Hawaii vacation!

Sisters!

The kids already love them, but they love them even more now!

Beautiful Hawaiian baby

THE BEST BREAKFAST EVER!

Date night

Ready to go snorkeling

The kids at Dragon's Teeth (old lava)

At the Fish Market in Paia

Black Rock baby!

Fun night with the Nevils

Hula Grill

Black Rock

The view from our room

Daddy playing in the sand with the kids.

My view reading a book

We all made fruit loop necklaces

We just got back from Maui a few weeks ago and we are all already having withdrawls from it!! We decided to go to Maui this year for a lot of reasons. But the main ones were we wanted a family friendly location, and we wanted to go somewhere where it's easy to relax. Maui fit that perfectly. With Travis having school all June and July, it was such a treat to have August free and he worked extra hard so we could go on vacation, thanks babe. Our Maui vacation in one word= perfect!!
We didn't know what to expect with the kids flying because it had been so long since either of them had flown anywhere, but praise Jesus, they both did amazing on the flights. They slept, and besides Peyton getting a little antsy, they did great. Getting to Maui was so exciting for us because we were excited to see our best friends there! The Nevil family had already been on Maui for 5 days and our trips overlapped by a few days. It was so fun to hang out with them in paradise. We had dinner with them, checked out each other's hotels, and had a full fun day at Black Rock snorkeling, swimming, and hanging on the beach. We realized after that that we are destined to vacation together more in the future because we had so much fun!
The next day my sister Desi and her husband Jimmy joined us (they had gone to Ohau for a few days). We had such a blast with them. We went and checked out the town of Paia and ate at the Fish Market and got some yummy gelato, we went to the beach where they learned how to snorkel and Travis and I got a chance to snorkel together, we went to another beach where we sat and jumped the waves for a long time, and even another beach where we did more snorkeling and played at the beach. We went out for many yummy dinners, sat by the pool every afternoon and relaxed, and played fun games at night. Travis and I got a date night where we went to dinner, did some shopping and went to see a Magic show which was really fun! We went running on the beach, ate breakfast on the beach (white chocolate macadamia nut pancakes were sooooo delicious, easily my favorite meal there!). We also went to check out the town of Kehei and found a hole in the wall Italian restaurant that was amazing and so authentic. Every night we would watch the sunset and sit in awe of God's creation!
The kids LOVED Maui and are still talking about it now. Their favorite parts were going down the water slide at the hotel (Peyton would even go by herself!), going to the beach, Peyton loved to sit in the sand for hours and play, and Brayden loved to play in the waves, they loved hanging out with uncle Jimmy and Titi Desi, and loved anytime they got to go swimming. For the most part they did a great job even after we wore them out everyday.
My favorite parts were hanging out with people we love, and spending hours at the beach. This trip was definitely a full circle moment for us in that the first time we went, we were alone with no children and it was amazing, last time we went Brayden was a year and half and hated the sand, but we still had an amazing time, this time we obviously had the kids and it was amazing. Bottom line I don't know how you can't not have fun in Maui! We're so thankful that God blessed us with this trip. We came back feeling refreshed, rested, relaxed, and so in awe of God's creation. We will have these memories forever!

On a side note: Since we got back Peyton will get her shoes on, get her purse, her baby and her blanket and stand by the door. I ask her "where are you going, " she answers "to Hawaii." :)