happy birthday campbell!

Today is Campbell's sixth birthday! "Champ" or "CW" as he is often referred to, is my nephew who lives in Missouri. He is a very kind hearted, bright boy who loves to talk and talk and talk, using vocabulary that most kids his age don't understand. We sure will miss having him and his family here for our family reunion this weekend. We love you Campbell! Happy Birthday!

embarrassment

Update: The following happened to Dave (not Holly). We apologize for the confusion. :)

This last Sunday, after unloading our girls, diaper bags, manuals, scriptures, and kitchen sinks from the car and heading into our local chapel (Right on time, of course! And by "right on time," I mean "20 minutes late."), I paid a quick visit to the men's restroom.

As I was leaving (still in the doorway), a fellow church-goer passed in front of me, moving quickly. I took a step back and to the left in an effort to avoid a collision. In doing so, I unknowingly hooked one of my back pockets onto the claw-like handle of a drawer that was built into the hallway wall—just to the left to the restroom door. I began to walk away (in my memory, this next part happens in slow-motion) and the inevitable ripping sound followed. I stopped. One of my eyes twitched involuntarily. I felt a light breeze on the back of my legs, that under normal circumstances, would have been refreshing, but in these abnormal circumstances, was most certainly not.

Questions raced through my mind. Who puts a drawer in a chapel hallway? Right by a bathroom? Who uses this drawer? What on earth is in it? Does the Bishop ever pause in the middle of an early-morning meeting and say, "Now, where did we put those files?" and then hear his Executive Secretary respond, "Oh, they're in the hallway drawer. You know, the one by the bathroom. With the claw-like handle."

When he was drawing up the plans, did the architect of this chapel foresee me, years later, standing there, pale-faced and ventilated, in his corridor of shame and laugh maniacally? I'll bet he did.

I covered my back-side with a church manual, shuffled out of the building, drove home, and changed pants. Did I return to church that day? Yes. Did I return with dignity? No. No, I did not.

happy birthday tainui!

Today is Tainui's 11th Birthday. I can't believe how old he is getting, especially because that means that I'm getting older too. We are excited to see you in just a few days T-Man! I'm 99.9% sure that Uncle Dave will play Settlers of Catan with you.
The fab five. All the Wihongi kids, Tainui is in the middle.

He is quite the athlete, as you can see.

a few firsts

First lemon

First clippie, and notice the shirt drenched in drool. That is no shadow, it's just her norm.

First ice cream (not Mommy feeding her!)

First tooth

Only one so far and it is so cute when she smiles!

stuck in my head

I am in love with this song right now. Can't stop listening to it. It has this 80's feel to it and I love that. Don't let the video influence your opinion of the song. Maybe just listen to it while you have another page open or something.



"Young Folks" by Peter Bjorn and John

happy birthday ashley!

It's her "golden" birthday! Meaning she turned 23 on the 23rd, something I just learned. Ashley married my brother last August, and has been a great addition to our family. She is a Diet Coke drinking, Desperate Housewives watching, aspiring reporter, that is a lot of fun to have around. She even gets competitive when playing the boardgame Sorry. So watchout.

One of the best and funniest memories I have of her is from last summer when my Mom and I tagged along on her bridal portrait photo shoot. At some point that afternoon my Mom realized and told me that she had lost one of her shoulder pads(yes, she still wears shoulder pads but they aren't gigantic, so don't judge). Well Ashley came up to me later that evening and in very hushed tones asked if I had lost something as she showed me this padded semi-circular thing. I was about eight months pregnant at the time, so maybe she thought I needed something like that for something relating to the female anatomy when one is pregnant. But once I realized what it was, I lost it and consequentially almost lost control of my bladder too. We had a good laugh and now it's blogged. Forever.

We are so glad you are a part of our family Ashley! Happy, happy birthday!

coronado island

I really miss the beach. Even kelp covered ones.Our thanks again to the Whites and Barkers for a great time on the island. I have been feeling very nostalgic as I look through our vacation pictures. One day at the beach just wasn't enough for me. Dave still isn't sold on the beach now that we have kids which makes it that much harder. But that is true about anything in life. Every now and then I get this longing for it, living here in Utah. Landlocked.

I miss the warm sand in my toes when laying in the warm sun. I miss the sound of the waves crashing. When we were in Coronado and we could hear them at night, it took me right back to BYU-Hawaii. What a lucky little 20 year-old I was to be living there well, for many reasons. But one of the things I miss the most is falling asleep to the crashing waves.



I miss how good hot dogs and s'mores are when you roast them on the beach. I miss watching the sunset, and the sunset at Sunset for that matter. I miss cutetanlines. I miss the smell of coppertone mixed with the smell of the beach. I miss standing in the surf and feeling the sand being pulled out beneath you. I miss the beachy breeze. I miss it all...the good and bad, tan and sunburn.

