Thanksgiving with the Nahinu Family

I am so thankful to have family here on the island! This Thanksgiving I stayed at my mom's cousin's house in Wainae, Hawaii. They are such an amazing family. Brandi is married and has three children - two gorgeous little girls and a baby boy in Heaven. They are always willing to take me in, despite the two hour drive around the island. I am so thankful for them!

Kapono, Brandi, Montana, and Ke'iwa

Ke'iwa loves wearing my glasses. She always wears them when I come! Hopefully they won't make her blind like me!!

In the backyard of Auntie Thell's house. It is absolutely gorgeous. 

Thanksgiving day began with a ward Turkey Bowl! Oh side note - in choir, when they announced "Turkey Bowl", the majority of the people had absolutely no idea what that meant. They asked, "oh...is that where you play football with a turkey or something?...Oh, that must be it. How strange." Ha! I laughed to myself. But I digress. We had to wake up very early to get to the game. Dallin and Kapono (Brandi's husband) were dropped off at the park with the kids and Brandi and I went to go get breakfast for the ward. It was a very busy day! After running around getting last minute things and then watching the men play football, we went back home to get ready to eat. (I also got to talk to my family in Colorado...probably the best part of the day :) I wanted so bad to be with them!!)
We went to eat at a million dollar house about 45 minutes from Brandi's house. It was Kapono's side of the family, so I didn't know anybody at all. The house was gorgeous (it's amazing, though, the difference between a million dollar house in Hawaii and a million dollar house on the mainland - you don't get nearly as much for your money here). There was a big patio in the backyard with a big gazebo type of covering and we all ate there. There were probably 40 people there! I met so many people but I don't remember anybody's name. I just call everyone 'auntie' ha. That's the Hawaiian way! The food was delicious and the people were so welcoming. I felt so thankful for all I have.
After we ate, Dallin and I went to a movie. While I loved being with a family, I just needed some calm time to myself that wasn't tense and where I didn't have to keep recognizing people I didn't know. We saw the Muppet's Movie! It was so funny! I needed that laugh. Dallin loooves the Muppets so that was probably his favorite part of the day! We had a great time. Then Brandi picked us up and we headed back to her house. It wasn't my normal Thanksgiving at home, but it was still something! It made me miss home more than ever because holidays away from home are just never the same. But Christmas is right around the corner. Only a few more weeks! I cannot wait :)

The Sad Result of Boredom

I don't know if I have said this before, but without a car here, there is nothing to do!! So one Saturday Dallin and I decided to go to the beach and just take a bunch of pictures. A very fun cure to boredom, if you ask me. We were determined to get a jumping picture perfect. It took a ton of tries with my little camera on a timer!

Take One: Dallin jumped the gun.

Take two: Dallin covered his face as if he were Zorro.

Take three: Dallin jumped the gun again.

Take four: WIN.

Now, at this point we needed some variety, so we decided to do a heel click. We put my camera on the mode that takes a few pictures at once and on the first try, we were COMPLETELY synced with each other! Observe! 

Frame one: Prepare...

Frame two: JUMP!...

Frame three: Land! (Ignore how ridiculous I look in all of these, please!!)

So, in our excitement, we had to show our success!!

And I just think this one is so silly so that's why I had to put it up :)

Someday, we will look back at these pictures and realize how ridiculous we were, but as of now, we are just bored, poor, and very crazy college kids!!

Birthdays

Today is my best friend in the whole world's birthday! Nicole Curtis turns 20 today. How old! I was just reminiscing on the good ole days and had to share.


When I think about birthdays, well mostly when I think about Nicole's and my birthday, I am reminded of the days when we both lived in Colorado and did joint birthday parties. Those were so much fun! Nicole's mom always made the most amazing cakes that were perfectly decorated in the most creative ways. She made a smiley face cake one year that was so adorable! And then she made a monkey cake that was the cutest cake ever. Nicole and I had to have monkey parties! (We both still LOVE monkeys.) There were many more, but my memory is terrible. 


All of my memories are kind of linked through different things. When I think about birthdays, I think about Nicole's old house. Oh, how I miss it! I remember when we used to gather every pillow in the house and find the slipperiest sleeping bags and slide down the stairs over and over and over until Patty had to tell us to stop! So then we would take the sleeping bags down to her basement and lay them out and have wars on them. Once we got bored with that, we would blow up tiny plastic balloons with little straws. You know, the kind of balloons that come in really small tubes? Anyways, we would blow those up, and make balloon sculptures until I earned the nickname "Da Bubbly" because I loved those so much. After blowing up balloons, we could proceed to play Pacman on Nicole's computer. Nicole was such a pro!! I think that is how she earned the name "Da Button." So from then on, we were Da Bubbly and Da Button! How silly! I still love it :) 
It seemed we were inseparable. Then, the more than terrible day came that Nicole had to move to Washington. I still remember her coming to my house to say goodbye, then returning one more time after I was already asleep to say goodbye one last time. We were both a mess! And those were two girls who did not cry! We were tough, but somehow not tough enough. It seemed to me like the end of the world. Who was I supposed to hang out with every single weekend? Who was going to come over for Thanksgiving and Easter and cause a ruckus with me? Where would I go every Halloween for a haunted house? It seemed to be the worst thing that ever happened to me. 


