Sleep

Like most parents, I have been struggling with the life long battle of sleep. Never ever ever get enough due to our bundle of noise...i mean joy...... A couple of months back we worked really hard to get Malachi to fall asleep on his own and i posted about the process. He did really well and we were at a good place. And then he started teething and it all went out the window. It seems like every time we start getting good at it, he gets sick or something happens and it all goes to the dogs.

Then my cousin (bless your soul Juliet!!) recommended this book, 'The Sleepeasy solution' and it is AMAZING!! It's the same general idea as other books and methods, that they need to fall asleep on their own, usually by crying. But this book deals with the emotions of the whole process, coz let's face it, no one likes to hear their baby crying out for you.
But this book has been so good, my child, who used to fight naps until he was so exhaughsted he couldn't sleep, now, you put him in his bed, day or night, he makes noises for 30 seconds or so and then bam, asleep. :)

So for all you parents out there struggling with this, get the book. It's worth the $15 you spend on it!!!!

Play play play play

That's Malachi's moto - along with destroy, destroy, destroy, and laugh, laugh, laugh. But this kid, any chance he can get, rain, shine, night or day he is running his little self off to the playground. We're really lucky that its right next to our house and i don't have drive anywhere or even walk more then 30 meters to get to it. This little boy absolutely loves to play on the slide, the swings, and he mostly enjoys being taller then me :).

Here are some pictures of this kid doing his thing.

Climbing up the slide.


He's very pleased with himself.


Screaming at the top of his lungs!!!


I'm gunna do it mum.....and don't even try stop me....


Making his way to the top.

It's serious business this playing...

I'm the king of the castle, and you're the dirty rascal....


Mum, push me!!!

I'm not having fun....


That's more like it!!

Family Pictures

Leeyen is the most amazing person in the entire world. Seriously. Not only does she teach me how to sew, make me little surprises all the time, organise easter egg activities for my son, she takes amazing picturs of my family. I love her. I hope you know that Leeyen.

So here are some of the pictures

(My head is a little "titled" in some of them coz the wind was blowing behind us)

Maunawili

On Tuesday morning last last week we went with Sam and Brooke to Kailua to hike Maunawili. It was spring break for us and everyone had the day off work so it was the perfect day. We started out soooooooo excited (well, me and Brooke did), taking photos of the ground, shoes, trees, anything really, we were just excited to be going. 1 hour+ and a billion million stairs later, we made it to the falls. It was awesome. We swam, ate, jumped off the rock, it was so good.
Here are some of the pictures from our day.

Guess who's the most excited....

My hiker boys.

The Tafuna family's first hike together.

As you can see, these "island" boys both wore slippers/jandels/flip flops, while we hiked up a mountain....

We're smart, we wore shoes.

Tui wrote "Tui <3's sera" on the tree...how sweet..... oxox

Tui the trail blazer waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay up ahead of everyone.

Some of the many....many..........MANY sets of stairs.

You're doing great son...
At the top! Or so we thought....
The hiker gang.

Best seat in the house!

I might have made it, but my shoes sure didnt...

We made it!!!!

After our swim.

This picture speaks for itself.....

It was tough work sitting up there the whole way.


I have to say, Tui was amazing. He isn't keen on hiking but came because he knew i wanted to go, and on top of that, he carried Malachi, our mini giant, all the way up and all the way down. What a trooper, thanks babe. oxo

Easter

(Sorry this is late, it took me a while to upload the pictures, and no one wants to read a blog without pictures...)


Easter in America is different. There aren't any national holidays - that's right, no 4 day weekend. They eat yucky peeps instead of giant eggs. And there's no hotcross buns!!!! It really is a sad situation. But we tried out best to make the most of it. On friday i attempted to make my first ever hot cross buns. All i can say is.....they were hot....not so sure about anything else. Turns out i got impatient waiting for the mixture to cool that i killed the yeast so they didn't rise and turned out to be rock cakes. And my crosses were more abstract then traditional. Some had none at all. Needless to say i didn't take any pictures - it's better that way. But i still fed them to some of my neighbors.....they're such good sports.

Then on saturday we did an easter egg hunt with some other little dudes and dudetes. We made little easter baskets (we meaning me, while malachi tried to sabbotage the whole thing), and then went outside for the hunt. Malachi took sooooo long to get down the steps, because he's determined to do it himself without any help, that by the time we finally got out to grass, it was almost over. But we found some treats and i picked them up while malachi collected rocks instead.....



His Easter basket that we made, sitting with Aunty Brookie.


Found some!



Get it!



Rocks or chocolate.....hmmmmmmmmmm.....that's a tough one.....

He's taking a break.



Yummy eggs.


Happy little hunter.


Look what i got!!!


The Hunters...


It's impossible to get 3 adults to look at the camera AND three little ones with a new stash of candy.


Munching away....

It was alot of fun, especially trying to stop my child from choaking on the perfectly sized choaking hazard eggs.

The next day i realised that malachi hadn't grasped the concept of egg hunting, i decided to give it another go in a controled environment....our house. I put all the eggs on the rug. This was the result.


He finally got the hang of picking up the eggs.


Am i doing it mummy?



The loot!


But all wordly things aside, we watched this video which truely touched me and reminded me of the great sacrifice our saviour made for us. I am so grateful for Jesus Christ and his willingness to come to this earth and atone for my many many many many sins. What a friend he is. And what a blessing to have this season to remember and celebrate his sacrifice and resurrection.