UH-mazing!

How cool is this?! I ordered the parts online, cut the vinyl out with my Cricut, painted it blue, and slapped this baby up on the wall last night.

I'm just glad the numbers look orderly, lol. (*psst!* By the way, that's our kitchen cart with the lamp on it. Isn't it beautiful and full of counter space?)

I don't think I'm completely done yet... I have a little something up my sleeve, but I think it turned out pretty cool, IF I do say so myself. :)

Funny story -- I'm sitting here at my friend's house (Kelsey) while her daughter naps, and I just looked up at their clock... and realized that I bought the exact same hands that she has on her own hand made clock, lol! Sorry Kelsey -- NOT intentional, lol! Anyway, it was pretty easy to do, so if you'd like to give it a shot, let me know, and I can help you.

Favorite Quotes

Okay, that last one was a little heavy, and I haven't done this in a while, so here are some of my favorite quotes. (Most of these are from movies... no one's said anything funny lately.)

"Ahh, landlord, you're a sinner! Between your lungs there's neither heart nor spirit, but the lump of your own swallowed money bag!" "He'll never get over that one, Joe!" (from 'Far & Away')

"Sometimes I wonder if we ever give God a headache." -? (Saw it on a stamp.)

(When Sean asks for directions...) "Well you see that road over there?" "Yeah." "Well don't take it. It'll do ya no good." (from 'The Quiet Man')

"Surely you can't be serious!" "I am serious... and don't call me Shirley." (-Airplane)

"If there's one thing I can't stand about you, Higgins, it's your confounded complacency. At a time like this, with so much at stake, it's utterly indecent that you don't need a glass of port." -Col. Pickering from 'My Fair Lady'

(When disputing about taking in Eliza...) Mrs. Pierce:"What's to become of her?" Prof. Higgins: "What's to become of her if we leave her in the gutter, tell me that." "That's her own business." "Well, when I'm through with her, we can throw her back in the gutter, and it'll be her own business again."

Count Your Blessings

Well, I don't know about you, but I'm tired of looking at our current post. There really isn't much to report on, though. I will say, we have three exciting additions as of late. The first, a kitchen cart! Allow me to show you how much counter space we have:

I dare you -- I just DARE you -- to try and use two square feet of counterspace in your kitchen for a day -- one day. Seriously, nobody has ever taken me up on this offer. Gu'head. Show me whatcha got.

Okay. I really don't feel like going through all the trouble of getting pictures of the kitchen cart on here, so imagine, if you will, two cabinets with shelves, a pull-out drawer above that, and a WON-derful slab of countertop to top it all off... on wheels. AND! There's about an extra foot of countertop with handy dandy side-thingys that you can put down when you want them out of the way. How sweet is that?! It's actually somewhat enjoyable to make food now, since I don't have to hold half the ingredients as I make it!

Secondly -- bikes! We loved our bikes in Idaho, but sadly, had to sell them when we came here. Dave had a mountain bike for a while when we first got here, but he sold it. Now that it's warming up again, and since it's been almost a year, we decided "it was time."

This is mine, and Dave's is very similar. We just wanted simple cruisers to ride to the harbor, beach, or shops. It's been soooo nice having bikes again! It's fun to have a reason to get out and see different houses around here... see how the other side lives.

Which brings me to blessing number three. When I was telling my mom about this, it occured to me how numb we've become to Hawaii norms -- busy traffic stopping to allow one car to make a turn, grabbing a cockroach instead of a fork in the silverware drawer, being flashed an extended thumb and pinky every time someone needs a little mercy... and our third blessing... people having their washer and dryer outside. We got a washer and dryer! Thank you Garcias and Kamauus for your generosity, but ... yeah. :) There's still a slight hiccup with the dryer, so on rainy days like today, we still can't do laundry lol, but they're ours.

As I said, when I was telling my mom about it, I was raving about how great it was that we bought them from a family who had them inside *ooh-la-la*, so they weren't rusty yet. Our conversation went a little something like this:

Mom: "Wait... inside? ...as opposed to..."

"Yeah, outside."

"Outside? Like... not IN your house?"

"Yeah."

" *silence* "

"Yup."

"Like... OUTside? ...But... are they on a porch or something?"

"Well... we have a concrete slab that they're sitting on. And the roof extends out over them."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"And this is common in Hawaii?"

"Very. That's why we're so excited they came from an 'indoor' family."

"Oh."

"Yup."

"So... what's to stop any random stranger from coming up and using it?"

"...Nothing."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

lol I love you, Mom! :) I have a feeling that part of the reason behind our coming here was so that Heavenly Father could show us how blessed we are. The past couple days, I've been having issues trying to fit everything into our fridge and freezer. Don't mistake me for ungrateful; I'm very happy and feel very privileged to have this much food. But today, my thoughts turned to going for a visit to the mainland, and opening a real, full-sized fridge. I'm not gunna lie... I think I got a tear in my eye, lol. We are so very blessed.

Clark Family -- DON'T READ!

