Four Days Until Christmas

Four Days to go. To the boys it may as well be an eternity.

Although...for Charlie a portion of Christmas came a touch early due to a little SNAFU during his inaugural game of "hide and seek."

Mommy thought it would be a good idea to keep the boys out of Daddy's hair by learning to play hide and seek. Mommy hid under the covers of the bed and listened as little pitter patters of feet were only barely heard over the giggles of two little boys trying to find Mommy.

Then the noise stopped.

Any veteran of parenthood is wise to the fact that that is not a good sound.

Next I heard from Paul, "um, I think you need to come out - now."

Uh-oh.

But everyone's tone sounded fine, no alarm bells were going off. In fact, everything sounded great - too great?

Charlie was proudly holding up two prized possessions that weren't to be his until Christmas morning and he was exclaiming proudly, "Mommy - there are TOYS in the potty!"

Yes...I had hidden the boys packages for Christmas in the spare bathroom....

They never go in there!

But then, we'd never played hide and seek before....

Lucky for me all the other presents had been wrapped.

Could I possibly dare hope that this will help with potty training?

It Has Arrived!

I was so lucky to be introduced to a marvelous idea by my good friend, Sarah. A Secret Ornament Exchange, hosted by Julie. (http://abbilyeverafter.com/) It was exactly what I needed this season - being so far from family.

So...IT HAS ARRIVED!

My beautiful jingle bell wreath ornament from SJ in Colorado (http://www.andallthejonesmen.blogspot.com/) has arrived. I love it - and so do the boys.

SJ - It is so interesting to me that we should be paired. My husband and I have looked at Colorado Springs on many occasions to relocate to after be retires from the Navy in the Spring. We both love Colorado. Thank you for the lovely ornament, it reminds me of Colorado ... and inspires sweet day dreams of how I hope our future unfolds - wherever that may be.

Gobble, Gobble

Okay, the picture has nothing to do with the post. But it's cute, huh? (And, yes, Mom that's the Target box one of the Christmas gifts came in and no we didn't let Charlie even see the wrapped packages inside. Those are all safely in the spare bathroom's bathtub...A place the boys hardly know exists.)

So, this year we had a repeat performance of "Operation Goodie Delivery to Soldiers on Duty." We did this 2 years ago when Charlie was 7 months old. Last year I was a little busy with Macalan so new born. But this year with our feet under us again - we were off! Fourteen goody packages were delivered and everyone smiled as Charlie handed them their treat and said, "Gobble, gobble."

Christmas Train

I'm typically opposed to Christmas before Thanksgiving dinner. However, who can resist the request of these two cute babes?

Thanksgiving is this Thursday and we're going to friends for the feast, but we still needed basics and we plan to cook a turkey at home too (Who can do without Thanksgiving turkey leftovers?) so we were forced to go food shopping and blindly and without thinking, I headed off to the commissary.

Whoops! Big, big, "the line wraps around the cue, through the dairy section to the back of the store to the produce section" lines. Wow. Impressive.

So, I did what any good Mom would do. I bailed all the non-essentials out the cart, keeping the turkey, the green beans, chicken broth and the other 17 items to keep us at the 20 item limit and headed for the express "do it yourself" checkout. Much better, we only waited 20 minutes in line versus the sure hour+ it would have been in the "normal" line. Until...

The turkey wrung up at $246.13.

I kid you not.

Obviously a mistake, but we then won the "do it yourself" lottery and had to wait for help to undo the damage.

All in all, we got out of there no worse for the wear. The kids were excellent. *hear me breathe a sigh of relief here* So, how could I say no to a train ride?

I couldn't, neither would have you.

The Trip

It's hard to choose just one picture to capture the Laguna trip. This one is of Mac on the Boardwalk at Main Beach. We went there a few times to play at the park.

Be sure to check out the photos under "The Latest Pictures." You can click on them and see them larger, or even order your favorites. Click once to stop the slide show, and click one more time to be taken to the picture site to see and order photos.

Thank Goodness for Photos!

More to come on this post, I'll edit it soon. But I just had to get started and say, Thank goodness for photos!

We just got back from a trip to Laguna. I flew with the boys, Paul arrived for a few days via San Diego. (he was actually in CA for business) It was great, but traveling with 2 toddlers and being out of our routine (with 2 toddlers) is difficult. I was just downloading the photos from the trip and realized what a great time I really had!

Does that seem odd? It feels odd.

But, I supposed I was so tied up in making sure the kiddos were doing okay that I neglected to take in what was actually happening around me. That or I'm so sleep deprived at the moment I just can't think and all the memories will come pouring back at some later point. For now though...take goodness for photos. Too bad I don't have any of that amazing yoga class I took with Mom! Thanks Mom, it was much needed.

Miraculous photos to follow....

Namaste.

The Real Great Pumpkin

With a request from Mr. Charlie Man...we had a return visit to the Pumpkin Patch this morning. It was easy to say yes to this request as our earlier pumpkin picks rotted out 2 days after we carved them due to our balmy Hawaiian weather.

Pumpkin is rather, um..."fragrant" in it's rotting stage....

