Farewell to Hawaii...

Hawaii will always hold a special place in our hearts because it is where Tyson and I both got our under-graduate education...not to mention where we met, fell in love, and started our little eternal family (and yes Pounder counts in that family)


Leaving the island was very bitter-sweet because it holds so many memories, yet we were ready to start our lives on the mainland and to tackle adventures outside of Laie.

Pounder!

If you haven't met Pounder yet, you are sorely missing out. Hes our 10 month old fur-baby with quite the personality. When we adopted him, he was about 10 lbs and seriously the cutest thing ever. Observe:

How can you not fall in love with that cute little face? Pounder was named after one of Tyson's favorite beaches that we lived near in Hawaii ( I was pulling for Kamehameha... but Pounder stuck). However, he has really started to fit his name as he has gained over 75lbs in the past 7 months! Yes, that means our little baby is a mere 85 pound beast.  A 'pounder' indeed.

I love looking at snapshots of our cute puppy! He has gotten so big and can be so stinkin naughty...but we can't help but love him. His favorite things to do recently are to play fetch in the creek outback with Tyson, protect the backyard from birds, squirrel, and deer, stomp in his kiddie pool, and eat fireflies out of the air.

And... of course he likes to create messes and dig up the flowers. Did I mention that we love him in spite of his puppiness?

Visitors in Hawaii

Living in Hawaii for 3 1/2 years had some perks.... one of which was that friends and family always wanted to come visit the island us! The pictures I took were few, (shocking I know) but they really hold some great memories.

My younger brother, Austin was able to come stay with us for about a week, and since Tyson was still on break from school, we had a lot of time to spend showing him around.

Of course we had to take him to Matsumotos  for some shave ice...with ice cream on the bottom.

Another day we spent the entire day beach-hopping so that Austin could see some of our favorite beaches,  and so that we could visit some that we hadn't gotten to try-out yet. Our friends, the Griffiths, went with us and it was just one of those perfect days. The boys body-surfed all day while Jenna and I hung out on the beach and chatted ( and ate fried banana!)

Here are the boys eating at one of the Kahuku shrimp trucks. 

Tyson, Austin, and Johnny also spent some time playing football in the sand.  It's amazing the lengths they will go to in order to catch that ball. Ha I mean, sand is soft-ish, but it will still give you a nice 'rug-burn' and diving into it will inevitably lead to a mouthful/eyeful of sand ;) It was sure fun to watch though.

I'm sad I don't have any pictures of New Year's that we celebrated while he was here. We went to Kawela Bay with some of our close friends to have a bonfire, BBQ, and watch the fireworks that Turtle Bay put on. It was such a nice way to bring in the new year, and it was a little extra special having Austin there with us.
Unfortunately, we also didn't get pictures of the hike and surfing trips that we dragged him on, but just take my word that they were eventful!

Another notable visit (that I have documentation of) was when my Mom and youngest brother and sister came to visit us when we were living in Punaluu. This was shortly before we left the island for good so it was a good time to visit :) The picture above is of Jillian and Ammon enjoying some sun and water.

Christmas 2011

Better late than never, no? Okay, so I'm backtracking a half of a year...but this was right before our camera charger disappeared so now that I have a new one (finally!) these are the pictures and events you get the privilege of seeing. 

Right before Christmas break, my lovely friend Camille threw a Christmas party/ clothing drive! It was a lot of fun and she collected a pretty large amount of clothes to donate. Of course the most memorable part of the night was when all the guys decided that they needed to try on the clothes that the girls had donated. It was crazy to see who could fit in those size 0 jeans...and of course I was mortified when my husband came out in a dress. You can thank me later for not catching a picture of that. :)

The lovely Camille showing off the Christmas goodies she prepared!

Tyson and I also got to fly out to Arizona to spend Christmas with my family for the first time! These pictures are from Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve is probably my favorite family tradition. My Mom's family always gets together and has a Christmas program, complete with the reenactment of the nativity scene, Christmas carols, donuts and hot chocolate, and a round of White Elephant.

Tyson got lucky and got to play King Herod!

