America's Best Dance Crew!!

Does everyone remember last year when all the TV writers went on strike? Yeah, it wasn't fun...repeats all the time and just sadness for TV freaks like me. I needed to find something to appease myself during that sad, sad time, and what did I happen upon? America's Best Dance Crew. Yes, I know its on MTV. I can rarely sit through anything on MTV these days, but ABDC is different. I was completely sucked in! It is great stuff...dance "crews" from around the country compete against one another to be the last one standing and win like 100 grand or something. Its great stuff. Maybe its the Filipino in me or something, but I eat this crap up!!

First season winner was the Jabbawockeez...

Asian Persuasion, baby!

Then the second season, Super CR3W came along...

You'll notice more of the Asian Persuasion up in there!

This season I'm pulling for Quest...

Asians can dance, yo! Apparently some of these guys were on So You Think You Can Dance. I don't know, don't watch it, but these fools are good!

Go watch it!

Storm Of The Century? Not Really.

So the other day I'm chilling with the kids "at the pavillion" here on the compound when I'm informed of another impending winter storm here on Kauai. I admit, a storm here on Kauai is nothing compared to what's gone on in the rest of the country, but a storm is a storm and this one was predicted to be pretty large. Lots of rain & wind with gusts up to 60 mph. As a Hurricane Iniki "survivor" hearing 60 mph winds makes you stop in your tracks. Hurricanes are classified hurricanes when gusts reach 75 mph, so we weren't going to be too far off. The storm was scheduled to arrive early this morning.

Therefore, we spent yesterday afternoon prepping for these high winds...especially after we found out school was being cancelled here as well as on Oahu, Maui and Molokai. Then Wes got the call that HE didn't have to go to work either. Hmm....starting to look even worse than we thought. Nothing to do but sit and wait for the wind and rain to arrive...

And wait....and wait...and...you guessed it...WAIT.

Its now 3:11 pm and although its been raining on and off, its just been your typical rainy day weather. I suppose I should be thankful that it wasn't as bad as expected, but I can see a whole lot of heat coming down on the governor for this one. Cancelling school, giving all the state workers admin leave for the day. Oooo wee! :/

Party Like Its 2009!

Remeber when it was 1999 and everyone was worried that the world would end when 2000 rolled around? All the preparation, food saving, computer backing up, etc...for NOTHING! Midnight hit and the clock kept ticking. Has it really been that long since that happened? Geez, talk about time flying. (Side note: does anyone else realize that they don't play Prince's 1999 on the radio anymore? What's up with that? Just because it isn't relevant anymore? That's one of my favorite Prince songs! Someone needs to bring that one back!)

Anyway, sorry for the lack of Christmas posting. Hard to believe that the "holidays" have now come and gone. All that anticipation and build up and back down again. Kaytin asked me the other day, what happened to the tree, mom? I mistakenly took the tree down during a nap and apparently a three year old mind is bewildered with the idea that it could just be gone. Poor kid. Left the lights up outside for her, though, and that's been satisfaction enough. We had a fun fun fun Christmas...its great how with each year that passes Kaytin loves it more and more. So neat to see her eyes light up at all the lights and excitement. I think she even got the idea this year that we celebrate Christmas because its when Jesus was born. Very cute. (My apologies for the lack of Christmas day pics, but with Kelli here she's become my camera person and all the pics are on her camera!)

It was fun to see Kaytin not afraid of Santa anymore! He called her name on his Christmas Eve visit at the Burkman's and she jumped right up on his lap. Not to mention the fact that he also gave her one of her favorite presents...a princess tea set!! (Where does she get this girly-girlness from? Not me. Does that mean it comes from Wes? Just kidding.) Notice her Christmas dress, as well...want to know why she loved it so much? Because when she twirled it would flare out like a "princess dress." Egad. Who would have ever thought that my daughter would be a lover of all things princess-y? I've come to terms with it as long as when she's out there running around with the boys she doesn't cry everytime she falls down. :)

Then there's Caleb who seems to be morphing before my very eyes. I swear the kid just keeps getting bigger and bigger! He's five and a half months old now and has completely mastered turning himself from his tummy to his back, so we are constantly finding him like this....

He likes to sleep on his tummy (shhh...don't tell), but now that he can manuever himself onto his back will often wake himself up by landing on his back during a nap. Aiyah! Regardless, we still find him pretty cute and so does Kaytin (whose opinion is probably most important lest she try to get rid of him in one way or another). ;)

Anywho, we were quite blessed by a wonderful 2008 and are greatly anticipating an even better 2009. Hoping you and yours are just as excited for a new year!

Monday Funny

A friend of mine shared this video and I cracked up! Maybe because I knew some girls like this growing up in L.A....but seriously, watch it and please someone else find this as amusing as I did. :)

Bon Qui Qui at King Burger...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZkdcYlOn5M

Why Do They Have To Grow Up?

How cute is this picture? Seriously? I wish I could just freeze this moment in time when my kids genuinely like each other and aren't old enough to fight yet. I really, really, really love these guys.

Frosted Window Panes...

I know, I know...my posts are becoming few and far between, but my excuse is that its the holidays and I barely have time to do my laundry let alone blog. :) I'm trying.

