Pics from our Wisconsin trip

In my laziness, I didn't post a darn thing while I was on my two weeks of vacation....so here are some pictures that I promised, from our trip to Wisconsin...only a few weeks ago. These are courtesy of Brian and Andi and their twins who took Alex to the Children's Museum for a day of fun while Mommy and Daddy were at the wedding.



Cute little drummer boys.



A very happy Alex with Uncle Brian (now that we're Hawaiian, you are Unlce Brian. Hope that's OK.)


Where did this big boy come from? Sitting in a chair? Reading a book? He's all grown up!




Alex found a nice spot to sit at the twins' house. Apparently the twins like to sit in these baskets as well. Such nice hosts..."mi basket es su basket"



The E's wanted to send Alex home not only with fun memories, but with a new trick. This is Ethan and Logan, trying to teach Alex to do "touchdown." He looks like he's catching on, doesn't he? :-) I can tell you though, 3 weeks later that he can do it now. The problem is that when I was teaching him, each time he'd do, it, I'd tickle him, so now when he puts his hands up, he'll wait a few seconds before doubling over in giggles of anticipation, even if I never actually tickle him.

Doin' Fine

We experienced our first earthquake here in Hawaii yesterday! Everything is fine, we were nowhere near the actual center of the quake, but we definitely felt it and the many, many hours of electricity-less-ness that followed.

It was about 8ish a.m. here. We were kind of up, as families with small children often are, way too early on a Sunday. It was raining and yucky. Bummer. That was my last day of vacation. And then...the house began to shake. We heard the glass in the windows shaking, the pictures on the wall shaking. Dan and I looked at each other and were just dumbfounded. We were just starting to talk about what to do--i.e. which room in our house was safest?!?!-- when it stopped. And it was over. Only lasted 15-20 seconds. But it was enough to knock out electricity in the entire state. The entire state. That was 8ish. What were we going to do with no computer all day? We alread don't have a t.v. so there was no withdrawl there, but the computer?!?! Dan was actually starting to twitch by the end of the day...

We are pretty resourceful and thought we could enjoy sometime walking around outside or even at the beach, but it was raining on most of the island still, so with no electricity and no outdoor fun, it was a seriously lame day.

Then Sydney hurt her leg, and we had a mission: to find a vet clinic that was open. We found a vet clinic that was open and had power! Not just a generator, but we found out that power had been restored to one area of the island! We took care of the dog then dropped her back at home.But we had found the one possible source of amusement in this city with power. So we returned, looking for a place to do....well....anything. We found a place that was serving dinner, and divised a clever plan to get dinner and then request some cold milk just as we were leaving to take home for Alex's evening milk. See, most of the grocery stores on the island were either closed or were working on generators, and many of them were specifcially *not* selling milk or meat, and our milk was waaayyyyy nasty by now.

We ended up going to sleep before we had power again. Ours apparently came on around 10 (as determined by the time on the microwave when we got up). But one of my coworkers didn't have power until 6:20 this morning, and another didn't have power as of the time she went to work in the morning! She looked darn good for having gotten ready without any lights, blowdrying, haircurling, etc. Seriously, I had no excuse :-)

So, thanks to everyone who sent an e-mail or called to see how we were, especially to those of you who started your e-mails with "What's shakin'?" Yeah, you weren't the only clever one who thought of that. But we thought it was funny each and every time ;-)