Hawaii

We just got back from visiting my friend Jenee and her family in Hawaii.  Violet and I really enjoyed it.  This year we stayed a couple of nights at the Disney Aulani resort which had awesome pools, lazy river, and beach.

The pools were a big hit.  Violet literally spent the entire last day in the pool.  I had to force her out for lunch and a snack.

 

 

Our hosts, the Odani's

The beach was fun too but it was more work and messier.

The room was super nice.  We had a one room villa with a kitchen, but with five people, we were all crammed in there.

And the room was maybe a little less nice after we left.  After being at the pool, I would take Violet's swimsuit off.  She wanted to color a bit before her bath.

I was really tired and let this go on a bit too long.  I sort of knew I was tempting fate at the time.  The next thing I heard was a bit of a scream from Violet and an "Uh oh!".  You guessed it, poop on the carpet.  Being a Disney hotel full of little kids, I can't imagine this is the first time that's happened but it was still gross but at the same time quite funny.

Then there was the character breakfast.  For $50 ($32 for adult, $18 per child), you could have a buffet breakfast and meet the disney characters.  Violet's been super into watching the Mickey Mouse Club cartoon so I figured this would be a big hit.  She did tell me beforehand that she did not want to meet Goofy because he was scary.

Suffice it to say, Violet was scared of all the characters and spent most of the brunch hiding or crying trying to get away from them.

Note Violet is not in this picture because she is too afraid of Minnie.

So the character breakfast was a complete waste of money.  I still shelled out an extra $32 for the pictures with the characters too.  At the end of breakfast, we waited for the bill to come.  After waiting quite a while, we noticed no one else was paying a bill either.  Since they knew who we were (I made the reservations for the brunch at the same time as the hotel reservations), we figured they would just know to charge the room, right?

So when we checked out, our charges were less than anticipated.  By scanning the bill we realized that there was no charge for the character breakfast and pictures with Mickey.  We had completely skipped out on paying the bill with Mickey and friends.  We fessed up and tried to correct it, but the hotel wouldn't fix it.  She said it was a bit of "Disney Magic".  Pretty awesome considering Violet spent the breakfast in fear and ate nothing.  

The awesome Aulani resort

Checking out the aquarium at the resort.

It was great to spent time with Jenee and her family.

Although our "girls trips" are no longer filled with trips to spa or getting pedicures, it's a different type of fun now with kids.  Violet loves her Auntie Jenee.  She always gives great Hello Kitty gifts too.

Violet is starting to take pictures with the real camera to mixed success.  She took these two pictures of us which we really liked.

But then she took an awful lot of pictures like this:

Despite the poop on the rug and stiffing Mickey on the bill, we had a great time.  We will be back to visit next year again I am sure, although I don't know if we can justify staying at the Aulani resort again.

 

On the drive back to Jenee's house Violet saw her first rainbow and she was awestruck. She told Daddy later that it had "beautiful colors". Sometimes I can't believe how well spoken she is.

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First day of preschool