Food Fest!

Hannah before we left for FOOD FEST!
Every semester they do a fundraiser for the clubs called food fest! It was fantastic! My club (dive club) did clean up rather than a food booth.

She's 5'7" and was wearing heels.


She thought it was funny that I matched her car.
Spicy curry dishes from Thai club. She had papaya salad.
I had green curry chicken!
Bubble drink from the Taiwan club.
Meat pie from the Mongolian club.

Acai blend from the triathlon club. It was much needed after the spicy curry dishes!


Mochi from the Japanese club.
And a Chinese dragon! The Chinese students also walked behind it waving scarves.



Hannah and Jarett
Some of the ethnic clubs wore the native dress like the Japanese club...
And the Mongolian club.
It was so much fun! They had big inflatable things for the kids to play on and live entertainment. We also had lumpia and turon from the Filipino club, crepes from the Tahitian club, baked goods from the swing dance club, malasadas from the Hawaiian club, kimchi from the Korean club, and springrolls from the Vietnam club. There was also awesome food from the Samoan club, African club, Hong Kong club, Indian club, student council, dental club, and the American sign language club. And a lot that I can't remember. We ate too much, but it was all for charity right?

Birthday Photos

So here are some birthday pictures.It's scary to me how much I look like mom in this picture. Not that mom is scary, just the resemblance.
On the 5th, Ryan bought me a birthday plumeria lei and we borrowed the neighbor's car and drove to Haliewa.
We waited outside the Thai restaurant for a half hour for a table.
It was actually a rather chilly night.
Yes I'm a nerd. The encyclopedia of birds was a welcome surprise. For those of you who don't know, I've started bird watching and have been invited to volunteer in the aviary at the Honolulu Zoo.
Since it was my birthday the waitress brought me some delicous chocolates.
On Sunday, the 7th, we invited our neighbors Hannah and Jarett over for cake and ice cream.



They got me go fish cards, an inflatable whale, and an under water camera.
I made the best heath bar cake ever! It was so good!

Happy Birthday to me!

Fun with Sister Jones!

Some of you have met Sister Jones, our friend from Georgia. In fact, she asked about Shiloh and Cami and how they were doing. Well she and her husband have just moved to Oahu. She asked Ryan and I if we wanted to spend a day with her. Her husband had to go back to the mainland for a week and she was really wanting company. So Monday Feb. 1st, was our day with Sister Jones.
First we went to Haliewa Joe's for lunch. I had some delicious marlin tacos.
Then we went to some lagoons by her house to go snorkeling. She lives on the other side of the island.
There was so much to see! We're getting better at identifying species, although there are still a lot we don't recognize or know. We saw convict tangs, different varieties of wrasses, needlefish, unicorn fish, parrot fish, butterfly fish, some eels, trigger fish (humuhumunukunukuapua'a), and we swam along side some sea turtles (honu)!
The water was very clear and calm.
That dot on Ryan's finger is actually a tiny crab.
Sister Jones doesn't like the water, but she loves the sand.
She likes pools, but not the ocean because she doesn't enjoy swimming with other creatures. We tried to convince her she was missing out.
Since she lives so close to the Marriott, we walked over there to see their man-made lagoons that housed bonnetheads and stingrays.

This one was about 3 1/2 to 4 feet. Five feet is about the max length for a bonnethead shark.
He was the biggest one as you can see by the little guy up in the right hand corner of the picture.
The starfish were pretty! They reminded me of the one Cody and Hillary found in Puerto Rico.
Then we stopped at the stingray lagoon.
I liked this guy's markings.
Hillary, aren't you glad you didn't step on this guy?
He was a rather large specimen.
I liked his eyes.
Then we watched the sunset. We get sunrises in Laie, so this was actually the first sunset we saw since we moved here.
Just another day in paradise.

PS- Brother and Sister Jones have a spare bedroom and bathroom and have opened an invitation to all who want to visit. Since all their kids are grown, they welcome company and were excited to hear that Cali and Travis and Gideon were considering an Easter visit and that mom and dad had mentioned one around Thanksgiving. They have a pool, a kiddie pool with an artificial beach, a hot tub, and beach access. Plus there's a divine bakery just down the street from their house where one can get hot malasadas.