Our Vacation of a Lifetime

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I must apologize for being completely AWOL for almost three weeks, but I had a really, really good reason:

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We went to Hawaii! Yes, all four of us. I mentioned earlier in the year that my husband and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary on January 31. We had planned for a while to do something special for our 20th, but the reality is that a January anniversary doesn’t accommodate the kids’ school schedules very well.  We could not in good conscience take them out of school for a week or more, especially Jamie, who is in high school. So although I would’ve much preferred to go in January, when prices would’ve been significantly cheaper, we made the decision to use their 10-day Easter break for our big 20th anniversary vacation celebration.

I could spend pages upon pages telling you about every detail of our vacation. And I probably will. 😉  But because I know not everyone wants to read my vacation memoirs in all their verbose glory, I’ve decided to simply summarize the trip here, boiling down our trip into one picture per day, although the reality is that each day had multiple adventures, and one picture doesn’t really do it justice.

If you’re interested in learning more, I will eventually have a write-up for each day.  I had really hoped to have them all done before I published this post, so you could just click on the picture for each day below to read all about that day’s activities, but the minute we got home, we were back in the thick of hockey, baseball, and lacrosse (and oh yes–my full-time job!), so that is just not the case.  I actually have them all written up (no small feat, let me tell you), but putting the pictures together will take me a little while longer. (I have over 2000 pictures to go through!)  Thanks for your patience!  Meanwhile, here is the summary…

Hawkins Hawaiian Vacation

We spent 10 days in Hawaii, five on the island of Oahu in Honolulu, and five on the island of Maui in Lahaina.  The weather was absolutely perfect, and we made the most of every day, never lacking for activities. That was actually mostly my husband’s doing; he is usually pretty laid-back about our vacations and doesn’t like to over-plan, but I guess he wanted to get his money’s worth, because he made sure we had something to do every day. I would’ve preferred a little more time sitting around the pool drinking adult beverages, but that never actually happened. On the other hand, thanks to his insistence that we capitalize on every moment in paradise, we have some amazing memories (and thanks to me, the pictures to prove it!).

Day One: Arrival

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We stayed at the Moana Surfrider, a very famous hotel in Waikiki. It’s actually the oldest hotel on Waikiki, and is featured quite often on Hawaii Five-0. (Which, by the way, is what totally inspired this trip in the first place, after I binge-watched the show one holiday over a year ago.) As you can imagine, it wasn’t cheap, but it was absolutely fantastic!

Day Two: Kayaking

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My husband found a kayak rental company during his online searching and insisted that we do a day trip. It was the first time kayaking for any of us, and let me tell you, it was not for the faint of heart! We kayaked to two different islands, having a picnic lunch at the second one, and I can assure you that the boys slept quite well that night. Actually, so did I.  😉

Day Three: History Day

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This was one of only two days of our vacation that I planned. You know I love my history, and I had to visit Iolani Palace, the only royal palace in the United States. I had been to Hawaii twice before, visiting my dad when he was stationed there in 1989 and 1990, but this tour was never on his list of things to do. None of my boys were interested either, but I didn’t care; I was perfectly happy to take the tour by myself. It was amazing, and I learned so much.

The other part of “history” day was a special personal tour of Pearl Harbor and the military bases surrounding it. You’ll have to read the detail to learn more. Bonus: I also had a big personal milestone for myself that day, which you can read about the detail. (I told you our days were never dull!)

Day Four: Easter Sunday Surfing

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After Easter Sunday service and my favorite meal of all meals (Easter brunch), we spent the afternoon watching the kids learn to surf! Disclaimer: that picture was not taken by me. The surf school we used had a photographer on staff, who was happy to take 600 pictures and sell them to this sucker picture-loving mom.

Day Five: Pearl Harbor

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After the special “preview” tour on Saturday, we did the official USS Arizona and USS Missouri memorials on Monday. I’ve done the Arizona tour twice, but this was my first time on the Missouri. Both were extremely moving and yet also inspiring. Once again, I learned so much. In the afternoon, we hopped on a prop plane and flew to Maui.

Day Six: Snorkeling

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Once again, in full disclosure, that’s not my picture. I swear those professional photographers see me coming. 😉 I would say snorkeling was my least favorite activity, simply because I don’t really care for being underwater for long periods, but I did go into the water at both snorkel spots and look around a bit before heading back up topside to enjoy lounging on the catamaran.  All three of my boys greatly enjoyed swimming with the fishes. My husband picked this activity, too, and picked what I’m sure was the most expensive option, but it was definitely a first-class operation, and they treated us extremely well.

Day Seven: Vow Renewal

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And here’s the other thing that I got to choose, which was a very important component of our vacation: renewing our wedding vows!  The idea for this was developed more than a year and a half ago, although we really had no idea we were going to do it in Hawaii when we first started talking about it. It turned out to be a beautiful ceremony, and so memorable. I’m so glad we took the plunge and chose to do it!  I can’t wait to share the pictures in the detail write-up! 😀

Day Eight: The Road to Hana

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This was something my husband was pretty insistent upon. A lot of people have negative opinions on this trip, but for us, it turned out to be a great day. We had a few ups and downs, which is par for the course when you’re traveling long hours in a car with brothers, but we made lots of memories and I took lots of pictures!

