Traditions, a Farting Dog, and Champagne

December 7th - 2015      Do you want to build a snowman?  

     We did :)  There are definately aspects of winter that we have missed living in "paradise".  We weren't sure if it would really feel like Christmas without the cold and snow.  We will miss the Live Nativity in Lethbridge, and Home Town Christmas in Magrath.  We will miss putting up our awesome outdoor Christmas lights, and our "3 day decorating the house" party.  We will miss snuggling up by the fire, in fleece PJ's, with a mug of hot chocolate.
     This Christmas has been scaled back drastically in the gift department.  I've been wanting to do less every year, and now that we are forced to...it's happening.  Every kids gets 5 gifts (parents, grandparents, sibling, extended family, and Santa).  I kept the post office mail-outs to a bare minimum.  No christmas photos/cards except on-line.  We shopped black friday to get all gifts at 50% off.  Wow!  Surprise and shock over how extreme our Christmas expense bill dropped.
     And not only that, the kids are in no afterschool activities, so we can plan family traditions to do together every night.  So we decided to celebrate the 25 days of Christmas.  Every day, we share a scripture, sing a carol, pray, and do a christmasy activity together.
DEC 1st - constructed a paper chain to count down to Christmas (everyone gets to rip one link off daily)

DEC 2nd - Visit Santa at the mall, and finish Christmas shopping.  (Couldn't get a picture because Mrs Claus said no cell phones...and we weren't paying for their overpriced one)

DEC 3rd - We each picked out our favorite non-perishable food item at the grocery store and donated in to the food bank.

DEC 4th - Wrapped our Christmas gifts to each other and put them under the tree

DEC 5th - Attended the Pahoa Holiday Parade.  Here are our favorite floats:

I love the marching bands.  Rebekah reminisced about her days in Magrath's.

Here is our parade star - Summer walking with Pahoa Elementary and singing "Up on the Roof Top"

Alanna's Favorite

Nathan's favorite- reminds him of disneyland

Rebekah's favorite horse :)

Reindeer dog (in the wagon)...crowd pleaser

Dallin was getting confused about why there was a skeleton on top of that car

Dallin's favorite - monster truck

Rebekah's favorite circus crew-loved the stilt walkers and unicyclists

I really enjoyed seeing all the cars dressed up with palm branches- it's all about being good to the land here.

My 3rd favorite - classic hula dancers, the boys and the girls

DEC 6th - We invited some families over to play Christmas Song pictionary/sherades with us, and ice (and eat) sugar cookies.

Tonight, DEC 7th, we will be going to the library to sign out some Christmas books.  Then we will read our favorites together.

     Speaking of books, the funniest thing happened this week.  Picture this:

I was sitting on the bed watching a reality tv clip on the lap top with Summer and Alanna.  Nathan was going through the bedtime routine with Dallin.  All of the sudden, we hear Nathan shout from Dallin's room "who brought this book home from the library?!"  

   We couldn't imagine what was so horrifying about a kids library book...then he began reading it out loud!  

     "Walter the Farting Dog"

What!  We couldn't believe what we were hearing...

     Betty and Billy brought Walter home from the dog pound.  "Nobody wanted him", said Billy.  "But we love him", said Betty.  "Well, he smells awful", said their mother...

     And that's when they got the first clue,  the tell -tale bubbles in the water.  "He's probably just a little nervous", said mother, hopefully.  "His stomach must be upset."  

    But Walter's stomach wasn't upset.  Walter's stomach was fine.  He felt perfectly normal.  He just farted a lot.

    Of course we began laughing our heads off.  As Nathan continued to read and disclose Walter's tradgic story:  Walter farted in the bath, when he played with the kids, when he walked around the house, in the kitchen, the dining room and while he slept.  The kids tried to defend Walter's actions to their father, who demanded he be taken to the vet.  The veterinarian confirmed that he had rectal flatulence, and prescribed a change in diet.  The new food was unable to cure Walter.  Soon their house guests would fart, and stand near Walter, so that they could blame the episode on him.  Dad said Walter needed to find a new home.  But that night, Walter save the home from burglars by scary them away with his smell.  He was finally recognized for the true hero he was!

     Oh my...I don't remember the last time we've laughed that hard!  We were gasping for air between laughs, collasping to the ground with ab pains, tears were rolling from our eyes!  

     It was certainly an entertaining book :)  We still don't know how it got into the book bag.

     Anyways, in other household news...Rebekah tied for 1st place in the district spelling B.  Good job!  She also has been reading the Hunger Game Series (I wanted her to wait until she was older, but it is school cirriculum)...and now our back yard is filled with bulls-eyes, and hand crafted bows, arrows, and spears.  

 

Nathan is beginning to get molding up around the house (that means it's almost finished :)

Alanna and Summer constructed some homemade mosquito traps.  They used yeast to create carbon dioxide...attracts the pests, and traps them in the bottle.

Special Eats:

Banana bread with crushed, toasted Macadamia Nuts on top

LOCO MOCO:  traditional Hawaiian Cuisine
Rice with meat (usually spam or pork, we opted for steak),
a sunny side up egg, and gravy lathered all over it.
Surprisingly, it was good.

This weeks adventure:  Champagne Ponds

    These were the only directions we had to find it's where abouts..."you'll see a 4WD lava road on the right.  If you take it and a right, then left onto the lightest gray oil pan-eating road at the first confusing intersection, it heads for 1 2/10 miles to Kapoho Bay".  We can do this!  

    This looked like the road.  There were tire marks in it (though over grown), and went along telephone poles...so we headed down.   NOT THE ROAD!  After 20 agonizing minutes of driving on an uneven, rocky, narrow pathway, we determined we were not getting closer to the water.  We tried to turn around in a grove of trees, and POPPED THE TIRE on our non-4WD vehicle!  There was no cell phone service.  Nathan ripped out the driver's manual to figure out where the spare tire was located.  He changed the tire, while being eaten alive by mosquitos.  The kids cried about how we shouldn't go exploring new things for the first time with them in the car.  Another 30 mins later, we were headed back to the main road.  We went home.

     Two days later, we tried it again...this time drove a little further, and found the really lava road.  We decided to walk down it, instead of attempting to drive....good thing, because the car wouldn't have made it.

The walk was beautiful, and took us 25 minutes.  But we did reach our final destination.

Champagne Ponds

Scenery on the way to the ponds

     The water at Champagne Ponds is heated by a volcanic spring :)  It is also crystal clear!  We spent a lovely afternoon swimming and looking for sea turtles...apparantly they love this spot too.

So glad we attempted to find it again- it's my new favorite swimming spot.     

If you attempt to find this stunning place:

1- only take a 4WD vehicle down!  There is a reason for that recommendation

2- don't drive down the pathway beside the telephone poles!  wrong lava road.

GOOD LUCK :)