have been the same without them

My group monkey around at the zoo

UGM White Center, Summer Staff 2010

In August we also celebrated James and I getting married. It was great getting celebrate with all of our family and friends, especially since we will be leaving soon. The weather was beautiful like we hoped, the sun poured down on us at my aunt and uncle's farm. It was a fun day, and I am so thankful for everyone who helped me prepare for it all.

Beautiful backdrop, Mt Rainier

Thank you so much Candace for all your help!

Candace, Me and Fa'ana

I love these girls!

Another big event in August, was taking 8 high schoolers on a 20 mile backpacking trip. It was an adventure, many of them had no idea what to expect, and one we (Pat, Micah and I) had to talk into going. He complained about it the whole ride up, but ended up being the first one to finish and was really proud of himself. It was a tough 3 days but it was totally worth it, the kids were very encouraging to one another and helped keep moral up by singing Mulan songs up the mountain. I was definitely not in good shape for this one, I was in so much pain afterwords.

All of us on day one, before the pain set in

Linda and I, (our 3rd year in a row) we are missing our hiking buddy Keliah.



End of day one we were so happy to finally set up camp and be done hiking for the day.

Copper City, an old ghost town we stopped to check out along the way

Day two, swimming in the lake

The last day, we finally made it to the summit.

We were told many times that we had made it to the highest point, just to come around another bend to find

another trail ascending upwards. 

 We also did a family outing to the Circus, it was a blast. I hadn't been to the circus since I was little. There were so many great acts but my favorite were the little miniature donkeys, they were so cute.

Kenny, my nephew, sporting his circus hat.

August ended with the YES Foundation of White Center's

10 year Anniversary Luau.

Tammy and I giving our speeches

Got some beautiful flowers and words from Pat, since I was leaving. A very nice surprise.