But it was all okay! I took many trips to Seattle over the years to help me to get my "Nicole fix". We made it a point to do something crazy every time we saw each other, so maybe her move wasn't too bad after all. It really made me so much more thankful for our friendship and the amazing person she was to me. We went indoor skydiving (twice), para-sailing, went to drive-in movies until 2am, took tons and tons of pictures, and spilled our souls to each other! And we have yet to go skydiving, but it will happen! (There is a place out here we can go, Cole, so if you come out to visit ever, we WILL do it!!) Seattle became my new favorite place to travel.


Then college happened. And boy is it crazy! Now, we are thousands and thousands of miles away, but I feel closer to Nicole than ever before. We don't talk nearly as often as I'd like (we are both so busy and the time difference is such a little bugger!) but every time we talk I feel it has only been a few days. I love her with all my heart and I am so thankful for a friend like Nicole in my life. I hope everyone in this world has a "Nicole" in their life like I do! 


So on this wonderful November 19th, the happiest day of the year, I would like to wish Nicole Curtis all the happiness and joy the world has to offer. I can't wait until we meet again. Love ya, girl!!

I just did something CrAzY

I did something absolutely crazy today! Oh man. I guess I should start from the beginning.

So there is this girl. Her name is Rachel. She has a problem with me, but I have no idea what I ever did. All I ever do is say hello to her. It makes it worse because she is my neighbor so I see her all the time, but she refuses to make eye contact or say hello in return. I know this isn't just her personality because when I met her at the start, she was very friendly and seemed very excited to meet me. She even invited me to walk with her to church so she could show me how to get there. (She never followed through though even when I asked her in person...which should have been my first sign that I offended her or something, but I digress...) After that, she started avoiding me at all costs. I thought maybe she simply had a small soul...but she had a big soul around other people! I sat next to her in church and then she moved. I sat near her in choir and she moved. I sat next to her in this stake choir performance and she moved. I say hello to her and she looks the other way. It didn't matter to me at first, but now I just feel really terrible and wonder what I did. I know I shouldn't feel this way, but it is kind of offensive now. And this girl who I met who was super nice is now friends with Rachel and won't talk to me either. And this girl is so mean about it - at least Rachel is good at pretending she doesn't see me... She doesn't even try to hide that she dislikes me. All I know about her is her name!! How could she possibly hate me that much already?! I always always always try to smile at them and just say a simple hello, but it is always in vain.

Well, I hit my last straw tonight. I walked into the cafeteria and Rachel left, which I am sure had nothing to do with me, it is just a delicious cherry on top of one of those days, then when I was going back to my room, I opened the door and saw a girl in a hurry. It was Rachel's rude friend and I held the door wide open for her without hesitation. She looked straight ahead and didn't even acknowledge my existence with that same "I am pretending you aren't human" look. Is it too much to ask for a thank you for holding the door for you while you were obviously in a hurry? I didn't say hello this time, so that should have required a thank you, too!!  I know it must seem as if I am overreacting, but this has been going on since school started. I just don't know what to do.

I take it back. I do know what to do. And I did it. I did something crazy! I wrote Rachel a note! Ah! Crazy, huh?? And it looked something like this:

I did not sign my name, because that would be a bit weird. It is comforting to me that no matter what she does at this point, no matter how rude her and her friends are to me, I helped her to have a good day without her even knowing it. It is much better than treating her the same way she treats me--that is childish. I have no idea what is going on in her life so I cannot judge why she immediately walks the other direction when she sees me (yes, that happens, too). But she is missing out on a great smile everyday! So hopefully that will make up for whatever I possibly could have done in the first few moments of meeting her.

I got this!

So last time I posted I just had an explosion of emotion that had to be released. It was such a rough week with it being fall (my favorite time of the year) and so different than I expected. But I have turned over a new leaf! (Hehe...get it?...leaf?...) Things are much better now. I am much more tolerant of my roommate, I am making a lot more friends, and I am actually improving my singing! Yay!

I went to a fireside on Sunday and it was amazing. Exactly what I needed to hear. It was mostly about dating/getting married/having children, but interestingly enough, that is not what I got out of it at all. The parts that stood out to me were about self improvement and coming closer to Christ. President Whiting, the president of BYUH, said something that really struck me. He said that it is a commandment to be perfect and we all need to set a date when we will achieve that commandment. First we should make a reasonable list, then start checking off things on the list as efficiently as possible. The first thing that came to my head when I thought of a list of things I can do better was negative judgments. So many times, I have been so quick to judge people based on one small encounter where either they were having a bad day, or I was. It isn't fair to anyone to judge someone based on that.
Here is an example. That girl who never let me eat because she said I was dressed immodestly (which still isn't true) is actually really nice! She is in my ward now and I talked to her on Sunday and she is so sweet. I really like her. Now whenever she is working it is a nice hello instead of awkward stares! Hooray! Another example: There is this girl who always said negative things and comes off a bit stuck up because of how she acts and dresses, but she apologized for speaking her mind so much the other day and bam! She is so cool and a really fun person to hang out with. We also had an awesome chat about the amazing Sutton Foster, so more points there! Everyone just has so much to offer no matter what and you miss out on so much if you can't get past the first hello.
So the first thing that I am checking off my list is judging people and making negative comments. I have already started to see an improvement! It's amazing. My list is extremely long, but the day that I want to check everything off is the day I get set apart as a missionary of the Lord. I can do it!

While I am here, I might as well show you the most delicious dessert that Dallin and I had the other night. Good thing I am not huge yet! (That in itself is an accomplishment!)

 This is a banana sunday. It has tons of cut up bananas on the bottom, followed by three scoops of ice cream--macadamia nut, cookies n cream, and dolce de lece--topped with caramel, hot fudge, condensed milk, whip cream, and three maraschino cherries! Mmmmm!