We visited Hawaii at the beginning of December.

Here’s a picture of Eli on the way over:

When does this flight end?

Regardless, we had a great time. Saw friends and family and enjoyed the sun and the waves. I really enjoyed hearing the newscasters telling everyone to bundle up as it was going to be in the low 70′s during the morning. The ended the broadcast by looking at one-another and saying “Brrrrrrr”

70 degrees? This place is P A R A D I S E

Eli Likey

Eli enjoyed pool time!

A Hawaiian Christmas:

Meeting Chris and Tanya’s newborn, Zack:

BFFs Forever.

Can’t Beat an Island Sunset

Heading over the Pali Highway

Not a bad view from the top of the world!

Surrounded by Beaches

When do we head back?

I didn’t really find a chunk of time, but here’s a written account of our first venture out and our first road trip, starting with the road trip. (I know, sounds official, huh?)

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Damn. It’s TOUGH traveling with an infant. Actually, it’s tough to get ready to travel with an infant. Or at least it was tough for me the first time around. I won’t lie; there were tears.

Circa July 30. Eli age: 3 weeks old. We were headed east to introduce Eli to the cabin. His cousin Hazel was nice enough to invite us along to the tail-end of the Barker Family Vacation aka BFVGPS10. I was responsible for getting myself, the kid, and the dog into the truck. Nate had packed up most of the gear already. I just needed to load the final bags and the young ones, then pick up Nate in Pioneer Square before heading out. No big deal, right?

Eli in his snap-in carseat... the easy one.

Eli's not sure what to make of the cabin.

I tried to remain cool as Eli screamed his head off while I ran around loading the last-minute stuff and the dog. I had everything ready to go, and I was only 10-15 minutes behind schedule. Lastly, I grabbed the crying baby and set him into the carseat… where the straps were too tight to go around his little arms. Dammit. As it turned out, the carseat was my doom. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how to loosen the straps.

An hour, several phone calls, several curse words, several more curse words, tears, cries (from Eli), and a $30 taxi ride later, Nate came to save the day. He fixed the problem in about 30 seconds, which brought on even more tears of frustration (from me and Eli). Eventually, we got to the cabin just fine.

And we had an awesome time.

Jet ski on the Columbia! Whoo hoo!

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And while that was the worst to date, there have been some comical other firsts in regards to “traveling” with Eli. The first outing we took as a new Kaiser clan (aside from heading home from the hospital) was on July 11, just four days after Eli was born. It was Nate’s birthday, Eli’s actual due date, and we headed to Redmond to join Keith and Susie at church.

Nate aka “Clipboard Kaiser” had a schedule that he wanted to keep and an ideal time to leave the house. Being that Eli was four days old and we had just come home from the hospital two days prior, everything from getting ourselves showered and dressed to getting the diaper bag packed was a challenge. But we were up to the task!

The task included a load of laundry prior to our departure, washing Eli’s intended outfit for the day. We were both certain that everything would dry by the time we had to leave… We were wrong.

• 40 minutes prior to our intended departure, I started feeding Eli, all the while shouting out things like “Don’t forget the _[fill in with random baby item]__” to Nate who was running around getting himself and the diaper bag packed up.
• 20 minutes prior to our intended departure, I decided Eli had had enough to eat and needed to get dressed. Nate took the laundry out of the dryer, only slightly damp.
• 15 minutes prior to our intended departure we changed Eli’s diaper and put him in his outfit for the day.
• 10 minutes prior to our intended departure we assessed that the outfit was still pretty damp and we should attempt to dry it further before heading out into the chilly elements (and sadly, it was fairly chilly and overcast for a mid-summer morning). We turned on the hairdryer and pointed it at our son. Yes. When our son was only four days old, we dried his clothes with a hair dryer while he was wearing them. I’m not proud of it, but he didn’t seem to mind, and the hair dryer did the trick.

You’d think at this point that we’d realize the need for additional layers, but you’d be wrong.

We managed to get out the door 10 minutes behind schedule, which wasn’t bad given our antics prior to intended departure. We snapped in the carseat, started the car, backed out of the garage, and we were off! … So we thought.

As we were backing out of the garage, I noticed that the blanket wasn’t in the carseat. “Nate, did you grab the blanket?”

“No Mars, I thought you did!”

Next, I noticed that we’d forgotten to put socks on Eli. By this time, we were at the streetlight, but with a damp clothed son, no blanket and no socks, we determined the need to turn back around. Needless to say, we were late to church.

Amusingly enough, the sun came out just as we crossed the bridge, and we ended up stripping the kid of all his clothes once we got to Grandpa and Grandma’s house. Go figure.

Eli sans clothing and loving it

In Grandpa's lap, sporting his fly dry outfit

The shirt says "I'm a sloppy kisser." It should say, "I drool in my sleep."

• We’re staying in the Hilton Hawaiian Village Vacation Club, thanks to a birthday gift from my mom.
• We’ve had amazing meals with friends and family: pupus, some of the best Vietnamese food ever, delicious Korean BBQ, and Laoatian/French cuisine.
• We’ve swam in the Pacific Ocean at every opportunity.
• We’ve driven to the North Shore and sampled all sorts of ice cream and shave ice along the way (and swam a little there as well).
• We’ve hiked 5 miles through the Honolulu hills.
• And we’re off to Kona tomorrow for another 7 days

I am so thankful for the fun times, the great company, and the tons of memories that we’ve collected. Here’s some more pics and highlights.