Hawaii 2023--Buffie & Chris:)

     This year just lined up perfectly for me.  My piano recitals were early this month--Saturday, Dec. 2nd--and Chris didn't leave until Tuesday, Dec. 5th for Hawaii.  So he was here to help me set up/take down my recitals AND I got to go with him to Hawaii!!!  With our youngest now driving, it was just a matter of re-scheduling a few students and then I was OFF TO HAWAII for five days!!!  

    The last time I was in Hawaii was in March 2015 and the only time I'd been to the Pearl Harbor festivities with Chris was December 2011--their very FIRST year of the Pearl Harbor parade.  Boy, have things changed in 12 years.  This year was the 82nd anniversary of the event.  Only two Pearl Harbor survivors remain--the oldest one is 102!!!  They had 90 entries in their parade and everything ran amazingly well.  Chris is in charge of the whole event and man, he sure has a TON of details to work out each year.  I was impressed with his direction and leadership through the event.  I was in charge of a few things--Mignon (Bert's wife) and I got to walk at the very front of the parade to get to the end to set up the trophies/medals for the finish--but not to brag or anything but we got a few cheers ourselves😂. There was a fun little "after-party" that the Marines' Band played music for.  It was so cool to see all these teenagers come together after walking a mile in a parade and still having the energy for a major DANCE PARTY!!!  There was crowd-surfing and everything!  After the last number played by the Marines' Band, the kids ALL began chanting, "USA! USA!!!"  It seriously gave me the chills.  It was nice to see these young kids proud to be American (which we don't see much of these days).

I got zero pics of the parade but here a a few highlights of our trip:

*We got to fly first-class AND stay at the Royal Hawaiian (the pink hotel/resort that opened in 1927)

Cool sand sculpture at the Royal Hawaiian Center

Love the Banyan Trees

*On Friday (after the parade was over), we went to Kualoa Ranch.  I had been there in 2011 but had never done the ATV tour so we did that this year.  We were at the very tail end of our group so I'm pretty sure we were the dirtiest.  But boy was it worth it!!!  The views were breath-taking and it was really cool to see parts of the movie sets for Jurassic Park, Jumangi, & Kong.

Kong movie set

Jurassic Park

I got to drive (because Chris forgot his license)

The AZ Gang:
The Conways, Meekers, & Johnsons

Funny/small world story:  One of our guides (Ericka H.) was from Tempe, AZ.  She told us the crossroads of where she grew up and where her parents still live.  Come to find out, she is the next door neighbor of Tatum's pitching coach--Lisa.  Funny thing is that many softballs end up in their yard and Ericka's mom likes to do her own yard work.  I guess it's the "neighborhood joke" because even Tatum & Chris have witnessed this lady blowing her leaves like at 7/8:00 pm Monday nights.  But she insists on doing her own yard work and won't let her husband hire anyone else to do it:)

Man I looked RIDICULOUS but couldn't resist taking a few pics of myself before I jumped in the shower.  This is what I would look like with a uni-brow😂

Thankfully, we had just enough time to go back to our hotel to shower and get ready for the luau that night at Paradise Grove.  Perfect ending to a perfect day/trip:

The food was incredible and the show was amazing.  The fire-dancers were hands down the best part:

    It was sure nice to sneak away for a few days to paradise.  I'm hoping to make this a yearly event. Mele Kalikimaka🎄