So the frosted window panes are NOT here in Hawaii, but they are in Las Vegas! How crazy is that? My parents had flown out this past Sunday to go to my sister's graduation (she just completed her Master's in Health Promotion at UNLV...congrats Kelli!) and on Monday my mom calls me and says, guess what? Um...what? Its snowing! Now I know that its quite uncommon for snow to fall in Vegas, but I do know that it HAS happened once before since Kelli's been there. Still, fairly exciting...didn't have the heart to tell Kaytin since she's been talking about playing in the snow for who knows how long!! A few days pass and then Kelli texts me on Wednesday (my parents were scheduled to fly back early early Thursday) that its snowing again! Apparently it was the start of Blizzard 2008 in Vegas. I kid. Seriously, though, people who live in the desert are pretty much NOT prepared to drive or survive in snow! The airport started talking about shutting down, school was cancelled, people were advised to stay off the roads. Ca-ray-zay. For real. Not to worry, my parents made it back to Hawaii in one piece after only a 30 minute delay. phew.

On the home front, we actually got our Christmas card out on time this year! Woo hoo! As opposed to last year when, sick as a dog, I didn't even want to think about them. I ordered cards that said "Merry Christmas" on them on Dec. 27th..no joke. hahaha...at least we sent them out, right? I'm sure all of you with kids and/or animals know that it was no easy feat to get a good picture with everyone looking in the right place and smiling...all I can say is thank God for dog treats and candy! :)

We're well on our way to Christmas insanity here. Kaytin is asking...daily...if she can open her presents. Um, no, not yet. Kelli & Eric arrive on Sunday and I've been telling Kaytin that she can't open her gifts until after Aunty Kelli & Uncle Eric get here. I'm sure she'll be mighty bummed when she finds out that it will still be a few more days after they arrive and then she can open them. I guess all that calendar work that I attempted to do with her hasn't really taken yet.

If I don't get around to posting again before Christmas, wishing you and yours a very merry one!

No Turkey For You

We've returned from our annual Thanksgiving trip to Oahu unscathed! It was a fun filled week and although a bit crowded, it was just what my in-laws wanted...pure, unadulterated family togetherness. heheh...

Wes (the lucky dog) left a day early with his dad to go watch the UH football game, so my adventure started on Sunday when I had the privilege of flying with TWO children. (OK, so I wasn't totally alone...my mother-in-law flew with me) Kaytin is quite the seasoned traveller and has never had a difficult flight...no ear problems or anything of that sort...and I had been hoping for more of the same from Caleb. Unfortunately, no deal. He fussed a bit and was pretty uncomfortable for the whole flight. Good thing it was only 20 minutes! ;) Thankfully, on the way home he fell asleep nursing and we arrived back home unscathed.

Kaytin absolutely loved waking up to built in playmates via her cousins. They watched HSM and danced and sang their little hearts out. I'd say her favorite part of the weekend was probably when Grandma Ruthie took her and cousin Anna to Claire's and let them spend $5.00 each. All of you who are familiar with Claire's Boutique (the ultimate girly girl store of trinkets that I really don't need around my house) know that five bucks is like a million bucks with their dollar bins and what not. OMG. I think they spent like a half-hour in that teeny tiny store only to emerge with *gasp!* pink purses and wallets and all things girl. Katy was SO sad on Sunday when the Burkman's flew back to Kauai early in the morning while we didn't leave until later in the afternoon. We think she even fabricated a story about her neck being sore so that she could cover up the crying that ensued. Crazy.

We, of course, hit the Honolulu Zoo again this year! Luckily there was no animal porn going on like our experience last year. phew. Apparently the tiger had some cubs which were pretty cute to look at. They weren't out and about yet, but if you strained your neck and stared through the bars of the enclosure, you could see them. hahah...there was one particularly loud one that made sure everyone knew that there were cubs in there even if you couldn't see them.

My father-in-law, tradition bucker/not a turkey lover extraordinaire, decided that our family should go against the grain for Thanksgiving dinner this year, so instead of following suit with most likely every other family in America and having turkey, we had steak and crab legs. No complaints there! Tyler, Wes's brother, who has friends in all places, made a delicious marinade for the steak and a yummy "broth" to cook the crab legs in. To keep with some tradition, we had mashed potatoes and a sweet potato dish to accompany the dinner...then bucking tradition again, I made cherry pie for dessert. :) We also got to meet the newest Ishimura cousin, Carly Mei, that was recently adopted from China that evening.

My shopping adventures with sis-in-law Shannon were curbed this year (tear) since I had to have a baby boy in tow wherever I went. (oh the woes of a nursing mama) We attempted to go Black Friday shopping...as a family...and I'll give you one guess as to how much I actually got done. It sort of just isn't the same with a husband following you around, a daughter complaining about sore feet and a son strapped to your body. Not to mention the fact that it was irritating me that there were so many people at Ala Moana breathing on me and cracking poor Katy in the head with their bags. Ugh.

The UH game was fun...Caleb's first...and he did great sitting up in the nosebleed section of Aloha Stadium. The first time I tried to sit up there I was pregnant with Katy and promptly got dizzy and nauseous. This time around it went well...not to mention protected us from the consistent drizzle that fell the entire night. It might not have been the prettiest played game against Washington State, but a win is a win is a win, right? Here's what Caleb thinks...

All in all, it was a fun weekend. We have much to be thankful for this year...hope you all enjoyed the same.