We bought Makaela a playhouse over a month ago, and she loves it. She is finally learning all the perks the house has to offer such as the shutters and doorbell. We've been having a great time with it. Who knew that at 30, I'd love playing house.

first hair cut

Makaela and I met Matt for dinner tonight and Pigtails and Crewcuts (a hairdresser for kids) was located in the same shopping center, so we stopped in to check it out. We have been thinking about getting Makaela's hair cut because it is always in her eyes and her barrettes only last about 1/2 hour in her hair before she gets frustrated with them and rips them out. I was pretty impressed with the place, so we decided to try it out. She was good, for the most part, but once the spray bottle came near her hair, she started panicking. The hairdresser was quick though and offered her some "cookies" to be good. Ahhh, bribing kids with food- works every time. As for the results, her hair is no longer in her eyes, but she has a paige girl haircut. Her bangs are so short!

car washing time

It is official...summer has come to Ewa. It was so hot and humid today, a run was not in the cards, so we decided to do the next best thing in the heat...play in the water. Just so happens that my car was disgustingly dirty, so I thought it would be a great time to teach Makaela how to wash the car (starting to train her young to earn her allowance). Makaela totally enjoyed getting soaked, running through the hose and surprisingly, washing the car. She gets a little carried away with the cleaning at the end of the video though.

polo match

Waialua has polo grounds and today we decided to go watch a match. We packed up the car and headed to the north shore to meet up with the Buelows, Martins and some other friends. Tailgating was so fun, lots of great food and drinks. Since the grounds are right next to the beach, the scenery was stellar. The horses were stunning and it felt like an earthquake when they ran by. We learned a bit about polo and the lingo too. After the match, they had a band and Gav and Makaela stole the show boogying down. Can't wait to do it again.

sea life park

Today, Makaela got to experience first hand how awesome dolphins are. In honor of Mother's Day, Sea Life Park gave free admission to moms, so Steph, Claud and I piled all the kids in the car (seriously, there were 4 car seats) and drove to the other side of the island. We got to see a dolphin show, a sea lion show and feed the turtles. The kids had great seats during the show and it was amazing to watch them squeal and clap. The video is of Makaela reacting to the dolphin show. At one point, the announcer said "Are you ready for some more" and Makaela did her baby sign language and signed "More"-if you look closely, you can see it in the video. All the kids were so well behaved and everyone was exhausted after the fun filled day.

bring your daughter to work day

Makaela's daycare provider called out for the past two days. Her daughter was sick and with the craziness of the swine flu going around, she was worried her daughter had it, thus, Makaela was staying home. Problem was, I couldn't...I have been so swamped at work that I had no choice but to pack her up and drag her to work with me. She ran around leadership meetings, found the drawer that I kept all my markers in and "decorated" our recycling paper stack with colorful scribbles. I had my honor students chase her around the library restacking books as she yanked them off the shelves.

the growing ohana

Here is a picture from yesterday's girls' day. Our girls' night has morphed into girls' day since everyone has to bring along keiki and since they all fall asleep by 7pm, we've moved it to a more convenient time during the day. The kids had a blast in the water and I was actually able to balance two kids on my hips!

got big shoes to fill

Today I babysat Gavin and had a great time watching the kids as they screamed and ran aroudn the house. They were really good though and it was fun watching them interact. They are finally getting to that age that they can actually ackowledge and play with each other. As you have been reading, Makaela has been mimicking us constantly. Today Matt was getting reading to go to work and had taken out his sneakers in preparation. Makaela then decided to take it upon herself to take off in Dad's shoes.

mother's day

We had a great mother's day. Matt woke up with Makaela and then we headed to North Shore to go for a hike with the Buelows and the Martins. We ended up huffing up the side of a mountain...Matt was a trooper carrying Makaela on his back almost the entire time. It was a great workout, we had some good converstation, overall, great bonding time. After we cleaned up, we had lunch and all of the kids were so well behaved. Our plan was to hit the beach, but we were all so tired, we opted for family nap time instead. A very relaxing and fun mother's day.

paradise

Makaela and I went to Lanikai beach today. We played in the water, got totally sandy and Makaela even approached two little girls and shared her toys with them. Totally love days like this...

"share"

Makaela has been having some issues with sharing, as most kids do. We've been working on it and with all the practicing, the word "share" has been repeated more than once. Today, when we went to the park, we brought along a soccer ball. Makaela loves to kick the ball around so we were playing when two little girls walked up to play along. Makaela instantly grabbed the ball and started to stalk off, but I told her to "share". While she didn't hand over the ball, she did kick it in the direction of the girls and we ran around the park for a while. Then a boy came to the playground. Makaela went to check him out and about a minute later, I hear her saying "share, share, share". I walk over to see Makaela trying to pry this kid's match box cars out of his hand and telling him he needs to "share". Funny that she knows what "share" means when she wants something.

while the mamas are away, the babies will play

So last night was our friend Tanya's bachelorette party and we had the preparty at our house which meant that Matt and Makaela needed to be vacate the location. Well, with all the women congregating at our house, all the men took the babies to Brian and Monica's house. In a few phone call updates we found out that the kids were running down hallways that were filled with 50 or so balloons (they were left over from Monica's bday). Oh to be a fly on the wall with screeching kids, hardwood floors, 50 balloons and poker playing dads :-) At one point in the night, Brian looks over to find Brooke, his 10 month old, chowing down on a cookie. Brian turns to the guys and says, "Which one of you %&$#@ gave my daughter a cookie?" The guys all claim innocence until one of them sees Makaela with cookie stains all over her mouth. It only took one night away from mom for Makaela to turn into a peer pressuring cookie pusher.