Last full day!

Paul's last day of work was the day before our morning flight! Last day working for Waianae Coast. He liked it there, and everyone loved him. He made lifelong friends, and I am happy it was his first post medical school work experience. 

While he was gone, I had to get the HUGE U-haul truck, and drive it by myself. My friend Ashley drove with me there and drove the kids back home (Hawken and Lullaby lost it and went crazy in the car - they started feeling stressed about the move the day before, poor things). Thanks Ashley for your help and tremendous amount of patience with my kids.  This is my reaction to driving this HUGE truck.

I had to pick Paul up from work because so many people, patients and staff, brought him gifts. Kawi, Paul's amazing MA, will be sorely missed. She has family in Kauai, so he's already working on her to move! :)

After Paul got home, he and I and our neighbor Jeff, loaded the truck. Thanks Jeff!  It didn't take very long because everything was set to go, with the exception of the mattresses and suitcases which we loaded in the morning.

The kids were no help at all, and at some point, James asked the big boys to go to the pool with Hayden and JP and some other neighborhood kids for one last hurrah.

Emptying the refrigerator and freezer was the last thing to do. We brought it straight from ours to the Reaves. I enlisted the help of all the neighborhood kids, who happily helped. Then I kicked myself for not asking them to help earlier. 

Saying goodbye to the BEST neighbors ever was really hard. We spent LOTS of nights up late talking and chatting and just watching TV. They are such good people. We miss them already.

goodbyes

One of our last days, we headed over to Auntie Pat's house to work on her garden one more time. Her tomatoes are doing GREAT.  Talo and Ala came too, and made it a party. We love this group of people. They have been so good to us. 

We stayed all day, ate our weight in delicious Hawaiian food, and played into the night. We left way after the kids' bedtime, but it was worth it. We already miss them terribly.

closing!

Finally, amidst all the craziness of packing, and cleaning, and finishing up all the Oahu things, we went to closing and signed for our new condo in Kauai! So now it's official, we're home owners in Hawaii. A very permanent feeling for our family of gypsies.  The condo is small, and backed up to a jungle, and there is a pool close by, and Paul's work is less than a mile away, and so is Sully's school... We couldn't have picked anything better. We love it so much. But at this point, when the picture was taken, we had just signed, having never even seen the place in person... Scary! And exciting! 

help

Taniel watched my kids for me while I cleaned up one of the last days. We lived out of our suitcases and only the Legos were available for the kids to play with. So they welcomed the chance to play with friends. I got a ton done and they were wiped out and ready for naps.

goodbyes

Our last Sunday at church was so lovely. The tradition is for the congregation to sing "Aloha Oe" to the families that leave. Then close friends bring up leis for the family. It is so sweet. The kids were really excited about the candy leis especially. We really had a great ward family in Ewa Beach and we miss them all so much.

We had to get a family picture with most of the leis (the kids had already eaten quite a few). I love this adventurous family of mine.

goodbye friends

We took a break from packing to play with the Dance family at the pool one last time. We love them so much. 

critters

While packing we found lots of critters.  Thankfully we had Matix to save the rest of us. A couple lizards IN the house, and a LARGE toad hiding in the backyard (then he hopped into the back shed). Yikes!

Hawk

Hawk has such a unique personality. There is just no one like him. When given the chance to eat anything he wanted at Costco for lunch. ALL of the kids picked hot dogs, except him. He chose a caesar salad, because, you know, "it's probably the healthiest choice" and "healthy foods give us the most energy". An easy choice for this 7 year old. 

cute

These selfies make me so happy. Look at those curls! So cute.

telescope

Our friend gave us a telescope and it's awesome! It's quite bulky and gets in the way a lot, but so cool.  We brought it out to look at the moon one night and this is a picture of the moon through the telescope using my iPhone. Pretty cool, huh?!

art wall

Packing was challenging with 4 tiny helpers, but we got it all done. Paul worked right up until the day  before we moved, so although he did a bulk of the work loading and unloading the truck, he wasn't there to pack. When I took down the art wall, the kids were only okay with it if I took pictures of their favorites first. So here it is, the art wall, the favorites, and the cute kiddies.