Day Nine: Mount Haleakala

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This was an activity I’d never heard of, but it’s fairly popular, from what I can gather. It’s not cheap, but it was absolutely worth the money. Basically, you get up at an ungodly hour, drive to the meeting point, take a shuttle up to the top of a 10,000-foot high extinct volcano, and watch the sunrise with about 100 other people,  Then, if you’re really adventurous, you bike 23 miles back down the volcano! I heard a lot of people talk about how fantastic the sunrise pictures can be, but my experience, in my humble opinion, was just so-so. Sunrises are tough: you’re really at the mercy of the clouds and the light refraction, but even though I didn’t feel it was my best sunrise picture, I will say that the views as we biked down the mountain were absolutely magnificent and worth the ungodly wake up time and all the effort to get back down the mountain. Once again, not a trip for the faint of heart, but I would highly recommend it!

Day Ten: Hotel Day

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We had a late flight out, so we spent the morning packing while JJ went down the hotel pool slide about 100 times, and then it was off to the airport for the very long, excruciating flight home. (FYI: I hate flying.) Our flight left at 6pm Saturday night and arrived back in Michigan about 11pm Sunday morning.

And that is our Hawaiian vacation in a nutshell. Since this blog is not just for me to brag about my amazing vacation ;), you may be wondering about my health and eating habits while on vacation, so I’ll give you a little overview of how that went.

A little over four years ago, I went to Disney World, and I was very proud of myself for managing to stay on the Weight Watchers program and count all my points for the entire week that we were there. You can read all about it starting here if you like. Back then, I was only a year into my healthy habits, and it was honestly a real test. Backsliding would’ve been extremely easy, especially back then, when I was just getting into good habits that had helped me lose the weight.

Flash forward 4 years, and my attitude is different. Don’t get me wrong, I still want to be healthy, and I still want to maintain my weight, but this time around, I didn’t want my health and especially my eating to consume me. So I didn’t let it! Bottom line: I ate with abandon the entire time we were in Hawaii. OK, maybe not abandon, but I didn’t deny myself anything that I wanted. You can see and read about some of my food choices in the detail reports, but the point is, there was a ton of amazing food in Hawaii, and if I wanted it, I tried it. Nothing was off-limits, and I tried a lot of things that were new to me. And most of them, I liked! I’ve discovered that macadamia nuts in pretty much any form can take me to my happy place. 😉

I did run twice for a total of 11 miles, once on Oahu, once on Mau. I think that’s pretty damn good!  I’ve said often on my blog that I love running when I travel, because it helps me to really see new places, and running in paradise was definitely an incredible adventure.

So you’re probably wondering, did I even bother to weigh myself when I got back? Yes, I did!  I was right back to my Monday weigh in this week, with results that weren’t too surprising:

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Yep, 3 1/2 pounds up.  But I’m not too worried about it, and here’s why:  I’m sure it will come as no surprise to learn that this is the most expensive trip I have ever taken and most likely will ever take. Even while we were in the midst of the trip, I felt guilt over how much money we were spending. But when the guilt feelings cropped up, I reminded myself that this wasn’t just a family vacation to celebrate 20 years of marriage (although that’s certainly a notable accomplishment, I think). Another reason that I decided to take this trip is because this month (April) marks my fifth anniversary of having gotten to goal weight. Getting to goal weight was hard, but keeping the weight off is even harder, and keeping it off for five years…well, I don’t need to tell you that it’s a pretty small statistic.  It has taken me a lot of time and effort and tears to finally learn and embrace the habits needed to stay healthy and maintain my goal weight (within a few pounds). I’m proud of myself, and proud of the work I’ve done. I’m also proud of the fact that I wore a bikini for my entire vacation and never once felt embarrassed about it. I really do feel that I earned the right to wear that two-piece swimsuit!

So, although I will be paying this vacation off for a long time to come, I will never regret it. Besides the fact that our family had an amazing time and created memories that will last a lifetime, I feel like it was a great “present” to myself for all the hard work I’ve done over the last five years. And on top of all that, I love that I can look at all the pictures of myself from this trip and not feel embarrassed or unhappy about how I look, but instead know that I am as healthy and as fit as I have ever been in my entire life.  I think that is definitely an accomplishment!

Check back later if you’re interested in more detailed summaries of our trip and my healthy habits and eating.  (Oh my gosh…I could write a book just on the food! 😉 )

Thanks so much for reading!

5 thoughts on “Our Vacation of a Lifetime

  1. Desiree Marshall

    Oh my gosh! I LOVE reading vacation posts so do not feel bad about sharing away, imo! Sounds like you really did have a trip of a lifetime! I love the pics that you’ve posted so far and so glad that you had such a wonderful time! Your hubby sounds like a wonderful tour guide!

    And pssh, a 3 pound gain! That’s nothing! I’d definitely consider that a victory!

    Reply
  2. Meg B

    What a fantastic trip!!! Love all the memories you made with your family. Congrats again on your 20 year anniversary. And congrats on your five year anniversary!!

    Reply
  3. Cindy R

    Thank you for sharing your family’s anniversary trip with us. What a wonderful way to celebrate with your children!. I loved the photo of the “vow renewal” because you both looked so happy in it! I had the pleasure of staying at the Moana Surfrider a few years ago and I still remember that their waffles were some of the best I ever tasted! Can’t wait to read the more detailed descriptions when you have the time to attach them to the photos! Happy 20th!!!!

    Reply

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