Frozen Kona: Aloha Friday!

Reality is slowly setting in.... in a good way! We are starting to get all settled in our home (also known in Hawaiian as hale). My mom’s been great helping to really make this place our home. I spent a few hours planting flowers to make our lanai look pretty. I planted sunflowers (one of my favorites), carrots, tomatoes and all kinds of mixed flowers… so soon enough it will be a lush garden! Last weekend we went to Aloha Stadium to their swap meet and festival they hold each week. It was a great place for cheap souvenirs and of course food! We tried the shave ice (notice 'shave ice' not shaved ice ;)) as well as a Hawaiian sweet roll (yum!) We also got an adorable decoration for our place. My mom got a matching one to take home as well! It's a really cute hand carved Hawaiian sign that we to hung by the front door! The first night in the apartment we ran into a few obstacles. By the time we got back to our place it was getting pretty late and it was to hard to put together our bed so Mark and I ended up sleeping on the floor and my mom on a half blown up air mattress. It was actually really fun and none of us ended up to sore the next day surprisingly. Cleo and Caesar did however ditch us as we found them both cuddled up next to my mom on the bed the next morning!

This weekend we are attending our first Hawaiian festival. There are so many awesome/different festivals here which I’m really excited to experience. This weekend however it’s the Honolulu music and book festival and well as the Spam festival. We’ll see how the Spam one goes… do as the Hawaiians do I suppose? Poi is one food in Hawaii that is really popular among the locals which has strong opinions... mainly negative! We tried it at our Luau last weekend and honestly it wasn’t as scary as we all anticipated. It seemed easier to use it as a dip and then serve it with veggies to kind of block the taste. It’s supposed to be very healthy so we are willing to get used to it! Many tourists say it tastes like ‘wallpaper paste’. I don’t necessarily agree on that taste description but it sure does look the part. Poi is made from the stem of the taro plant. After a lot of mashing and cooking the consistency should be thick liquid. Interesting to say the least.

Mark tried this... basically a teriyaki burger. (I'm almost already getting sick of teriyaki here!)

So far the price of food hasn’t been nearly as scary or expensive as we expected! The only thing that we really found a different with price wise is bread and milk. Literally everything else has been very close in prices from that on the mainland if not cheaper, which is strange. We picked up a loaf of wheat bread for 2.35 which was the cheapest kind they offered. But eggs for example, were the same price if you purchased the Hawaiian farms brand. Plus the farmers markets are AWESOME! They literally are every single day in and around Waikiki and within walking distance for us. That right there will be a money saver for sure with fruits and veggies. But the traffic on the other hand is NUTS! I am so happy that we are blessed enough to be able to live in Waikiki/Honolulu area because around 6-9am and 4-7 pm H1 (the main freeway system here in Hawaii is crazy!) A lot of the population drive into Waikiki/Honolulu from the suburbs because this is where all the jobs/activities happen. I think if we ever do end up driving here it will be on a moped-more cost effective and just a more fun way to see the island!

A few days ago we visited Sea Life Park! That was one thing we have been extremely excited about since about November since we started looking into moving to Oahu! It was such a blast! One of the best parts about it was the wholfin. It was 1/2 bottlenose dolphin and 1/2 killer whale. It sounds really weird, but was absolutely adorable. Our favorite there for sure! Another highlight was feeding the honus!

The lovely Wholfin!

Mid yawn :)

Watch out Mark!

Momma feeding the Honus!

Soaking it all in...

After Sea Life Park we went on a Movie Site Tour at the Kualoa Ranch in the Northern part of Oahu. They took us around a beautiful ranch in a little bus showing numerous spots that TV shows and movies were filmed at. Actually on the day we were there they were filming Hawaii 5-0. Pretty neat! It had to be one of the most beautiful parts of Hawaii. Regardless of which direction you were facing there was a beautiful view! On one side you had a view of huge waves coming ashore, and then you make a 160 degree turn and you have the most beautiful set of mountains in the distance with horses and cows in the pasture. We also took a picture near a tree that was used in Jurassic Park!

At a old WWII Bunker

One thing that I really want to start pursuing is surfing. I’ve been wanting to try it for such a long time and being 2 blocks from the sand is leaving me no room for excuses. It’s one of those things that’s so awesome and exciting but at the same time pretty intimidating! Mark has been in love with the ocean. He is such a beach bum at heart always wanting to swim and get in the water. I think it will be so awesome for us once we get a little more settled to have an ocean/beach day in the morning and then head into work in the afternoon. Something that we are shooting for once we are a little more settled is to make a point of getting in the ocean at least once per day.

Dole Plantation Train!

Honu cutting board! The cool thing about this is I still have a pig cutting board my Grandpa Doonan carved which was given to me from my parents. This is Mark and my way of kind of continuing that tradition with our kids some day!

One of my favorite things nature wise is the Rainbow Eucalyptus tree (Rainbow Gum). We first found it on the dole plantation. It’s absolutely beautiful. The entire grounds of Dole are covered with these trees, each with their own color/patterns. As the tree ages the bark sheds off the tree exposing new, bright colors. It tends to grown in warm, moist areas making Hawaii the perfect grounds. What a sight to see!