Here is my nephew Charles' recent experience at the beach. I wonder if he misses it at all.


What do you love and/or miss about the beach?

sea world

One of our days on vacation was spent at Sea World. Inez really loved watching Shamu as well as the dolphin show. Since returning home, she has named this little wooden dolphin Dolly, after the high jumping dolphin from Sea World. I love Sea World, it makes me miss living near the beach and also reminds me that I once wanted to pursue oceanography. That is until I actually took oceanography at BYU-Hawaii and there was way too much chemistry. Ick.

Here we are feeding the bat rays. Inez was really excited to do this until I fed the first one and kind of let out a little squeal because it was a bit startling.





Feeding the dolphins

sprinkles of makaafi

So when we were in So Cal, we visited Beth, my very dear and old friend (as in longtime, not age), and her cute little family.

So we (as in the Lesues) visited them (as in the Makaafis) whilst in the real O.C. We let the kiddies run around awhile and then we went to Sprinkles for some delicious fatness. After that, we headed on over to the Newport Beach Temple where the children were perfectly reverent angels. Except that Inez stole a rock from the fountain. They are all glued down or sealed or cemented or something, but she must have pulled one loose somehow. Oops. Maybe we'll put it in the fountain of the Provo temple.

Here are some pictures of the Makaafi children, who should all be modeling and putting their parents through vacations and houses and such. My children couldn't look whiter next to them, and rightly so since that is what they are. Beth's children are half Tongan and once again, rightly so since their father is Tongan himself. Ilai, Inez, Gwen, Eden and Anela (or "Vanilla" as Inez called her).



I was also priveledged enough to taste some taro (is that right Beth?) with coconut milk. It wasn't too bad. The coconut milk helped, I think.

Then Sprinkles...

It looks like someone is presenting them in this picture, but it is just Inez going for the one with the candy dot on top. The flavors are (left to right, top row): banana, chocolate peanut butter and dark chocolate, (bottom row) black and white, another chocolate p.b., and vanilla. They are very rich, and very yummy.

And not too far from Sprinkles is the Newport Beach Temple.


Beth and Fo'ou posed for the Prom

Here's our perfectly reverent angel.

the man in the ketchup bottle suit

I had a dream the night before last that a bunch of people dressed up as condiments (ketchup bottle, mustard, salt and pepper shakers, etc.) were running a foot race. The condiment suits were huge, bulky getups—like baseball mascot outfits—and everyone was really struggling to run in them. The ketchup bottle guy's suit was taller than the others and his bottle top got snagged by a low-hanging wire, which knocked him to the ground.

For some reason, I thought this was the funniest thing in the world and I started laughing in my sleep so hard that I shook the bed and woke Holly up. She asked me what was going on, and still half-asleep, I told her what I had dreamt. I continued to laugh—seriously, harder than I've ever laughed before—for another five minutes. I couldn't stop. I couldn't say three words before erupting into another burst of laughter. The absurdity of all this caused Holly to start laughing to, which only made me laugh harder. It wasn't until I splashed some water on my face and completely woke up that I could physically stop laughing.

Holly has been making fun of me non-stop ever since.

my weakness

You can ask anyone that lives with me. I love to bake chocolate chip cookies. And the 50 degree cold front that we had last week, coupled with my new measuring cups from Brooke, well it was just too much to resist.

happy birthday sammie!

My niece, Samantha, turns 3 today! She is one funny kid, as you will see in this clip from her family's blog.

Here she is with her Uncle Jon on his wedding day:


To see more clips and pictures of Sammie, visit their blog.

We love you Sammie! Happy Birthday cutie pie!

disneyland

Our days at Disneyland went by too fast. We were lucky enough to share them with both The Cobbs and The Whites.



Gene, Bridget and Caitlin waiting to get their spin on.

Meeting Buzz Lightyear was rather exciting.

But Aladin took the cake. She is telling him here that Jasmine is her favorite princess. That's news to me!

I think a teeny crush formed.

We were there just days before the opening of the Nemo Submarine attraction. But they had the seagulls working, they randomly call out, "mine! mine! mine!" in their funny voices.

The traditional family picture.

I for Inez.

This is one of our favorite places to hang out in New Orleans Square.

Especially because it's right next to the spot where Dave can pick up his favorite refreshment.

Inez and Natalie were happily playing here until a cast member came up to them and told them they had to get off because there were snakes in that honey. They freaked out as any little girl would. I couldn't believe someone would actually say that instead of something more appropriate like, "please get down from there."

We are always so sad when our days at Disneyland are over.