The Blissfully Happy Housewife: Hawaii 2013

We recently got back from an amazing vacation in Hawaii!!! I've wanted to visit Hawaii since I was - I kid you not - about 5 years old. When I was little I would go to our county fair and pick up Hawaii brochures from the travel agencies that had booths there. I would take them home and just POUR over them. I did this for YEARS. So it's fair to say that when the company my husband works for announced that the destination for this years company trip was Hawaii I was just a LITTLE bit excited. It's also fair to say that I took an INSANE amount of pictures while on this trip. 608 to be exact. I won't bore you with alllll of them, but I do want to share some. I figured to keep it somewhat broke up I'd just post a few each day for the next few days. Enjoy!

I should begin by mentioning that it was a 9 hour flight to get to Hawaii. I wasn't sure how Eva and Jaden would do (Greyson stayed home since this was a business trip and I knew he wouldn't handle it well). On top of that, once we got there we had a 6 hour time change. I could not BELIEVE how well Eva and Jaden did. They were so good on the long flight, never even watching a movie!! They would color, read, and work on homework. I was amazed and so proud of them!

This is the view from our balcony. I watched the sunrise nearly every single morning and loved it. We had a 6 hour time difference so I was easily up waaaaay before the sun was!

Our new little friend. She would swim up to the shore in the mornings and crash!!! One tired little sea pup! We loved her and she visited often!

Jaden spending some time with our seal friend!

These cuties would visit each morning too!!! I wanted to snuggle one and kept trying, but couldn't get close enough. The last day I actually swam out to one....but he was gone by the time I got out far enough! Stinker.

Paddle boarding with my little girl! This was something that Eva had talked about doing before we even left for Hawaii!! I was so glad she was able to experience it.

Daddy and Jaden paddle boarding!

The resort we stayed at had an entire section of sharks, another section full of stingrays, and yet another section full of tropical fish, eels, and starfish. We could walk right down to them!! Jaden loved it. He would just sit there and spend time with the sharks.

We decided to tackle climbing Diamond Head (an extinct volcano on the island).

I had done some researching on various hiking trails on Oahu and thought Diamond Head would be a good choice for our family. It was absolutely amazing, but it wasn't the easiest hike!! We were hiking up a volcano, so the trail was steep and rocky. Some of our friends tried hiking it and ended up turning around and not making it to the top! That being said, the kiddos did fantastic and loved it!!

At one point we had to go in a tunnel through part of the volcano. Not good for anyone claustophobic as it was not a big tunnel!!! Ha!

Diamond head was important during WWII because it allowed a clear view across the ocean. There is a bunker that you have to crawl into towards the top of it. Again, it's a tight squeeze....I had to get on my hands and knees to get in!!