Home Is a Special Place to Me...

"... In the middle of the sea..." (I love that song) lol  Well we FINALLY made it to Hawaii on Thursday night! Here's a little bit of what's been going on... We flew to San Francisco on Thursday morning, the flight was suppose to leave at 835am but was delayed till 1040am, we got to SFO and just stayed at the airport for about 5-6 hours before our flight left. The flight was WIDE open, for real! There were like 64 people on standby and everyone made the flight, that's how open it was, and I think there were a few seats open even after clearing everyone.  We landed in Hawaii about 745pm and my mom was waiting for us.  When she pulled up Ila first said "Mom you lie!"  I never told Ila that we were coming down, and neither did my mom.  So when they came to the airport my mom told her that they were picking up her cousin and that they had kids that Ila needed to babysit. So when they pulled up Ila jumped out and grabbed Kesaia right away.  Oh and for another added surprise my mom brought us, well actually she said she brought it for Fehi, it was a garlic chicken plate and kalbi plate from Papa Ole's.  Lol. My mom knows my husband too well, those are his top two plates he always (more like 'only') gets from Papa Ole's.

The next day, Friday, was homecoming for Kahuku.  So in preparation for it we went to the little kahuku.org store to get shirts.  We got a little white dress for Kesaia that had a hoodie on it (picture below):

And for baby Moe we got him a black shirt:

And then I stuck to the old fashion Kahuku Football shirt (it was a white one) And my husband, well I didn't fully convert him to getting a shirt, but he did buy a hat, and didn't wear it.. what a monkey lol.  The game wasn't as exciting as it was my year (woo!woo! lol) but it was sooo good to be back home for a game. It was packed as usual, and it was loud, and there was yummmyyyyy food! Tita's grill was there selling their yum beef stew (and some other items... chicken, etc)  Aunty Darryl Whitford and her daughter was selling Laulau plates (with chicken long rice, laulau, rice, and lomi lomi salmon).  It was sooo nice to have hawaiian food! I love hawaiian food, probably more than tongan food!

The homecoming game was an alright game, they won at least, but there were too many close calls. But the company and actually seeing everyone and how they still have such pride for the team no matter what age you are, that's what I loved seeing.  Oh how I miss Kahuku! My husband and I have discussed many times about moving to Hawaii, he loves it here, and of course I do.  The only thing that stops us from making that move, is the fact that we may not be able to have a house of our home here, unless we inherit one from someone or we become rich and can buy one.  I told him if there was ever a day that we had enough money and bought a house here, that's the day we will move back to Hawaii.  I love the prices Utah has, and how it's realistic to get a house of your own there, but nothing will ever compare to the experience of growing up in Kahuku.  Or at least that's what I think.

Anyhow, after the game on Friday we made a 7's run, anyone from Hawaii knows what we mean by that.  So far our vacay has been fun, and we've been eating non-stop (as always).  I just love being home, when I'm here I feel relaxed, it's such a different feeling, and you really don't notice it until you move away and find yourself wanting to come back. I looove Hawaii (Kahuku in particular!) :)

Toes in the Sand...

That's exactly what I should be doing right now, digging my toes in the sand! Instead I'm sitting at home at 11pm at night getting prepared to sleep and wake up early in the morning to try the flight to Frisco.  We tried the direct flight today and it SUCKED big time! There were only like literally probably 5 seats open.  My good friend and her husband got on because they had S1 priority (for emergency travel) due to his brother passing away.  We were super late in getting to the gate, as in, we sat down and 5 minutes later they said the flight checked in full. So that was pretty depressing, though I already knew the flight wasn't that good.  They had mentioned that the flight to SEA was wide open, and there were 11 seats from SEA to HNL.  Now that number didn't seem high enough to me to even attempt.  My husband said we should try, and at first something (probably the spirit) kept saying to just go, but I doubted, and said it wasn't good enough to go just cause I didn't want to get stuck and from San Francisco for Thursday looked really good.  So we didn't go to Seattle.  Then I checked the flight again and everyone (which wasn't alot) got cleared, with 9 seats left! Ugh! Talk about I told you so! lol. I should've just listened to my husband and that prompting, but I didn't, and now I'll be in Hawaii (hopefully) 24 hours later than if we went to Seattle.  Don't you hate that? lol.  Me and standby aren't friends just yet cause it hasn't worked for me the way I want it to, but hey it's ok.  So we are going on the 830am flight to San Francisco, and if we make that, we'll chill at the airport till 5:30pm when the flight to HNL departs.

