Back from Kauai and Trying to Adjust to Our New Schedule

Well, we've been back from our trip for over a week now, but I'm just getting back to blogging. I think a week long trip to Hawaii with five kids actually takes about three weeks - one week to pack, one week to travel, and one week to unpack. We came back exhausted from all our activities in Hawaii. The red eye flight back was a challenge and then we had to adjust to the three hour time change. Kylie started second grade the day after we came back and I'm back to subbing to earn some more money. Also, soccer season for Courtney, Katelyn and Kylie is beginning which means we have three soccer team schedules to coordinate. So far we have soccer Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights with Saturday games beginning in September. Lloyd is now working the swing shift and is gone from noon to midnight Saturday - Wednesday. I am struggling with this new schedule. I'm doing my best to make dinner, get the kids to their activities, and put them to bed each night. The older girls are a big help to me. I still haven't figured out when we're going to do scripture study and FHE. I guess we're shooting for FHE on Thursday nights and scripture study (minus Kylie) at 11:30 on the days I don't work. I don't think Lloyd will continue on this shift; we just have to endure until October. I really don't know how single moms do it. I feel so grateful that I'm not alone all the time. Anyway, back to our trip in Kauai. We really jammed a lot into the seven day we were there. I'm going to do a separate post about each day because I have so many pictures and so much to say. For this post I am going to write about out airplane ride there on Monday, July 28 and the activities we did on Tuesday, July 29. In my last post, I mentioned the 13 bags, two car seats, and stroller we took with us on the trip. We had a lot of stuff! It was such a blessing that my brother, Bryce, and his wife Chareen were on the same flight as us. They met us at the SFO airport where they helped us get our bags checked in, Chareen's mom and sister helped us with our bags too. We encouraged the kids to run around the airport until we boarded the plane. Lloyd was excited to be at the airport and not be working. The over five hour flight wasn't too bad because of Bryce and Chareen's help with the kids. Cameron liked watching movies on Bryce's ipod. Conner sat in his car seat and did okay. He cried a little and refused to fall asleep. This was Kylie's first time on an airplane. She became an expert on airplane emergency situations by studying the emergency information card for almost half the flight. We all entered a contest our flight had to guess what time it would be when we reached the halfway point to Hawaii. Cameron (with Lloyd's help) actually won with a guess of 4:48:03 he was only 38 second off! We left at 1:45 and got halfway there at 4:47:25. He won three cans of macadamia nuts. We were excited when we finally landed in Kauai. We drove to the time share condos my mom reserved for us. We stayed with Bryce and Chareen in a two bedroom condo. My mom and Jay stayed in a two bedroom condo with Karen's family. Brad and his family had a one bedroom condo. On Tuesday morning, Karen and Matt did a family devotional. Then we were off to see Waimea Canyon which is nicknamed the "grand canyon of Hawaii." Here's a view of the canyon.

All 19 of us in front of Waimea Canyon:

We ate lunch at Koke'e State Park. The kids enjoyed playing with their cousins. Cameron found a tree to climb in. The view was gorgeous!

After that we went to Polihale Beach. It was very warm there - the sand burned our feet; however, this was such a gorgeous beach. The coastline looked like it would go on forever. The only way to see the coastline to the north is to go by helicopter or boat. We drove as far as you can by car. It was a very bumpy road; it felt like we were four wheeling!
All the kids, except Conner, loved the warm water. This was our first time at the beach in Hawaii and we all loved it! The kids jumped in the water before we even got our swimsuits on! Conner preferred to dig in the sand and stay away from the waves.