Hawaii (part 1 of 4)

 After months of counting down the days, our Hawaii trip finally started!!! We were SO excited!!! We had never been on a big trip like this as a family and I didn't know if I had over-packed or under-packed, but here we were at the airport!  We left on Friday, May 23.

 Waiting at the airport to board our 12:00pm flight.

 They each had their backpacks with treats and entertainment.

The kids did great on the flight. By the time we rented the car and drove over to the North Shore where the beach house was, it was about 6pm in Hawaii (10pm our time) and the kids were getting tired. I figured we'd just take a look at the beach and then go to bed, but everyone got so excited we had to go change into our swimsuits and try out the water. 

Here is the beach house that the whole Hatfield family stayed in. Our room was on the top left of this picture. 

 This was the view from the foot of our bed. We slept with the doors open every night and listened to the ocean.

 Here is the the kids' first experience with an ocean right after we pulled up.

 After we decided to change into out suits before we got soaked.

 Hooray for the beach!

Getting use to the 4 hour time change took a few days. That first morning, the kids were all up before the sun so I took them down to the beach to watch as the sun came up.

 Here is a little picture from inside the house.

Having breakfast that first morning. 

On that first Saturday morning, we all headed a few minutes up the road to Waimea Bay, which was a really good beach for little kids.  We had so much fun; I'm sure I took too many pictures!

 The day before we left we got a package from Nini and Papa with lots of super cool beach toys, and the kids had so much fun using them.

Everyone loved using the boogie boards all week.

Throwing the football

 When Bradley took his head off.

And then Jacob did

 Grandma and Mackayla

 On Sunday, we all drove back to Honolulu and went to church in the same church building that my Grandma and Grandpa Tree attended when they lived there 70 years ago. It was a huge, beautiful building.

Although he looks happy enough in this picture, he was actually not happy that I had taken it.

 Hawaii looks good on her

 Sunday afternoon we went and hiked Manoa Falls. It was our family, the Holts, the Derek Hatfields, and Jackson that went on the hike. It turned out to be more of an adventure than we were expecting. It started raining on our way up, and by the way down it was pouring!! The trail was wet, muddy, and very slippery. We had a lot of little kids with us, so it was a little tricky.  We were all soaked by the time we got back to our cars. It was raining too hard to even get the camera out when we were at the waterfall so I don't even have a picture of it.

We were fascinated by all the cool trees in Hawaii

 The cousins

 The girl cousins (all but Eden)

 They found so many great treasures

Caitlin was such a stubborn little trooper, and insisted on walking the entire time. She finally gave in and let us carry her for the last 5 minutes on the way down as the rain continued to soak her.

 A nice picture, before the rain started :)

 After the hike we drove around the island seeing some of the sights. 

Here is the blow hole

Another look out point. This was on the old sugar cane route.

Monday morning, just our family went back to the beach at Waimea Bay for a little while, and then we spent the rest of the day with everyone at the beach by our house.

 Jared took this picture from the lanai of the house.

 Hanging out on the lanai with her Dad

 Cannon and Bradley

 The waves were much bigger by the beach house, so the kids liked to be with Dad or Mom if they got too far in there. It was too big for the little kids to go in the water by themselves.

 We took lots of pictures from the lanai.

 Heather and Caitlin

 The boys all had a great time catching geckos and little sand crabs for pets. Jacob has one of each in this cup here.

Cousins

Caitlin and Mackayla loved sharing a bed the whole time. Since we've been back, Caitlin has decided she is ready for a big girl bed and Mackayla has decided her bed is too lonely all by herself.

Jared had posted this picture on Facebook with the caption "I could get use to this"

I copied his picture and sent it to him.

That was a lot of pictures of the first few days of the trip!