Hawaii (Part 3)

Greyson, making his offering to the sea

  The last two days of our trip we tried to soak in as much time with Kyle, Jade, and the girls as we could.  We hit all of our favorite beaches again, went to this AMAZING gelato place a second time, and took lots and lots of pictures.

Tayler and Ryenn were little beach babes after having lived here for over a month.  You couldn't pull those girls out of the water.  It didn't matter how many times a wave would knock them face down into the sand, they trusted that we would be pulling them up by their life jacket 2 seconds later.

No trip would have been complete without burying someone in the sand. 

 Somehow that person is always Chase.  He is such a kid at heart and I love it.

 The time difference between Hawaii and Kansas was 4 hours so each morning we would be up quite early.  It was awesome for a vacation though because we felt like we were sleeping in until eleven but it would only be 7:00am!  We would get out the door pretty early each morning and usually by 9:00 pm we were all dozing off in each other's company.  That is either a sign that we are getting old or that we played really hard!

Greyson wasn't quite walking on this trip and for that I was grateful.  It helped to only have one mobile child on the beach.  He didn't mind the sand one bit though. 

In fact, anytime he thought he needed a snack he would just eat a handful.

 Greyson and Beck's favorite thing to do was throw rocks into the ocean and they did it the entire time we were at the beach.  It took constant vigilance to make sure Tayler and Ryenn weren't in the rock's flight path.  Somehow we made it through the week without anyone getting hit in the face!

Beck and Ryenn are only six months apart.  They were just adorable together.  

Aren't Ryenn's little curls just to die for?!

On our last day we went to the cute little downtown Kona area for brunch

We also went to the beach for some last chance boogie boarding but it was windy and overcast so we didn't last long.  Just before leaving we went to our favorite gelato place one more time-
half macadamia nut and half coconut, yes please.
Then on to a super awesome playground to tire the kids out before our redeye flight home. 

You can see on Beck's face that he completely adores his cousins.  

He talked for WEEKS about going back to Hawaii to see Ryenn and Tayler.  

This trip will honestly be one of my favorite memories of all time.  We loved getting to spend time with the Enzlers, and they couldn't have done a better job of making us feel at home and giving us the trip of a lifetime. I couldn't help but cry as we drove away with those two cute little girls waving to us from behind.  The trip came to an end too soon and I knew it would be way too long before we got to see them again.

It turns out that we had impeccable timing for this trip.  The day after Chase left for Hawaii, Kansas City got a HUGE snow storm.  Schools and businesses were cancelled for  two days.  

Then, the day before we got home, another huge storm hit and everything got shut down again.  

Chase didn't have to feel guilty about missing so much work because he wouldn't have been able to work anyway.  

Last year by February, Spring was in full bloom in Kansas and we had warmish temperatures.  I was not excited to come back to this much winter after being in the tropics.

The snowman pictured below was 15 ft!