What Happens In Hawaii...

...Stays with your forever.

I saw that saying on a post-it note and immediately thought how appropriate it is. (And not just for my sister Cami who conceived her oldest child while on vacation here.) I've been longing to come back here ever since our visit four years ago.

Today was a very low-key day. First of all we got a lot of rain. Oh it was sunny at times too, but it did rain on and off all day long. This of course meant that the waves were big and the ocean was choppy. I wouldn't have wanted to be in it, but it did look amazing! And really these photos don't do it justice at all. In person you have the full effect of the ocean breeze & the salty air and the pounding surf. I just love to drink it all in!

Because of all the rain, you had alot of water run off from the mountains which look like thin little waterfalls. Paired with the low hanging clouds the effect is really magical.

We drove into town today to the outlet malls. I was kind of wishing we hadn't brought children with us this trip because I could have spent some time and done some major shopping there. They have awesome stores! But we only went into a couple of places and then took the trolley over to get Malasadas.

The kids of course loved the trolley ride so that was a good choice!

Malasadas are a divine Portugese doughnut that's dipped in either powdered sugar (or my personal favorite) cinnamon sugar. They fill them on site with either custard, chocolate or haupia. Haupia is the best is a coconut based type of cream. They are scrumptious and it took us until the last day of our vacation to finally get some! There are bakeries that sell them, but they're just as yummy from a truck!

After our trip to town we headed back to Skye & Ryan's via the North Shore. We spent the afternoon visiting and spending time with them. We grilled some bratwurst and got our suitcases packed and ready to go. Parker, as usual got tired and cranky very early in the evening. We gave her a bottle of milk and after it got quiet, this is how we found her.

And that's kind of the perfect image to end this vacation. We've worn ourselves out. We've had such an amazing trip and I'm so very sad we're having to leave already. I'm already trying to plot in my mind how to get back here in the next year sometime. There are just more memories waiting to be made!