The best surprise ever!

Life has been full of family time, adventures and making memories the last couple of weeks! It's been wonderful! For months we've been looking forward to my folks coming to visit again. We've been talking on the phone and making plans. So a week and half ago, we went to the airport to pick up my mom (she was coming a week earlier than my dad). We made her a lei and were excited to see her airplane arrive on time! We were hugging and kissing her when Zara said (with a confused look on her face) "Is that Auntie Jill?" I turned around to see both of my sisters walking towards me! They came to surprise me for my birthday! And wow... did they succeed! I was absolutely, completely blown away! I burst into tears, laughing and crying and exclaiming and hugging.... it was the most incredible surprise EVER! What a gift! We had a fantastic week together... it flew by way too quickly! The day before they left, my dad and Jasper (nephew) arrived for a week. So we had one fun evening together before saying good-bye to my sweet sisters.

We had so much fun together.... here's a photo recap of our week together.
(For those of you on Facebook, you will have probably seen most of these photos posted by Leah - she was the trip photographer so most of these are her photos! The others are Mom's! Thank you both for your lovely photo memories!)

In complete shock! It took a couple of days for the reality to sink in...my sisters are really here!

We ate outside on the patio most nights.

Hmmmm.... lots of good food! The first nights dinner was tomato pie and roasted eggplant. It was great to have my sisters around to help and inspire me in the kitchen.

A walk to one of my favorite beaches - the old tent camp.

At the Kalaupapa lookout (overlooking the former leper colony).

Buying tropical flowers at the Saturday market.

Lots of fun in the pool at the condo.

Lilikoi (passionfruit) is back in season! It's delicious over macadamia nut ice cream!

The Sunday concert at Coffee's of Hawaii is a big part of our life here in Moloka'i so I was so happy to get to share it with my sisters. Leah enjoyed learning to play the ukulele...she picked it up so quickly! Each week the band invites all the "uke" players in the crowd to come up and play together so Leah and I joined the group to play and sing "You are my sunshine".

We all had the chance to learn a hula with DJ (my hula teacher)

I love my sisters!

The next day we headed to the beautiful east side of the island to hike up to Halawa Falls. The scenery is so lovely along the way!

It's mango season again and there were hundreds of ripe (and very OVER ripe) mangos on the trail. We came home with a backpack full of them!

Halawa falls - a lovely spot!

Thor at the Macadamia Nut farm

 Mom treated me to a lovely massage on the morning of my birthday - a great way to start the day! And after a relaxing day, we had a little birthday celebration at Hotel Molokai. This is the only place on the island to have dinner by the ocean. (With the exception of a picnic on the beach!) The food was delicious and we had a lovely evening.

On Jill and Leah's last day here we spent some time at gorgeous Papohaku beach.

The water was crystal clear and so calm...we collected shells, swam, snorkelled and just soaked up the beauty!

Sweet little snorkeller! We got her all the gear when we were in Maui in December.... she LOVES snorkelling! She just cruises around comfortable as can be!

Our last night together. Mom wanted to get a photo of us in our matching robes.

A week of sister love! I feel so blessed!

And it's not a Kofoed family holiday without some jumping pictures! I'm not sure if it's because we grew up with the "Toyota jump" or because it's just fun to jump!

What a jam packed, adventure filled week! I am so thankful for the opportunity to share this beautiful island with my sisters.... this place we currently call home. It's been such a treat to have family around... I'm missing the company of my sisters now that they are back home with their families, but feel blessed to have my parents and Jasper here for a couple more days. We're soaking up the family time as it will have to last us until mid-summer!

I have so much to be grateful for in my life and right now I'm feeling very grateful for my loving family. Even when we're living "far way" they are always there. I love them all!

An east end adventure!

We live on the west end of Molokai and only seem to make it to the east end when we have company and want to show them the island! It's about an hour's drive over there and feels like a long way!

One night last week Zara suggested we go for an adventure to the east end.... so the next morning we did just that. We packed up our beach stuff, some snacks, and headed off with no particular agenda.

There are lots of areas over there that we've driven past and never taken the time to stop and explore. This was our day for exploring... 

The Kamalo harbour and old jetty...



Everything is so lush and green on the east end.

One of our lovely friends lives over there and have a sweet little farm - just an acre -with lots of plants and animals in that space... 34 chickens ranging from little ones to egg layers, a gosling, 2 dogs, an aquaculture pond with tilapia in it, a screened in garden for the plants most vulnerable to bugs and a healthy little garden. We LOVE visiting her farm!



We all fell in love with Juno the gosling. He/she was so precious!



Feeding the fish.

After a nice visit there, we went to the only store/cafe on the east side - Mana'e Goods and Grindz.

This is a favorite stop... their smoothies are ono! (delicious)

We took our lunch to the beach at Mile Marker 16 - a place we have been wanting to check out.

