Hawaii Picture.

I only took a few pictures before my camera broke...here is my absolute favorite!

Hops, Island Life and Broken Cameras.

I’ve been a little absent lately but I have an excuse…I’ve been living on the beautiful island of Oahu for the past few days! E and I decided not to take our Guam trip after all since the chance of us getting a military plane departing Guam was slim. As I mentioned in a previous post, we took a “hop” which is basically the extra seating available on a number of planes transporting military members and goods. The hops are sporadic and you won’t know the schedule until a few days before (nor are you guaranteed a seat), so it’s a bit hard to plan much of anything. You just have to be flexible. Surprisingly, I found flying military air to be much more relaxing that commercial flying. We didn’t have the added stress of driving to the airport, going through crazy security or dealing with the awful looks we get from traveling with a young child. All 65 available seats were taken and more than half of them were filled with kids (…although the workers said they’d never seen that many kids at once before.)

via my instagram

From the beginning of our trip we planned to do Waikiki on a budget. Our hotel is located right in downtown Waikiki BUT because it is a military hotel we pay about 1/3 the cost of all the surrounding hotels. Our only costs are the room, food and the cab we took to get from the base to the hotel. We decided not to rent a car and have been doing most of our traveling by foot. I do wish we could do a little more exploring on the island, but honestly, with Kaiden it is just so hard. He would rather be splashing in the water so it’s just been a series of lazy days for us…I definitely can’t complain.

I’m sure everyone feels this way but I’m serious when I say the island culture is definitely for us. Hawaii has such a friendly, chill atmosphere. This is our second time here and so many of the natives have mistaken us for locals. We were pretty excited when someone asked us what part of Hawaii we are from lol. E grew up on the beach and my Filipino roots naturally make me beach prone. J Did I mention Kaiden is wayyyy tanner than me and he’s been sporting some SPF 50? I’m more Filipino than him…how does that work!?! We put Kaiden on a standup paddle board and right away he went from his belly to standing position and ran across, while on the water! He is only 16 months and already has such a good grip on surfing. I’ve never seen a little kid love water so much. He is seriously fearless. He runs right into the water and actually wants to put his face under. The few times we let him do it, he resurfaced with a huge smile on his face. Let me just say, the best part about this trip is my “I could care less” attitude. I’ve been sporting sundresses and haven’t done a thing to my hair or worn any makeup since I got here. I haven’t even taken pictures. Instead of trying to always capture the moment, I’ve learned to just be in the moment. It’s been nice.

via my instagram

My camera is officially broken by the way. The one night I did bring it out, I set it in the middle of our hotel desk when we got back into the room. Kaiden tugged on the strap somehow and it hit the floor. It wasn’t even that hard of a fall but it was enough to cause a piece of the inside to stay in a position it shouldn’t. I honestly thought I would feel some sort of emotion. E expected me to be upset at Kaiden but I knew it was my fault for not putting it in my bag right away. I really think my reaction to the situation was so calm because of what I’ve been learning from the By His Wounds bible study I’m going through. It’s been talking about having an eternal perspective and using Ephesians to show us the gift we have in our Salvation and how temporal our right now is. When I realized my camera didn’t work I just thought, “It’s my fault. It’s just a material thing. Stuff happens. God provided the camera and He will provide a way to fix it.” Ask anyone that knows me well enough -- that would normally never be my reaction! The Dianne I know would probably get upset at Kaiden and cry over the situation. This study has been such an eye opener and although everyday has me feeling even more humbled (which isn’t easy for me) I’m so encouraged by the deeper understanding of grace I have each day.

via my instagram

Well, I should get back to relaxing. The moment we get home we will have to tackle a laundry list of preparations for moving to Germany. It looks like we will be officially leaving California mid-June. I will be traveling back and forth between Florida, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania in the summer and then off to Germany by November. I leave you with this quote, “Wherever you are, be fully there.”

via my instagram

Our Trip to Disney World

My parents decided to take our entire family to DisneyWorld this Christmas. It was definitely an exhausting trip. Now that Kaiden is walking, we weren't sure how Kaiden would do on the long flights. So, in preparation for the trip, we loaded Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episodes on E's phone and  packed Kaiden's diaper bag full of crackers and puffs. He slept during the first flight and stayed awake for the other 3.5 hour flight. Things weren't going too badly until we landed at our destination. We took the tram to our rental car facility, only to find that they wanted to charge us $450 more than the quoted price. It was back to the airport for us, where we continued to get ridiculous quotes from various car rental places. We decided to book our reservation online through Orbitz, and then proceeded to walk up to the car rental counter where we paid less than half the price they initially quoted us, and for that, I love you Orbitz! After loading up the car, we were about to drive off the lot when they told us that we were in the wrong vehicle... the one we were in was parked in the wrong spot. It was already a hassle to buckle Kaiden's carseat in so E wasn't too happy lol. We re-loaded into another car, drove up to the gate and AGAIN, we were in the wrong car. It was the same color and model, just the wrong number. Soooooo, we negotiated with the rental car people and they let us stay in it and threw in a free tank of gas. That whole ordeal took 3.5 hours until we could finally leave the Orlando airport...not to mention we still had to drive another 3 hours to my grandparent's house. When it was finally time for bed, Kaiden wouldn't sleep. He woke up every 15-30 minutes consistently until 5 am. It was a nightmare and I'm so incredibly glad it's over with now. Just thinking about it all melts my brain.

Thankfully, the rest of the trip was smooth sailing. After having lunch with my grandparents, we headed off to Clearwater (where I went to college years ago. I still can't believe I went to college there... I miss "studying" on the beach haha.) It was a relaxing evening eating seafood and doing some midnight swimming in the pool. The next morning I was off to do a photo session (check out the preview here!) After that was over we hung out at the beach for a bit and then headed off to Orlando.

You can see why they call it Clearwater, Florida

Seaworld offers free tickets to all active duty military members so we spent our evening oohing and ahhing over sharks and fish. On a side note: I can't express how grateful I am for companies that give so freely to their military members. I know they don't have to but it's rare that we get to go on a vacation, (or can afford one for that matter) so free tickets is HUGE to me.

My family met up with us the following day and that's when the real adventures begun. We went three days straight moving from park to park. It was crowded...holiday crowded and I quickly realized how much I don't like lots of people all at once. Despite the shoulder to shoulder walkways, I loved spending time with my family. It pains me to know how much I'm missing out with my brothers and sisters and how much they are missing out on Kaiden. Unfortunately, it's a reality I have to face. I just focused on the fact that we were all together there and we were having a great time! I was nervous that Kaiden would be afraid of Mickey but he loved him! He ran right up to him and started grabbing Mickey's nose. I don't know what it was about Winnie the Pooh but Kaiden actually hit him in the face and the security guard had a fit. I had to laugh. He's only one. What can a one year old really do to a person covered in layers of stuffing? Oh, well. 

We are now safe and sound at home and back to reality. 

I felt like a little kid watching all of my favorite characters dance on stage.

Kaiden's new thing is to start giggling and stick his belly out (like this right picture)...he's a goofy boy!

We couldn't get a picture where everyone was looking :(

And there he is...attacking Pooh.

My brothers and sisters with E on the Teacup ride!

By the way, you should be proud! I actually didn't take many pictures this trip. I made it appoint to leave my camera behind and just enjoy the time instead of worrying about camera settings and people placement and I'm so glad I did. When you're worrying about your kid, your family, the crowds and trying to get on rides, the last thing you want to worry about is your camera :)