Here are some pictures from the shoot.

Here are a couple pictures of my beautiful nice Alexa!

And a couple of cute little Jacie.

Jacie and another little girl that was in the shoot.

It was a fun shoot and I can't wait to see the catalog!

Here is Nicole and her proud dad!

Me, Craig and Jacie.

Nicole made her own table center pieces.  She was going to put water in the container and a little fish, but the sand clouded up the water, so we used them like this and they were very nice.  We attached balloons to the top so they were very festive!

Party favors, yummy cookies from Charmaine's Bakery!

A yummy lemon crunch cake from The Alley.  Known for their delicious cakes and food!

Great entertainment.  Manoa DNA performed first.  They were fabulous!

Next, Da Braddas did their comedy routine.  If you haven't heard of Da Braddas, they have a local TV show on OC16.  They are hilarious!!

And of course they make the family come up and get some ribbing!

And the Honolulu Dance Company performed some great dance routines.

But the best entertainment was Nicole's brother Thomas!  I didn't know that he was such a great hula dancer! 

Congratulations again, Nicole.  I'm so proud of you!!

I do think it's a good thing though to recognize kids for their achievements.  Heaven knows, it's not easy being a kid these days, and I think recognition goes a long way in incenting kids to keep plugging along and continuing their hard work!

Here are a couple pictures from Alexa's event.   I'm so proud of her!  She is a good girl, who studies hard and is kind to all!!

Alexa with her proud mom!  On to middle school!

The graduation ceremony was held at the Stan Sheriff center on the University of Hawaii campus.

Here is the proud graduate.  If you caught my post about Jacie's graduation last week, you know that the giving of lei on special occasions is a big tradition here in Hawaii.  As you can see, Nicole got tons of lei and it wasn't even the end of the night.  What you can't tell from this picture is that one of her lei is short one item.  While we were seated waiting for the ceremony to begin, Jacie got hungry.  She's a little bottomless pit.  And when she gets hungry, we all hear about it until the situation gets remedied.  So we had to untie the end of one of the lei for Nicole and give Jacie a packet of cookies or candy (I can't remember what exactly it was.  Sorry Nikki!!

Here is Nicole with her dad and mom and then with her brother Thomas and sister Emilee.

And with Alexa, Jacie and Craig and with Auntie Sherry.

They grow up so fast!  Have to enjoy every moment while you can!!

Here is Jacie in the car heading to the beach.  She couldn't even wait until we got there!!

Finally, at the beach, in the water, and ready for the big moment…well almost!

Here I am trying to calm her down and get her to put her face in the water.  You should have heard her breathing so hard through her snorkel. 

Okay, maybe she'll feel safer with her little vest on too. So cute!!

After a little snorkeling she was so proud of herself and she really did do a great job for her first time.  The day was a little overcast and not your typical hot Hawaiian day.  We'll have to go again soon.

Alexa went in the water for a little bit, but was more interested in getting back to her Harry Potter book.  She's on The Goblet of Fire, one of my favorites of the set!

Here's Craig, in case you can't read upside down!

And here he is "meditating"?!?!  He's a funny boy!

Jacie trying to get warmed up by mom.  More snorkeling adventures to come later in the summer!

The first event I want to share is Jacie's graduation from Kindergarten at Hanalani Schools!  Full cap and gown ceremony!

Here I am with my little cutie girl!  In Hawaii we have a custom of giving lei as a special part of any occasion.  As you can see, lei can be made of flowers or anything else that you can make into a lei. 

Jacie with her dad Alex, brother Craig, mom Sherry and sister Alexa!

And with her cousins, Nicole and Emilee (my brother's daughters).

Mrs. Neumann, Jacie's K3 Teacher and Miss Wester, Jacie's current Kindergarten teacher.

And with a couple of her little friends!

It was a fun night and it's hard to believe that my little Jacie will be in first grade next year!  Hope the summer doesn't go by too fast!!

Lei Etiquette

There are very few "rules" when it comes to wearing a Hawaiian lei. Anyone can wear one, anytime – there need not be an occasion. It is perfectly fine for one to purchase or make a lei for themselves. It is common for locals to have a nut, seed or shell lei on hand to wear on special occasions. And hats are often adorned with flower, fern or feather leis.

There are, however, a couple of "unspoken rules" one should know when receiving a lei for the first time. A lei should be a welcomed celebration of one person's affection to another. Therefore, always accept a lei, never refuse. The proper way to wear a lei is gently draped over the shoulders, hanging down both in front and in back. It is considered rude to remove a lei from your neck in the presence of the person who gave it to you, so if you must, be discreet. 

Lei giving is a regular part of any special occasion such as birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, and graduations. It is not uncommon for a graduating senior to have so many leis around their neck that they can no longer see!

Lei or Leis?

The Hawaiian language does not distinguish between singular and plural. Therefore, the proper way to say the plural form of lei is actually just “lei.”

We made Mother's Day pencil holders, embellished with flowers!

One flower had an I {heart} U Mom circle in the middle and the other had a picture of the child.

Here are a couple pictures of Craig's class…

And one from Jacie's class.

Happy Mother's Day!!

Jacie's so small she couldn't even sit back in the chair and have her feet go in the water!

Jacie picked out a purple polish!

The three of us all got pedicures.  Jacie wanted to sit between mom and me, so I was to the right of her.

Jacie found out that some of the things done tickled her feet a little!

Almost done!  In addition to the purple, the gal painted cute little white flowers and polka-dots on Jacie's toes. 

Too cute!

Here are Jacie, Craig and Alexa coloring Easter eggs!

And of course they got Easter presents from Auntie Jacque.  I forgot to take a picture of Alexa who got the book The Magician's Elephant.

The little stars of my life!

Future rock stars?!?

And Sherry and Jacie made this yummy cake for our dessert!  We also had a scrumptious ham dinner with all the fixin's!

It's so fun to watch those cute little girls all bunched up, taking the ball away from their own team mates, etc.!  It's just a game!

Jacie's team is called the Pink Dragons.  Now you know where I'll be spending my Saturday mornings!