Happy 7th Birthday Syrah

Happy Birthday to our baby girl...

Syrah is celebrating her 7th birthday today. Syrah enjoys reading, playing soccer, family game times, animal crossing, her dog Ava, school, the color yellow and cuddle time.

Syrah has a big heart that is full of energy and spirit. Syrah is a great girl who we feel so blessed to have been given the opportunity to raise us as the gift from God she is. She has a bubbling personality, a contagious giggle, a willingness to try new things, a bight smile, an openness to challenges and a warm heart.

A picture looking back:

Hard to believe how fast these years fly by, but oh do we feel blessed that we have each moment we do!!

Happy Birthday Syrah!!

Birthday Celebrations

We started the day off by celebrating Syrah with one of her favorite breakfast foods; coffee cake! We were able to share this special morning with her Uncle Jake, Aunt Jaime and cousins Koen & McKayla.

Syrah had a super fun day and we ended it with a great dinner with some very special friends:

Syrah really wanted to go to Red Robin for her birthday dinner so we did! She was overjoyed to find out our dearest friends would be joining us (The Caceres Family - thank you for joining us, we loved it!). When they came to sing to her, it was AWESOME! These are the only two shots we have because all of us were laughing SO hard! Both Syrah and I were in tears with laughter!

All and all I think she enjoyed the day celebrating her life!

Happy Birthday little Brother

Sunday we got to celebrate my little brother's birthday (as you can see he is 4!). Actually Lauren put four candles on the cake because growing up they always did 4 candles

One for past

One for the present

One for the future and...

One to grow on!

Happy Birthday Eric ~ We love you!!

Soccer Season

It's another soccer season... Syrah is loving it!!

final goodbyes to Maui

It is sad to say, but our trip to Maui is now merely a memory! We had such a great time and we felt the time spent with our family was priceless. I have so many pictures that I am going to let them doing the talking...

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Goodbye Maui, we took memories that will last among generations! Thank you Grandma Connie for the gift of this once in a lifetime trip!

Postcards from Maui....

There are so many pictures to choose from!

Day 3 we drove into Lahaina - this is one of the first things we saw as we came into town!

Love it!

In Lahaina they have this enormous Banyan tree; it has an amazing story about it's start as a seedling with the celebration of missionary work being done in Lahaina; you can read more about this amazing tree (this picture does not EVEN come close to doing this tree justice) here.

That evening we had a family dinner outside!

My wonderful husband and me!!!!

The beautiful sunset!

One of Syrah's favorite things to do here is swim and that she has done a lot of!!

Day 4 we went on a road trip on the Road to Hana

This road is very twisty and turny so needless to say I took some Dramamine because I have a tendency to get car sick on a "normal" road. There was NO WAY to capture the amount of twists and turns. In addition there were many (close to 50) one lane bridges.

Sadie checking out the view (Syrah slept!)

This is a road to Wai'anapanapa State park which is wear you will find Black Sand!

This is my brother taking in the view; the water had a jelly fish warning so he was the only one brave enough to put his feet in. I had never seen black sand before and I was quite amazed. The sand is VERY hot!!!

At this same spot there are a few lava caves; this is one that we entered and Sadie was taking in the view from the shoreline within the cave.

One of the many views from above the black sand beach.

Later we drove to Pi'ilanihale Heiau and Kahanu Gardens which is the largest sacrificial heiau in Hawaii.

These grounds were on a botanical garden; here is the family in the midst of the sugar cane.

I have several pictures, but this one of Syrah gives you a small indication of how HUGE this heiau is. The original heiau was built in the thirteenth century and was extended by the High Chief Pi'ilani, who came from the western side of Maui in 1570 and conquered the chiefs of the fertile Hana region. You can read a bit more about the Pi'ilanihale Heiau by clicking here.

On the grounds of Kahanu Garden's Sadie found this huge coconut! It's bigger then her head!!

Just a great picture of my guy on the grounds!

On the road back from Hana we stopped to take in some of the sights and to snap a few photos! Here is one of the beautiful waterfalls we saw along the way.

This is just ONE of many, many, many beautiful views along the way.

It is very hard to tell, but this is a one lane bridge; I just love it! I love the flowers cascading from the trees over the bridge!

Day 5 - I hardly took any pictures on this day. We spent the morning snorkeling; this was the second attempt, but the first was not successful. This day however we spent HOURS checking out all kinds of fish and both Sadie and Syrah LOVED IT!


After a long day of snorkeling we came back and had some down time reading and then went out and got a quick treat... Syrah's first shaved ice.

The girls and I enjoying a cool treat!