The Nativity scene 

As of late

The last few weeks have been a lot of fun. We are back in Hawaii, Tyson is back in school, and I have a new job as an Internal Compliance Auditor for Byuh. We love our tiny little studio apartment and have had a lot of fun with friends out here lately.

Tyson has been surfing a lot lately and has been having a blast.
Although I'm not really a "beach person" he likes to drag me along to take pictures of him ;)

This is one of Tyson and his friend catching the same wave.
If I remember correctly, this one didnt end well haha

My cute tired-out husband

Somehow I got talked into spending our Saturday watching the Phillies game at Buffalo Wild Wings
(or "B-dubbs" haha)
The food was great and the place was packed with screaming fans (of course the majority were watching a football game, but it still added to the excitement!)

It was such a beautiful day to be in Honolulu!
And see that water behind Ty? Yeah... I slipped and fell in it about 2 min after taking this picture ;)

My friend Allie and I making dinner on a Sunday.
A few of us get together every once in a while to have Sunday dinners. Lots of fun :)

This is in our little studio.
Just compare our tans. And this was when he was white.

Summer Recap

I always have such good intentions of updating our blog...but then I forget and it never gets done. However, this summer absolutely flew by. Tyson and I spent this summer in Pennsylvania where we both worked at Raven's Claw Golf Course. Tyson's parents were wonderful and put up with us for the entire summer. It was really nice to get to know Tyson's family better and enjoy Pennsylvania.

Tyson's sweet mother made me a delicious cheesecake with an oreo crust (which is my favorite!) 
to celebrate my birthday the night we flew in. 

Tyson and his dad caught 2 little turtles that we kept as pets on the kitchen counter...
While RaeLynn was out of town of course. This one's name was Snap!
He liked to eat hot dogs and leftover easter ham.

My stud husband caught a big ole' fish.
He was quite proud of it.

Tyson was not so happy when one of his "pet" fish from the pond outside died.
His mom had to help him clean it out...
he wasn't super sure what to do ;)
What would we do without mothers??

The 3 of us outside the ball park

These pictures were at the Phillies game we went to for
Tyson's 23rd birthday!
We had great seats and even though it was crazy-hot outside, we had a really good time.
We were lucky to have Tyson's brother, Brandon, in town to celebrate with us.
All 3 of us left with some nasty sunburns that afternoon.

This is where Tyson spent most of his summer: behind the desk at Raven's Claw.
He was the Assistant Golf Professional there.
He was able to give lessons all summer and he loved every minute of it ;)

These are from of our dates we went on.
We went to the Movie Tavern and saw Crazy Stupid Love.
It was so cool because they serve you dinner while you watch the movie!
I had never been to a place like that before.
The food was good and the movie was cute!

Tyson had his 5th knee surgery this summer.

This is Tyson in the recovery room after the surgery.
He was SO out of it...
He went in to get his torn meniscus repaired..which is minor in comparison to some of his other surgeries
But they ended up removing his entire medial meniscus in his knee.
He's still not happy about that because that will most likely cause him to have a total knee replacement
much sooner in life :(  It also causes him to have to wear a cumbersome brace when he is being active...

This is a few days after surgery when we were cleaning the incisions.
It's crazy how far modern medicine has come to allow them to perform his entire surgery through those 2 little incisions.

A week or so after his surgery we drove back up to the out-patient hospital in Dansville, PA
to get his stiches out.

Since we were close to where Tyson grew up,
 he got to show me around.
I got to see where he used to live, where he went to school, and of course the various
golf courses, gymnasiums, and soccer fields he used to compete at.
Sometimes it's nice to relive the glory days ;)
And of course we had to go get some icecream at The Freeze!
Unfortunately it was storming the whole time
so we ate it in the car.

On our way back to Hawaii when the summer was over we stopped in AZ for a week.
It was nice to see my family again!
Tyson spent the entire trip with my brothers and dad...
doing "boy stuff"
This is Tyson and Ben shooting in the desert.

Isn't he cute?
All-in-all this was a really good summer.
Of course, I left out about 95% of it...but I still havent gotten the hang of remembering to photograph
our life.