Waves, Zoos, and Views

Well, there goes September and on we go to October . . . I'm still trying to figure out where the heck September went. Our weather has yet to cool down in true autumn style (hovering around 88 every day), but our winter waves are starting to make their appearance. So last weekend, while Brian slaved away on homework (with a little college football watching mixed in), the kids and I joined our friends, Risha and her daughter, for a jaunt to the North Shore to check out the waves. We made almost a whole day of it by throwing in some yummy Thai food, followed by shave ice. Yum, yum.
On Sunday, Brian and I decided to get the kiddos out for a good 'ol fashioned "family day," which with our crazy schedules is a bit more rare these days. We started out with breakfast at one our favorite places, Lulu's in Waikiki, and then we walked across the street for a trip to the zoo. Don't worry, I didn't take a million animal pictures to bore you with, but I did take a couple pictures of some unusual things. First, this is a gum tree . . . as you can see, the colors are quite spectacular.

And then I took a picture of the elephants, which to most people isn't all that exciting, but considering that the past ten times or so that we've been to the zoo, the elephants were in hiding, it was pretty exciting.

Then we hit the road and went on a beautiful drive that our neighbors had told us about, through the mountains and a lush jungle area. We stopped at the top to snap a few photos . . . can you tell that Charley is not thrilled?

You can see Diamond Head and Honolulu off in the distance . . .

I like the view in this picture because you can see the airport runway in the distance, completely surrounded by water, and you can see Sugarbowl just a bit closer . . . .

And here is my little monster, who suckered Daddy into giving him a free ride . . . but how could you resist that smile?

So we had a fun weekend and a good start to the week with school, but of course yesterday was a bit sad for all those who suffered in Samoa, and a bit crazy around here as we considered the possibility of a tsunami in our direction too. For the first part of the morning we were under a tsunami watch, so I got the call from Brian just to make sure to stay up near our house (which is up in the hills). I have many friends who live much closer to the water, so we were taking in "refugees" who felt more comfortable waiting it out in a higher elevation. Fortunately on our end it turned out to be a bunch of nothing, but of course the Air Station is working around the clock, using as many resources as it can to provide aid to Samoa. We haven't seen Brian since yesterday morning when he left for work at 6:30 a.m., but he should be home soon.

And here comes October. And it's going to be a busy one. We've got various Halloween activities this month, Brian is supposed to leave on Saturday for a week of training in Seattle, my Aunt Marge and Uncle Mike will be here for a week mid-October, the kids are on fall break next week, Zander is going to do one more round of swimming lessons this month, plus we will just have all our normal stuff. And then November will be even BUSIER. No wonder time flies so fast here in Hawaii.