I'm excited for a number of reasons, one being that it's homecoming.  Talk about a good weekend to go back, or at least I think so.  It'll be nice to go to a Kahuku Football game! I haven't been to one in years! Me and Fehi might check out the new remodeled Gateway restaurant they opened up at PCC, I actually may want to do something different, you know, make use of free babysitters while we go on a date.  We'll still plan to stay till Monday night, but I told Fehi if there was only one seat then he can go cause he has to work, but I have 3 more days to get back. lol.  He thinks I had this all planned out, but I didn't, I promise. I was just saying, ya know, just in case! lol.  I'm excited though, so please flights don't fail me, I need to get back to Hawaii and see more brown than haole people! lol.

Wish us luck, and I'll keep ya posted!  :)

Hawaii bound!

I'm so excited to FINALLY use my benefits to go back to Hawaii this Wednesday! I'm so grateful for my leads for giving me time off also, so we'll be going on Wednesday and probably stay until Monday (as long as flights look good).  We haven't been back to Hawaii since May (right before I started working at Delta).  So it'll be awesome to have some time to go back, eat, and relax!  Anyhow, this was my first full week at Delta as a Ready Reserve Agent, and it was sooo nice.  It's like as soon as I get to work, it's finish! so yayyy for days like that! I'll be going to gate training in about 2 weeks, so good thing I get at least one trip in before I go into training again.  Oh, and did I mention I finally got my uniform last week. Hallelujah! Because trying to "substitute" with my own white shirt and black pants was not happening, that just screams "seasonal" to everyone, so it's nice to LOOK part of the team. lol.

Last week Thursday was my birthday, the big 2-5!  Fehi surprised me on the morning of my birthday with a dozen yellow roses (he always get's me roses for an occassion.. birthday, anniversary, apology ;) lol ) and he also brought us back some breakfast and a brownie icecream cake, which were both yummy as well.  He asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday, and I just said "I don't know." It's funny because usually I already have plans for my birthday, and it normally consists of a mani and pedi, shopping, and dinner.  But this year I didn't have much plans except that I wanted to paint our room.  Since moving into our own place, all we've been doing most times with our days off is painting or fixing up the house.  So far our greatest project was our Laundry Room.  Anyhow, so the night before my birthday I stayed up and painted our room.  It was a dark brown color, so I really didn't like how it looked, and on top of that when I don't like how our room looks, well it doesn't translate well into wanting to stay there or keep it clean.  So that was my project I wanted to finish.  I never took a before picture, but this is a picture of part of our room.

It's brown, and the doors and trimming were some peachy color

 And here's the after picture after I painted the walls and the trimmings...

I forget what the color is called, but it's  a nice cool color, a a soft greenish blue.. more on the green side I think lol

Here's one with the bed in place and fixed, I also replaced the blinds with these nicer wood ones.

So after painting the room, I told Fehi that I wanted to just go a look for a nice bed set, a nice cream colored one.  Our bed set we have now (in the picture) is ok, but I don't think it matches the wall color too much.  Anyhow, we went and looked at Ross, nothing there, at Bed, Bath, and Beyond we found one but for $180, that was just wayyyy out of our budget lol.  Went to walmart, and sears and NOTHING.  So therefore I'm stuck using our bed set, (for now) ;) lol.  Anywayz, since looking for a new bedset wasn't going well, we ended up going to TGIF and getting some dinner.  We had the jack daniel's sampler and potato skins for an appetizer (yummmy!)  The sampler has crispy cajun shrimp, asian inspired sesame jack-chicken strips, and baby back pork ribs. (Pictured below)

Then I ordered the petite steak and salmon with mash potatoes and broccoli. My birthday dinner was awesome. I was soo full that I had no room for dessert, so we just went home and relaxed.  So birthday was awesome, I wouldn't have changed anything about that day.  Anyhow, I'll be off from work for a little over a week, so it's time to get this house cleaned so that when we leave to Hawaii and come back, the house will be spotless and I won't have to clean a thing! lol

Until next time! :)

