Gardens & Wigglegram

Yesterday we went to Kaneohe to the Ho'omaluhia Botanical Gardens.

It really was more like going for a walk in nature than being in a garden, as there weren't many flowers but that Blue Marble Tree!  Isn't that a cool name for a tree!  ha ha It casts its blue “marbles” all over the ground.   Right next to it was a beautiful tree with yellow starfish flowers! :) I don’t know the name of it but I would name it the Yellow Starfish Tree.  Yellow flowers and purple marbles lying amidst mulchy browns and green grass...oooo would be a lovely fabric design.  I took a pic but it didn’t turn out very well.      

 




  The other tree I just adored is one that I would name “Parrot Tree”.   It looked like little parrots all over the trees.  I wish there were trees or plants that could make a noise.  This tree would sound so amazing! 

32 acres next to the beautiful Ko'olau Mountains

Last night we attended the Cook Island performers in the Hukilau Marketplace Pacific Theater.  They are excellent and so energetic! Here is a wigglegram via Andrew's app "Scopi" of a Cook Island dance scene.  Kind of fun to take a wigglegram of hula dancing ha ha!  That’s what we should call us grandmas who do the hula...wigglegrams. hehehe

Cook Islanders performing at the PCC

It was all a lovely Saturday after a very busy week!  We have been doing "perception analysis" with the old canoe pageant and the new Huki pageant.  We invite about 30 guests to come and using little dials, they rate whether what they are seeing is boring or awesome.  :)

Part of our team:  Chris, Abram, Dexter, Hui Lam...
setting things up for analysis.

A scene from the new and very awesome "Huki Canoe Celebration"

 

This is our research office Ohana
Chris, me, Tsai-Yi (Taiwan), AJ (Philippians), Abram (WA),
Del (CA), Helam (Hong Kong), Junha (Korea) 

4th of July

Chris's description of 4th of July: 

We accepted the challenging job with the bouncy houses. 

                  
The kids removed their shoes and for the most part had a great time.  At one point in the evening, some of the kids were getting a little rough so Debbie asked if I would trade houses with her.  I observed the same roughness and went in as the bouncy bouncer.  

After my eloquent speech, many of the trouble makers left and then promptly went over to my former house her new house.  I'm not sure that helped her at all,
especially after we had a couple of deflates during the evening.  Debbie had to try and hold the collapsing house up while she evacuated her bouncy house.

We had about 12,800 visitors to the PCC on the 4^th.  One of the parking lots was closed off for the activity which made parking even more of a challenge for the evening.

This cool photo is done via Andrews app called Scopi!  It's a wigglegram.
I Love wigglegrams!

About 8:45, we rode our bikes down to the soccer field at BYU-H and watched the fireworks show professional 12 minute show by Grucci great show.

Tom & Sharilyn

Sea Life Park

Hawaii throws flowers at our feet every day!  ha ha!  I love it when plumeria are so plentiful!  We made six leis last week for missionaries that were going home and now we have made two more for Tom & Shar's arrival!  We gathered blossoms mostly off the ground around the BYU campus!

 We had such a fun time with Tom and Sharilyn here.  It was a quick trip and they said "Not enough time in Hawaii but too much time away from the kids."  Ha ha  We can all relate to that.  We're thankful Andrea could watch the kids so they could come.

Beautiful Laie

We always have such fun playing this game - made & invented by a
couple senior missionary brothers.

Little Chirpers

We have a little house pet that lives behind the quilt that hangs on our wall.  I named him Chirpers.  Did you know that geckos are little chirpers!   I like their sound.  It was sad day on Friday because we opened our front door and ...well, have you ever had your finger pinched in a door as it slams shut?  Poor little Chirpers was there in the pinching place, flattened like a pressed flower ready for a scrapbook.  Sad day.  But as it turned out, that evening we heard him again behind the quilt.   I guess the flat one must have been a friend of his.

Ham radio license!

Exciting day!  I just passed my ham radio exam!!  Yahoo!  And so did Debbie Day!  Pheww!  It was labor intensive evenings learning all that material but I loved it!

I love walking to work on mowing day!  These beautiful Egrets flock around the mower with their hungry appetites! 

Such of cute picture of Chris at the Mission Settlement today!

Aj, me and Hui Lam ready for an assignment :)

Painting flowers

Hibiscus near the ticket office

Flowers in Hawaii are so generous to us.  They bloom everyday.  We pick them to make leis and put them in our hair and we don't worry that we are picking the bush bare...new flowers come out the next day.

I wish all of life were a garden.  So much of life is strewn with rocks and thistle so we just pull the thistle and paint flowers on the rocks!  ha ha

It's not always as it seems but these gardens do seem to just grow on their own.  Our gardens back home need us to help them grow in their little piece of space and we need them to help us have a little peace in our space.

Thank you God, for little things
That often come our way...
The things we take for granted
But don't mention when we pray...
The unexpected courtesy,
The thoughtful, kindly deed...
A hand reached out to help us
In the time of sudden need...
Oh, make us more aware, dear God,
Of little daily graces
That come to us with "sweet surprise"
From never dreamed of places.
(poem by Helen Steiner Rice)

Twins Graduation!

Such an exciting time!  Two more Master's Degrees added to the family!  Since they were graduating on the same day and so far from each other, Andrew & Hannah decided to surprise Andrea and come to Washington! He came with robes and all so they could be together on their graduation day!

Surprising Andrea at the airport!

Such a delightful happy day to gather with some of our children and grandchildren!

We love and miss our amazing family!!!

It was a beautiful sunny spring day in Spokane.

It’s not happy people who are grateful, it is grateful people who are happy.”