The Great State of Hawaii-Part 2

April 4, 2016April 3, 20167 Comments

Good morning! I hope you all had a good weekend! I mentioned on Saturday that I haven’t been feeling very inspired, so today is another Hawaii post. But I promise I am working on a couple of other projects to share with you next week!

Our family visited Hawaii in February and we had the opportunity to see so much of Oahu. If you would like to read Part 1, click here. It was so beautiful and the weather was divine. Our last morning we hiked Diamond Head. It was rainy and windy in the early morning, but as you can see, it was nice once we started out.

Diamond Head was once a volcano. It erupted and left the crater behind, which you can see very clearly on this hike. In 1908, the trail was built as part of the Oahu coastal defense system. This huge pulley system was used to help haul some of the equipment and building materials up to the top.

The trail is 0.8 miles from the trailhead to the summit, going up 560 feet from the crater floor. It is steep and pretty strenuous.

What a view! We made it to the very top! This is looking straight down below one of the bunkers which was built into the side of the mountain.

The lighthouse was built in 1917. Aren’t the grounds around it beautiful?

Looking back at Waikiki, you can see for miles. You can see why this was the perfect spot for the defense system. See the marina? Our hotel was right across the street from there.

The walk down was much easier. 🙂 We just finished walking through a lighted tunnel which is 225 long and includes some very steep stairs.

Can you see the trail and the little ants, I mean, people?

Ahh! The reward for a hike well done! Hawaiian shaved ice! This one had coconut, pineapple and strawberry flavors. Yum!

This was so worth the effort! There were a few times I wondered if I could make it, but then I would look around and see all these others who were doing it and knew I could too. It was a great way to spend part of our last day in Oahu! Hope you enjoyed the hike!

Corner News-April 2. 2016

April 2, 2016April 1, 20164 Comments

Hello! Hope you are having a wonderful Saturday and weekend! I don’t have much to share today. I haven’t been feeling very inspired lately :(.

Here is our family picture from Easter. The weather was absolutely perfect for an Easter morning.

This is one project I worked on during my spring break. See the cover? And the guilty party?! This happened awhile ago, but with my ‘love’ for sewing, I kept putting it off. I finally just made myself get it done.

I used a painters canvas for this cover. This is probably the fourth one I have made (not because of Rozy!). The canvas was really easy to use and it was great to have the edges already hemmed. That is one of the parts I really dislike about sewing. Too monotonous! I used all the hemmed edges for the skirt part of the slipcover.

The pillow top cover is a giant envelope cover. This way I can take it off and wash it whenever it needs it. This is often with so many dogs! Isn’t the bicycle pillow cover awesome? They have some great deals on Amazon, under $5.00 and they are so much easier to store than pillows are.

Thanks for coming by today! See you on Monday!

The Great State of Hawaii-Part One

March 28, 2016March 27, 20166 Comments

Did everyone have a wonderful spring break, if you had one in your area? Mine was good, but I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked. But I did have time to relax and spend time with my girls (see zoo post here).

I know a lot of folks went to the beach or somewhere else nice for vacation. We stayed home, but we did go to Hawaii last month! This was our first time going. A lot of people couldn’t believe we had never gone before since we live in Ca. But now we can say we have! I realized I hadn’t shared any pictures with you, so I thought this would be a good time. I will have to do several posts, since I took llloootttss of pictures! We stacked a lot of activities into 6 days! I thought I would just share pictures of the beach where we spent our time and some of the wonderful things we saw there.

I have had traveling to Hawaii on my ‘bucket list’ for a very long time. What finally prompted us to go was Haley. She is part of the theater group at her junior college. She found out in the fall that they would be traveling to a theater festival that takes place each year. This year would be Hawaii. How could I not go?! I told here there was no way she would get to go to Hawaii and I hadn’t gone yet! So as soon as we found out where the festival would be held, we made our reservations.We made them through Travelosity and it included our flight and hotel. Such an easy way to travel. We also purchased a GoOahu Card through SmartDestinations.com. Best purchase ever! They have this card for many different cities, so be sure to check it out if you are traveling. By the way, I am not affiliated with these agencies, I just thought they were really good deals.

Okay. So on to the pictures! This is the beach were we spent most of our time. It was across the street from our hotel. The little piece of water you see to the left if a man-made lagoon. It belonged to one of the hotels and was a great place for kids. Straight ahead is a cove, so the water was great to go swimming in.

We had to get our feet in as soon as possible! Our beaches in Ca. are not this clear or warm.

We could see Diamond Head from were the beach was. We did hike up this later in the week.

Look who came for a visit! We were thrilled to see this turtle so close! He was enjoying riding the waves close to shore.

Yes, even the dogs go surfing in Hawaii!

The infamous Hawaii rainbow…

And the beautiful sunsets. Breathtaking.

Do you need to take a break? Go get something to drink or a snack? Or maybe make your own reservations? I will wait for you.

Okay, here is a few more pictures from around Waikiki. Tiki torches all around the city are lit each night.

These lanterns looks so cool!

Surfboards anyone! They actually have lockers for surfboards so you don’t have to carry them all over.

We ate dinner from this taco truck one night. One of the best meals we had!!

We ordered the garlic shrimp and the taco plate. Mmmm!

A little bit of flora and fauna.

The famous Hawaiian surfer, Duke Kahanamoku.

I hope you enjoyed this little bit of Oahu. Watch for Part 2 in the next weeks!

We Went To The Zoo!

March 24, 2016March 23, 20168 Comments

Sorry I missed posting yesterday, but we went to the zoo! Our local zoo just opened up a new area, the African Adventure, and I wanted to check it out before I take my preschool class in May. The girls were up for it, so off we went!

It was very busy when we got there, but we had no trouble seeing the animals. The walkways were wide and there were lots of places to view each area. This is the view of the savanna when you first enter the African Adventure.

It was empty when we first got there, but pretty soon, we saw these cute little gazelles running and jumping and hopping around. They were so cute! Then the wildebeest came out and chased off the birds. It was like they were all so excited to be out in this beautiful place!

We headed over to the giraffe pavilion where they have a giraffe feeding station. The zoo had this before too, but you had to reach up to give the giraffe some leaves. Now you are up on a platform and the giraffes’ head is right next to you. Very up close and personal!

Here are more with a few of their friends.

Next we headed over to the lionesses, where they were busy sunbathing. They are so beautiful!

Here is one of the zebras enjoying a peaceful day of eating all he wants.

Look at this tree! It’s so cool and huge! It is right by the elephants and zebras and you can walk all through it. The kids were having a great time!

That’s just a little part of our zoo. I’m so glad they have made a better habitat for these animals. I know there are plans to keep improving and I can’t wait to see what else they have planned! I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed Easter!

CORNER NEWS-FEBRUARY 20

February 20, 2016February 19, 20164 Comments

Happy Saturday! Always glad to have a weekend to get caught up on home stuff! I made a quick (!) stop at Hobby Lobby yesterday and found this cool whale’s tail book-end. Maybe it was supposed to have another end, but this part was on clearance, so I snatched it up. I love it! It fits perfect with my beachy theme, plus it’s neutral enough to go with anything.

I also picked up this wooden tree in the new spring section. Karianne, over at Thistlewood Farms featured these and a some cute wooden birds on her blog and I just fell in love with them. They are the perfect accent for spring! I LOVE her blog and her style! Her mantle looks so much better than mine. You can click on Thistlewood Farms above to take a look!

Guess where we just came back from?! Did you notice we seemed to be a little bit absent from the blog this past week? We were enjoying lots of sunshine and warm weather. Maybe this is why I liked the whale’s tail so much! I will be blogging about this soon!