Halloween Weekend

This weekend started out with Tanya deciding she wanted her hair chopped and colored dark, so she had our friend Natalie do it. She's an awesome hairstylist. Isn't it hot?

On Saturday morning I ran my first half marathon. It was at Gunstock Ranch which is right by Laie. It was a crazy course. The whole thing was a trail run with steep hills, through forests and jungle areas, and pastures. There was even one point where a bunch of us got to a river and wondered where the trail went - then we saw the colored flags on the other side. We had to cross the knee-deep waters (twice) and ended up slipping through the mud after. I had a lot of fun though and will possibly train for a full marathon within the next year (Maybe the St. George?)

Tannie was nice enough to cheer me on and make me this sign

Yesterday afternoon we went to a new beach that was really cool with our friends Mark and Natalie. It was nice and secluded. Best Halloween ever?

Mark taught me how to spearfish, but the conditions were not ideal, so we didn't catch anything

Last night we went to our ward's Halloween party. It was good old family fun with everyone and their babies! Haha. And musical chairs . . . it happened - and it got really intense.
We dressed up as tourists - sadly, we already had a lot of the items that we wore

And ate so many sweets that our heads almost exploded. Tanya made the white ghost cookies

Halloween was more fun here than we thought it would be. People get really into it and don't have to ruin their costumes with coats and sweatshirts!

Temple

This past weekend they finally re-opened the Laie Temple for an open house after almost 2 years of being closed for major renovations. The last time we went in it was the day we got married, and it closed a couple of weeks later. It is open to the public for the next month and then the prophet will come here and rededicate it the weekend before Thanksgiving. We are excited to be able to go again!

Today we had tickets for the open house. They started by showing a movie in these tents about temples and about the history of the church in Laie.

Then we got to go and take a tour of it. It is SO NICE inside. They redid everything - Carpeting, walls, chandaliers, furniture, setup, the font, etc. They re-did the outside as well. Now the entrance is more open (it used to be a room that looked straight out of the 70's (see wedding picture below) and they also have Gold accents all around the outside.

Then we walked around the grounds and ended up at the visitors' center, which we had never been to.

Pat Your Weaves Ladies

For her program here at BYUH, Tanya had to take a Hawaiian Studies class. The one that fit into her schedule was Hawaiian Basket Weaving. Today her homework was to turn this

Into this

So yeah . . . I'm pretty sure she's going to pass this class with flying colors.

On a totally unrelated note . . . we are really getting into collecting bottles that wash up on the beach by our house. They are all different sizes and shapes - some of them even have Japanese writing or crazy symbols. We plan on keeping the very best ones for life and filling them with sand from every beach we travel to throughout the world.

Amigos!

This past week our BFFs Curtis, Ashley, and Gentry flew in from Utah for Fall break and spent the week with us in our little bungalow. We both met Gentry here three years ago when we were all visiting students at BYUH, and she loves Hawaii just as much as we do. Curtis had never been to Oahu and Ash had never been to Hawaii at all, so it was fun to experience it with them.

The first night we went walking on the beach and ended up digging up a big black crab!

The next morning we went walking on bikini beach right by our house to collect bottles (our new thing) and ended up at this world war II bunker on the beach.

Then we headed north to Haleiwa for some shave ice at Matsumotos

And to Waimea for some beach and cliff jumping!

Then to Sunset Beach to watch the sun set.

The next morning (well, 3:00 AM) we woke up and started hiking Stairway to Heaven. This hike is amazing and such a rush. It is illegal to climb but people do it anyway. It's all stairs (basically scaffolding) that was built up sheer cliffs to a world war II satellite on the top of a mountain.

We made it to the top in time to watch the sun rise over Kaneohe Bay

That night Ashley made a pumpkin cake and we celebrated Gentry's 25th Birthday

And the junk food never stopped the whole week
(as well as playing Settlers of Catan every night and having pumpkin cookies 3 different times)

This is how it should always be

We went to the Japanese temple

And hiked to the Makapu'u lighthouse. The hike was hot, but we will be going back in a few months to whale watch because it has amazing ocean views and you can see Moloka'i from here.

We went to Sandy Beach Park to get rocked in the waves and I recreated an infamous picture from June 2007

Tried (and failed) to take jumping pictures

Our most recent purchase is these beach chairs that, if you want to look like a dork, can be worn as a backpack. They make the beach a breeze though and we love them. They even have a cooler on the back and a drink holder on the handle. I'm sure that drink holder will see its share of Diet Coke over the next few months.

We sat on the grassy knoll at Hukulau beach and each read separate installments of The Hunger Games series

And did another illegal hike to Sacred Falls near Hau'ula

We took them to all our favorite haunts, like Kahuku Grill and Ted's Bakery

We also went snorkeling at Shark's Cove, where Curtis and I ran into this friendly sea turtle

They all just went home and our house feels empty without them.
Thanks for coming guys!

Some Assembly Required

I am not handy, no not in the least. My dad can fix anything and everything and so I never had to. This is a huge disadvantage now that I live an ocean away from him.

My parents gave us some money for a housewarming gift (a grill) when we moved. After two months of searching, we finally found the perfect gas grill. The problem is that some assembly was required. I thought it would be good practice for me, but when I opened the box and I saw all these parts, I panicked.

But it all worked out! We broke it in when we had the sister missionaries over for lunch and fed them hamburgers. This will be a lot easier than heating up charcoal every time we want to BBQ for dinner, and it's the perfect size.

Also, FYI, we're EXTREMELY excited because the following crazy kooks will be joining us on 'da islands in approximately 1 week! Aloha snitches!