Christmas Vacation

I've been fretting about how to write about our Christmas vacation. I started something and then decided to do what little sisters do best. I stole my sisters blog and what she wrote. I slightly tweaked it, but not much. She mapped it out very well! Thanks Leilani!!!

We were all excited for the holiday traditions that we get to be a part of when we visit Grandma and Grandpa. We had two pictorial sessions. A casual dressed day with all the grand kids and then again on Christmas day with everyone all dressed in their Sunday best. There are 25 grand kids. As you look at the pictures you can see there are more boys then girls. There are 15 boys and 10 girls. On paper it doesn't seem to be a big difference but pictures sure do tell a different
story.

Everyone had trickled into town by Saturday night except Eric left behind to work. Sunday my brother Marc blessed his baby Rebecca and we all crashed at the homestead for a delicious meal. The rest of the day we visited and just hung out . Uncle Todd and Uncle Aaron were the best. They had most of the grand kids outside playing red rover, running relay races, and just plain wearing the kids out so they would sleep.

Luckily 2 of my sisters live close by my parents so we were able to separate at night and calm some of the chaos. Monday we packed our day full. We had the kids pictures in the afternoon at EAC (Leilani was the lucky photographer), Then we ate an early dinner at Casa Manana. Thanks to Kuliana for thinking of ordering ahead of time so we didn't have to hang out with 25 under the age of 16 waiting for food. After eating we headed to Mom and Dad's house where the children got to ride in a little train pulled by a tractor. (Same train from the carnival but this time there was only 8 cars.) The children all loved it! After the train ride was the family home evening talent show. It was alot of fun watching the children perform in various ways. It was a night never to forget. At the last minute we invited Aunt Leora and her crew over to join us. Aunt Leora was a good sport as we used her in our Mexican horse race. What memories we will all have for years to come.

This picture is of my nephew Kale he is 14. He has carried on my fathers tradition of performing the fire knife dance, he did AWESOME.

Tuesday we had no plans, thank goodness, because it rained and was cold! But it didn't stop the kids from having fun with all of their cousins. Kalebs favorite thing to do was to ride the quads. Every minute he could he was out riding, he would have been out there all day and night if we had let him. All the other boys loved it too but I think he did the most.

Tuesday Lehua and Leilani were in charge of the food. Per my request they rolled lumpia made California rolls, yellow coconut curry, rice and loaded brownies. Due to the nature of the lumpia it took them all afternoon to prepare. I was suppose to help in all this rolling but I was waiting for my mom to get back from the doctors before heading up to Lehua's. (More about this later in a different post.) Since I missed out on the rolling they put me to work deep frying all the lumpia. It was well worth the effort as it tasted great! Wednesday was Christmas Eve. The long awaited day. Not only because it was Christmas Eve but Eric was finally joining us. We all met at Pizza Hut and created mass chaos as we brought all the troops into the restaurant. Eric arrived 15minutes into the chaos, he was my knight in shining armor coming to rescue me. We had called ahead and ordered our pizzas and also told them there would be more then 50 of us coming. Unfortunately they were not as organized as Casa. They had some of the pizza's cooked and on the tables but they hadn't brought any cups or pitchers of soda. It took some time but we finally got everyone fed.

We then headed out for Christmas Caroling. We stopped at several of our relatives homes to drop off goodies and to sing. The grandchildren loved it!

Next we headed to the church where we reenacted the nativity. All the children picked what they were going to be.

After the play, the children all sat down for the long awaited candy bar story. It was a very successful night full of more memories.

Throughout the week the grand kids were intermingled, sleeping at different houses nightly. We didn't want to confuse Santa so on Christmas Eve we each gathered our own children and made them sleep at the homes we were staying in. We had decided just to stay at the different homes and open presents etc..

By lunch time several of us headed to Mom and Dad's to wish them a Merry Christmas and to get the kids out of the house. We were there a few hours before we again separated to get ready for the pictures. We were all very glad when they were done. Trying to organize 40 people for a picture is not easy. Aunt Leora snapped the pictures with Bam's camera as we stood there, hoping to get at least one decent shot. Thank goodness for digital cameras!

Friday morning the Mom's(Sister's) all decided to go on a bike ride and the Dad's prepared to head out on a ATV, dirt bike, rhino ride. The women headed out first. The day started out cold and dreary. We headed out all covered up. As we began our ride, it started hailing on us. Not big hail but small hail that felt like thousands of little needles being shot at us. Our faces really took the brunt of the hail as that was the only part of our bodies not covered up. Our cheeks felt numb like going to the dentist. On our way back we were tempted to head to Aunt Leora's so we could call the guys to pick us up in the truck but resisted. We would never have lived it down if we did so we surged forward. It sure was a lot further then remembered. But it was another adventure that we will never forget!

When we got back the guys were just leaving on their adventure. They also froze as they rode up into the snow on their motorbikes and ATV's. Crazy, crazy, crazy! What we will do for a little fun and a lot of torture!

We were planning on a trip to the movies to watch Bedtime Stories but the guys were too exhausted as were we. We ended up dropping the older kids off at the 9:00pm movie and then the sisters went out for dessert to kill time. After dessert we headed to Kameron's house(Kuliana's sister-in-law) to waste away the rest of the time. We were all so tired, a few of us even dosed off for a few minutes. When we picked up the kids it was snowing!!! We couldn't get to the respective homes fast enough. We had definitely over exhorted ourselves this day!

Saturday when we woke up there was still some snow on the ground to our Kids delight. They were so excited and headed outside to enjoy it before it melted.

Eric wanted to take me out on Lehua & Aaron's rhino so we bundled up again with Hayden and Traekon (cousin) and headed out. It was probably 33 degrees outside and it was freezing. The boys loved it but as for me....NO. I didn't mind most of it but coming down this huge hill, NO Thank you I got out! I wish I would of had my camera to take a picture of it. Eric said it was a little freaky at first when he first started down cause you couldn't see the ground. The boys cheered all the way down, they even went back for a second decent. When we got back Eric and I headed to Casa to meet Eric's brothers Sean and Scott and their wives Sarah and Cami. We had a great time, Sean and Sarah live in Georgia and we see them only once a year. After that to finish off the day we took the little kids to see Bedtime Stories.

Sunday morning we loaded up and headed home. It was good to get home and to my own bed. Hayden was ready to have his own territory back, he was the big bully to all the little kids. He needed his own space to breath again. We had a great time and we all loved it!