I reeeeeally want to put up pictures of more stuff that I've made, but I don't want the people I've made them for to see it... so! Here's what we're going to do:

Dad and KT -- I have b-day cards to give you when I come visit, and I want to post the pictures... so you aren't allowed to look at this post! Also, I don't think you even know we have a blog, but Bridget, you aren't allowed to look at this either! Umm... I think that's it. Everyone else can look.

*You are officially warned...*

*Stop looking!*

#1)

Okay, no more awkward trying to take pictures of the inside that are clear enough to see the detail, but fuzzy enough to blur the sentiment.

#2) I really liked how this turned out. I think I'll be playing with this design some more.

#3)

And last but not least, #4)

That's all for now. There are several birthdays and what not coming up, so I'll probably be making a lot more. Stay tuned!

Mother's Day Weekend

For Mother's Day weekend, we ditched our ward activity and went on a date -- Haleiwa Joe's! Dave had been there a few times for work, but it was my first time. All I have to say is that he was VERY brave to take me to a seafood place! There were only two items on the menu that weren't seafood, lol, and bet your bottom dollar, I got one of 'em! I haave to say, though, I tried some of Dave's crab roll, and it really wasn't offensive.

I found this picture on the internet. If I had taken a picture of where we were sitting, it would look like this. We got an outside spot! We didn't even ask for one! (People who requested an outside spot were told that there would be at least a 20-30 minute wait.)

This, however, I did take. Funny story: Dave had to buy a camera for work, and he brought it home to try it out. He went on a walk to the beach at sunset and came back with some really cool pictures. I was so jealous that he had such a cool camera, with all those nifty functions -- until he showed me that our own camera had the same ones, and MORE! Sweet! So, this is my first attempt to play around with the settings.

This was my second attempt. We went on a walk to the beach. Sunset is a good chance to play with the light and settings... and it's beautiful!

You're going to look through these and think, "Anna, these look like the same shots taken at different times." They are! Hey, you don't have to like it...


I went to take a picture of this paddle boarder, and he sat down, lol.

He's At It Again!

I walked out to the kitchen table this morning to find this:

More plumerias! I adore my husband. (We bought these bottles for me to try some glass etching. Any suggestions for what I should put on them?)

Our exciting news... no, I'm not pregnant... WE FINALLY GOT CURTAINS! I can sense some of you cringing as you think about the months we have spent curtain-less. We tried to just use what we had -- there's always something more demanding for your money to go towards -- so a black sheet hammered to the wall has been our former handiwork. But, we finally took the plunge.

A sheer layer, so we don't feel like we're in a cave, but some of the heat gets blocked, plus a heavier layer for privacy when we need it.

This is what spurred it: bamboo. We saw these, thought they looked really cool, then my amazing husband had a stroke of genius, and suggested we use them as curtain rods. Brilliant!

Now we're on a home improvement kick. The paint job in our apartment is AWFUL, so we're considering that... or flooring. We really hate to spend the money on it, since this isn't technically our home, and the fruits of our labors will be left for our landlord to enjoy. But, after seeing the difference a few homey touches can make, the wheels in our head are beginning to turn...

*Dave just called me from work and told me that he just got off the phone with the landlord -- who agreed to pay for paint! Ahh! :) *

Seriously?

Business first: *sigh* I figured that was why people were holding out on posting a comment on the blog. Okay. When you agree to make something for five other people, just to clarify, it doesn't have to be anything special. The blog I took this from said it could be leftover chicken! (That's why, in the agreement, you reserve the right to do something strange.) Fold a piece of paper in half, scribble 'Just Because' on it, and you're done. Nothing fancy here, guys. But hey, nobody wants to comment? Less work for me! :)

Okay. Fun stuff. We've been noticing lately that we have a lot of geckos. "Duh, Anna, it's Hawaii. EVERYone has geckos around the house here." Oh no... we have a lot of geckos. Last night, I noticed that there were three geckos on the two windows in our bedroom... and this is NOT their usual gathering place. So, I grabbed the camera, stepped to our front door, and snapped this:

Right after I took this picture, two more appeared on the door... and there were another two or three on the back door! Since A) they're fun to watch, and B) they eat annoying bugs, they're quite welcome to congregate! We even turned the porch light on to attract more bugs for them. I hope this is the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

I absolutely LOOOOOOVE the way this turned out! It took me forEVER because all the skinny little pieces turned out to be one giant skinny little piece, but it was so worth it. I'm excited to use more of these characters.

Yea!

May Day/ Lei Day Pictures

Some of the wares for sale at the Lei Day celebration at "the shell" in Waikiki...

She sells sea shells...

These were funny...

Feather leis.

Shrunken heads, anyone?

Shark Bait, OOH-ha-ha!

Some of the performers. Three short women, two kids, one bad spot way in the back, and zero naps... you do the math.

The troop.

There are reasons why I stay BEHIND the camera...

Some fun shots of the kids. They held out really well, even without naps.

Hydration is key!

He liked banging on the drums...

...a lot. :)