Less Work Hours = More Family Time! :)

Friday was my official last day of training for Delta Ticket-Counter, and I can't tell you how excited this makes me feel.  I actually loved training, our trainers were the bomb, and they bought us Cafe Rio one day, and then on Friday we got Starbucks (Double Chocolatey Chip is a must) and Chocolate Doughnuts.  So obviously, diet was not part of my plan that morning. lol.  We also bidded for our new shifts to start October 3rd and run for 6 months.  If you don't know, when you work for Delta you bid a new shift every 6 months, and it goes by Seniority.  So this bid, I was #97 of 98 Ready Reserves. lol. Talk about ONLY having 2 choices, then again it's better than having no choice at all (sorry #98).  So I was just hoping that there would be a shift that Fehi and I could work with between our schedules.

So Friday morning, we reviewed a little bit in training for our test, then they basically gave us a 3 hour break to do our bids and get lunch in.  I thought for sure that all the shifts at the gates would be taken, and I'd have a choice between the 430am or 6pm shift at the ticket counter.  Surprisingly, by the time I came there were no ticket counter slots left, and only positions at the gate working at either 730am or 6pm.  Originally, I wanted to work at 6-10pm but after discussing it with Fehi I opted for the 730am.  The only problem was there were only 4 morning shifts left, and there were 5 people ahead of me.  So I sat there just hoping there was one shift left for me.  The first 3 people took morning shifts, so there was only one left with two people ahead of me.  Luckily those two took pm shifts, and I got my morning shift I wanted.  This will be something completely new, only because we were in training for "ticket counter", and I'll only get to practice that for about 2 weeks before we'll get trained for the gates.  But all in all,  I don't mind.  I prayed that morning that whatever happens I would get a shift that would be good between Fehi and I, and that's exactly what happened.  So I'm very grateful, I know the Lord was mindful of me in that moment.

After lunch I took my test in about 30-45 minutes, and then they let us go.  So it was big relief once I got to go home because that was my last 8 hour shift (well, until gate training that is).  So this weekend has been a nice, lazy, relaxing one for us.  Yesterday morning we went with the kids to our jog/walk class.  And then we went to Kiwi Bakery in Magna for their meat pies (which were DELICIOUS, especially since we got a couple fresh out of the oven) and we also got some cream puffs (which were delicious too).  We spent a good hour or so with the kids at the park down the road from us, which we just deemed as our new favorite park.  We've already planned that we should have a party there, they have a big pavilion, with the playground next to it, and nice sized field, a trail to walk around, and a fishing pond next to it.  Not to mention, there was a little area where you can wash your dishes, it was seriously a really REALLY nice park, oh and they also had a gated area just for dogs.  The kids had so much fun, and it was just nice to get out with the family, and spend some quality time.

Monday I'll start my RR shift from 12-4pm, and I'm sure that's gonna fly by for me, and then I'll be off for 3 days.  I'm hoping that we'll be able to take a trip one of these days, places to visit on my list are:

1. Hawaii (of course, gotta go get some grindz!)
2. New York (I want to visit ground zero)
3. Indiana (Visit Fehi's mission)
4. Paris (Just to say I've been there.. and cause I can)

And that's about all I have on my list right now.. but trust, I will be making good use of these benefits! :)

Here's some updates about our family:

Baby Moe:
- He's really active, he likes to run and play A LOT!
- He loves to eat, but on his own schedule which is late at night, or just random periods of the day.
- He still talks his cute little toddler talk, but he knows exactly what he wants to say at each moment.
- His hair is STILL long, yes we still haven't cut it yet.

Princess Kesaia:
- She's a smart little girl, she understands what you say to her, and responds the correct way too.
- She loves her brother, and likes to mimic what he does, even the attitude too sometimes lol
- She loves to eat on her own schedule too, but isn't as picky as her brother.
- She likes to repeat her ABC's but her sequence is "A, B, O" and then stops.  She likes to say "O" lol

Fehi & I are doing great also, everyday our love grows stronger, and everyday we're grateful for having our own house.  We have such great team work, being able to work amongst our schedules so that one of us is always with our kids.  We are excited that I get to be home more often and we can finish up little projects around the house, and also spend more mommy time with the kids and family.

We are indeed grateful for all we have. :)