My People

One night we were all dressed in real clothes and on our way in to town. 

 The sun was just settling into another perfect sunset so I made everyone stop to take a few pictures. This was their response.

 Until I gave them the stink eye.

 Then almost everybody shaped up.

 I couldn't decide which of these two I liked better.

 top or bottom?

 Never ones to be idle Garrett and drew took the opportunity to do a little tree climbing.

 I adore this picture of these two best friends and think bringing Isabel along for Brynne was the smartest thing I've done in years!

My cute Garrett

I love the way that my boys look out for little Brynne.  They are awesome big brothers

 And to think that we are to blame for this crazy and slightly irreverent group of people!

Twin Falls

Along the Road to Hana there was a stop we wanted to make but ran out of day light.  We determined to come back later in the week.

Twin Falls is just a couple of miles in on the Road to Hana and from the highway just looks like a mere fruit stand with a gravel parking lot.

 If you know better you take advantage of the parking lot and follow the trail along side the fruit stand and walk a couple of miles along a wide gravel road until you come to the first swimming hole and water fall.

 Many explorers only make it that far and still the journey is worth it but if you follow along the river for another quarter of a mile there is another swimming hole and waterfall even bigger and better!

It looks like something from a story book with all the tree roots and greenery around!

We stuck around here and swam for a bit but knew there were even more places to explore further along.

We hiked through the jungle on a fairly easy to follow trail and made our way over to the second river that flows through the area 

Just as gorgeous as the first with several falls of it's own

The boys practiced their flips at the next swimming hole

And had fun climbing the crazy trees growing at the edge of the pool

There were several good places to jump from and Garrett took full advantage of them all in spite of the brace he was still wearing on his ankle

Drew followed in his every footstep

Definitely a great spot and easy hike for a family and can easily make a day of it

Twin falls had way more than two falls worth mentioning and plenty of fun for all!

More from Paradise

As I was out on my morning run I stopped quickly to take a picture of the little pathway the I was running on the the gorgeous beach that was quickly filling up.  Ahhh I really love it here!

We had gotten the kids off early to ride jet skis out in the ocean, the second of their chosen activities. I was surprised that they all had decided on the same things. Kite surfing and a sunrise bike ride down the volcano were tight in the running, but the jet skiing won out.  

When I came in from my run I found we had two injured kids!  Lindsey was just a few months recovering from knee surgery and all the impact on her knee had it a bit swollen and pretty sore

And Garrett had a very sprained ankle. It had swelled up to the size of a softball.  But ask him how it happened and the kids face broke out into the hugest grin so typical of this boy.  It was his first time driving a jet ski ever, and here he was driving over huge waves in the ocean.  Crazy kid decided he'd try to do a barrel roll on the dang thing and poor Drew was riding behind him as passenger! Naturally they completely crashed and somehow his ankle got mangled in the process but they both swore it was super fun!  

With two of the four big kids a bit broken we spent the next couple of days  just hanging out around the pool at the resort.

I'm certain Brynne is part fish with how much that little girl loves to swim

Cute Izzie was always so sweet helping Brynne with her goggles and making sure she wasn't too tired out.  

We bought the two little girls inner tubes that got plenty of use all week long!

 We played hours of volleyball in the pool

Little Drew is money with his serve and helped our team win a couple of matches.

And right next to the volleyball net is this cute little kids pirate ship and play area!

Every once in a while Brynne would get a bit tuckered out and climb up onto my lap and curl up for a bit.  I loved every minute of it.

If my lap wasn't occupied then I couldn't go too long with out having a face pop up into mine kinda like this!

 Or I 'd have a cute man child climb up onto the end of my chair giving me the single eyebrow raise as to what was on the agenda next.

As usual, Drew kept us entertained. This time by randomly joining a yoga class mid session in front of another hotel

Or by being thrown into the the pool by Garrett fully dressed.

Really though it didn't matter what we were up to how can you not be having a good time in a setting like this?

 One morning the boys gut up and tried a bit of surfing.  

 The waves hadn't been good all week so the going was rough, but I thought they looked good out there regardless

 Most evenings we found Izzie and Brynne curled up together completely spent from the sun and swimming for hours on end

 With so many of us we found it was much easier and considerably lighter on the wallet to take advantage of the grills out by the pool at the resort. Every night we grilled up steak, burgers, fish or chicken and had fresh fruits for dinner. 

With limited seating we had to get a little creative to accommodate all 8 of us!

This was typically our view over dinner. Yes it was VERY hard to come back home!