And it was a good thing we took this pumpkin outting. We discovered we were dupped last week!! We never really found the Great Pumpkin! It was a fake!! This week we truly, without a doubt, found The Great Pumpkin. We searched, we hunted, we walked and tromped. We lined up all the contenders - again and again. And then...we found it! The Great Pumpkin.

*Whew* Good thing we found it.

I Spy With My Little Eye...

Every week for the past month we have gone to the Honolulu Zoo on Thursday mornings. We go on Thursdays for no particular reason, it's just when we seem to be in the mood. Charlie has recently taken to using his binoculars to see the animals. We've tried to tell him that the way he uses them is making the animals appear further away - but he'll have none of our advice. (He's 2 and he's our son...that about explains it all...) The boys have such a long "favorites" list it's hard to keep up! At the top of the list are the elephants, the monkeys, the turtles, the zebops (zebras...) and the giraffes. But I might be forgetting one or two. Charlie's new love for the lizards challenges me though - it means I have to brave the repitle house and in it - the snakes. I've made good progress using all the tricks I know, but I still get queasy around the snakes. But for Charlie...I'll suck it up. Paul reminds me there will certainly come a day when he picks one up and brings it to me to "see." Especially if we ever live in the middle of the country. I can hardly picture it without passing out....

Pumpkin Patching

Lot's of fun was had this morning at the Aloun Farm Pumpkin Patch. This was Charlie's 3rd year picking pumpkins and Macalan's 2nd year. We were well prepared with gloves for grabbing and actual shoes for squishing through muddy fields. (Shoes are uncommon items in our daily lives here in Hawaii. "Slippers" a.k.a. "flip-flops" are our traditional wear. And I don't think the boys even have socks that fit - those are purchased only as needed for our travels to cooler climates.) Both boys successfully found their respective "Great Pumpkin," as is our yearly tradition. I think Macalan emotionally bonded with his - as taking it away was quite a feat. Charlie enjoyed the hunt for his "Great Pumpkin" but this year he was fine unhanding it, as that meant he was free to ride the "big kid rides." (Yes, to the rest of us over 5 feet tall they are the "little kid rides." But, to Charlie, who was for the first time big enough to ride - they were the big kid rides.) He proudly rode the swings and the Elephants. Both were enough to make me sick just watching.... I'm sure there will be a good picture or two in the next few days when we get down to pumpkin carving and seed roasting.

Baby Steps

It seems the whole family is taking them these days...

Macalan
Well, I have to start somewhere, might as well launch this site with the momentous news - Macalan is walking! Mac actually took his first steps on August 23, 2007 at the Honolulu Zoo. (in front of the pigs) But then really didn't try again at all for weeks. Perhaps he sensed the danger in having his center of gravity raised while Charlie careens around with boundless energy. Then on a trip Hallie and Mac took to Ohio to scout out places to live after Paul's retirement from the Navy, Macalan found motivation. After 9 hours couped up in a plane from Hawaii to Chicago (for a layover) Mac apparently needed to stretch his legs and put together 5-8 steps at the cutest children's display in an airport I have ever seen. Soon after we arrived Mac was showing off again. Aunt Kate put her arms open wide and Mac toddled right into them. The lucky little guy got to see his Grandma Pat, Grandpa Dennis and Great Grandma Mc on this trip. And though our time with them was brief - Macalan made the most of it by being extra cuddly and charming. Around his first birthday (September 16th) Mac picked up the pace with a step here, and a step there. But it wasn't until last week that the little guy really took off. Now Macalan is walking more than crawling and seems to have some confidence about his stride.

Charlie
Charlie has some big news of his own - no more crib! Charlie graduated to a toddler bed about 2 weeks ago. Thanks to some "super cool" sheets (Mickey Mouse) we had no problems with the transition. (There is still a gate outside his door as Mom can't handle the idea he might take to wandering the house at night. So far, however, he doesn't even get out of bed without asking...) Mom and Dad are still amazed how easy it was. *can you hear us knocking on wood?* Charlie is infatuated with construction equipment of all kinds. And thanks to his passion, Mom and Dad have had quite an education as well. The entire Herbert clan (at least those of us already speaking comprehendable English) can now readily identify Dump Trucks, Backhoes, Payloaders, Front Loaders, Payloaders and more! Last weekend Charlie had a blast when we took him to see the Blue Angels. We never actually got to see the Blue Angels (nap time prohibited it...) but we did get to see and climb all over helicopters, firetrucks, cargo planes and tanks. Mom was a little wierded out to see her sweet barely 2 1/2 year old handling a machine gun that was larger than he was...but, he is a boy and a I suppose it was inevitable. Frightening that he knew just how to handle it... *yikes* One of his favorite parts was when the Navy Frogs (guys who jump out of airplanes on purpose) jumped out of the plane and floated back to the ground carrying the American Flag. I don't think we could have kept count of how many times Charlie asked us with unending excitement to, "look, Look, LOOK, L-O-O-K!" (Yes, Charlie, we see it too.)

Paul & Hallie
Paul has officially put in his retirement papers and is gearing up for the transition to being a civilian. Hallie has begun to get her career as a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist off the ground and has been teaching graduate psychology classes at a local university.