After a few more exploratory stops, we spent some time at this little slice of heaven... MM (mile marker) 20. The water was crystal clear and the perfect depth for the kids to play.

Thor doing a beached whale impression!



It is so picturesque "over there"! So beautiful and lush... so different from the west end. It's always nice to have a change of scenery on this small little island! We had a wonderful day.

(I apologize for the little black dot on all my photos! I haven't been able to remove that speck of dust that seems to have lodged itself on the inside of my camera behind the lens... any ideas? I was thinking about trying compressed air?)

Sunflowers and other things!

The garden currently... LOVING the mammoth sunflowers...



I made matching skirts for Melody and Eyeris out of one long skirt.



Bella: "Aaaahhh! Cockroach.... someone, get it out of here"

Thor: "Oh, I'll get it". He picks it up and takes it outside with a little shrug... no biggie!



  

Bath time fun!

Sending you all some mid-week ALOHA! xoxo



A special day in pictures

Bella and Thor are 5!

 Toddlers no longer.... they are blossoming into amazing, adventurous, thoughtful, funny, independant "big kids".

They got an early start on their birthday when some wonderful packages from Gram and Gramps arrived at the post office the day before.

They have had hours of enjoyment painting these glass stones.Whatever they paint on the flat backside is magnified when viewed through the curved side.... we're going to turn them into magnets.

Their birthday morning started with a yummy pancake breakfast (orange yogurt hotcakes from the rebar cookbook! our new favorite!)

Trying to be patient as breakfast is prepared!

Singing along... "Happy Birthday dear Bella!"

Making a birthday wish.

Barbie dolls from big sister (a garage sale find that will be left behind when we leave!)

Some birthday bling... also from big sister! It matches her teddy perfectly!

Having fun with some new birthday blocks - these ones have magnets in them which adds a new twist to building!

Is it just me? Or is there something really lovely about a brand new box of crayons....  I don't know if it's the newness... the sharp points on them all.... or the amazing array of colors..... or both?

A swim in the pool at the nearby condos.

Birthday ice cream by the ocean!

A quiet moment to take in the view.

 Bella came to hula with me later in the afternoon and had a cake there, while Thor had a nice afternoon at home with Dad. It was a good day!

Another trip around the sun

My sweet little monkeys are turning 5! How did that happen so quickly?! A few years ago I asked one of my dear friends (also a mother of twins) "When does it get easier?!" She said "When they turn 5!" At the time that felt so far away and now, here we are. Everyday I feel so thankful they chose me to be their mama! I love the age and stages they are at.... the increased independance, the creative thinking, the conversations we can have, the deeper thinking that leads to interesting questions.... we are having fun together! Recently I was thinking back to being pregnant with them... the HUGE belly, feeling like a beached whale! Then their birth and the tiny baby stage. It's all been amazing in its own way and we've certainly had some challenges along the way, but what an adventure it's been!

Thor has adjusted so beautifully to living here in Hawaii. We had some temper issues for the first little while as he dealt with all the changes in his life, but he has adapted and is much more peaceful now. He has become best buds with Jack - his sweet little doll I made him for his 2nd birthday. I made both the kids dolls and they have certainly loved them over the years but in the last few months Jack has taken on a very important role in Thor's life. He has provided the stability and friendship that Thor needed in order to adapt. It is the sweetest thing to see them together all the time.

Jack was about to have a bath.... he was getting very dirty!



Jack was helping Thor create his car spiral. Thor also loves his little blue baby that his aunty gave him for his birthday last year!

Best friends!

Almost every night we sit on the front steps and watch the sun slip down into the ocean. (We're watching for the green flash but we haven't seen it yet!) Thor ALWAYS makes sure that Jack is with him.... he doesn't want him to miss that green flash when we finally see it!

I was reading recently in a Waldorf-inspired book about how important it is for little boys to have a doll to play with and it made me very thankful that Thor has Jack.

Thor is also loving boogie boarding, jumping on the trampoline, playing with Lego, drawing, picking peas out of the garden, bugging his sisters, and watching PBS kids on TV!

Bella is becoming quite the little entertainer! Often after we've watched the sun set Bella comes back out of the house with her hat and ukulele and puts on a great show. "People and gentlemen.... I am going to sing you a song...." She dances around and sings her little heart out... sometimes she sings about the ocean, or about the "aminals", about travelling or about how much she loves her parents! It's precious and we love watching her shows.

Bella is also loving puzzles, drawing, learning math, playing computer games (pbskids.org), swimming, boogie boarding, collecting shells, helping chop veggies for meals, and playing with her ever growing collection of stuffed animals. She also learned to hand sew last week and enjoyed that.

This is a sweet age.....they are still young enough to be in the moment and go with the flow....which is helpful with our gypsy lifestyle!

They are looking forward to celebrating their birthday in Hawaii this year and are counting the days!

 2 more sleeps!