Day 4- Princess Emma's Summer Palace/Dole Plantation/Shave Ice/YW Fundraiser Dinner and Dance

Day 4 started for Patrick and I with this view from our hotel room. We were staying in Waikiki, while Kristi and Mike were so nice and watched our kids over night. Kristi and Mike took the kids to the park and they all had a ton of fun getting to play with their cousin Hayden. They did have one mishap though. Joslyn looked the door to Hayden's room while she and Seth were in there and Kristi and Mike don't have the key. Luckily, they figured it out and no one was worse for the wear.

Patrick and I went to breakfast at a restaurant near the hotel and then headed down the Pali Highway to see Queen Emma's Summer Palace. Patrick and I were not impressed. We actually left the tour early. We left partly because they said the tour would be about 45 minutes and an hour and a half into it we still were only half way through. The main reason we left was because we were tired of being told that our culture is horrible and that the Hawaiian culture is so superior in every way and that we will never be able to even come close to as amazing as theirs is. The house itself was pretty and I wish that we would have just gone around on our own instead of going on the tour. I did get the chance to play Queen Emma's piano. Which is pretty special because anything that the Hawaiian Royalty has ever touched is considered sacred and you can be killed for touching it if you aren't of the royal class yourself. Luckily, Queen Emma gave her permission for other people to touch it before she died.

After we left the tour we headed back to pick up the kids and get them ready to go to the Dole Plantation. Joss has been wanting to see where the pineapples grow since we told her that pineapples come from Hawaii. She was even more excited when I told her that we would get to ride on the train too!

Here we are ready for the train to leave the station! This was about as happy as Seth got on the train ride. He wanted nothing to do with it and just cried the entire time.

Joss on the other hand was in heaven!

The train takes you through the fields where they grow pineapple, mangoes, cacao beans among other things. The scenery was gorgeous and the wind felt wonderful.

Here is one of the pineapples.

Some bananas in the trees

After the train ride they have some fun picture cut-outs. I did get my picture taken but I guess we didn't take it with my camera. Hayden playing the ukelele.

Hayden and Joss

Patrick

Kristi and Mike

After the train ride, we went to the garden. My mom would have been in heaven getting to see all the different trees, plants and flowers. Joss mainly just liked walking around.

In the garden, they have a koi pond. A nice couple was feeding the fish and let Joss have some of their food to give the fish too. She was so funny because she would take one tiny pellet at a time to throw it in the pond.

A few of those fish were HUGE! They must be well fed in that pond.

Our favorite part of the Plantation was the Dole Whip! This was a miracle cure for Seth's crabbiness. As soon as he had some of that pineapple ice cream, he was a totally different kid. Joss also loved the Dole Whip. She still talks about the pineapple ice cream.

On our way to the car we saw a farmer's market and I bought some apple bananas. They were pretty good but I think I'll stick to regular bananas. My kids were pretty lucky that day. Not only were they in Hawaii, got to ride a train, see the pineapples, have a dole whip, but then we went up to the North Shore and had some shave ice. All my life, I grew up with Shaved Ice, but I learned that it is really Shave Ice- no d. We got Strawberry-orange flavoring with ice cream and Azuki beans. It was definitely different having beans in my dessert. It was good though. Not good enough to get it again, but good. In fact, next time I would skip the ice cream and beans and go for the sweetened condensed milk on top. That looked really yummy.

Joss and Seth really enjoyed this special treat too.

We couldn't give it to Seth fast enough.

The West's also enjoyed their shave ice. You can see that Hayden isn't very happy in this picture. It's because his mom stopped feeding him his shave ice so I could take a picture.

After our shave ices, we went home. We were totally bummed that we didn't have more time to go to the beach up on the north shore. We really liked the North Shore area. It has a very different feel to it than Honolulu. More relaxed and small town feeling compared to the big city of Honolulu. We would have stayed there longer but we needed to get back to Kristi and Mike's so we could get ready for Kristi's ward's Young Women Fundraiser Dinner and Dance. Kristi and I are twins and that was really apparent when we realized that we were both planning to wear the exact same outfit to the dance. We both have the same teal pants and didn't even know it. We should have gotten a picture of us both in them but we didn't. In fact, we didn't get a single picture of the two of us the entire week that we were there. Any way, back to the fundraiser. I thought this fundraiser was a great idea. The young women set up a little restaurant. The parents would come and drop there kids off in one of the nurseries depending on their ages. Then they would be seated according to their reservation. You could ask for a private table or a group table. Then we chose between a Cafe Rio style burrito and salad. The Young Women were our waitresses and they brought us our meals and dessert. After dinner they cranked up the music and everyone started dancing.

It was a lot of fun and with about half an hour left, they brought the kids in and made it a family dance. It was so fun and Joss loved getting to dance with everyone. She was so excited on Sunday when we told her we were going to Aunt Kristi's church because she thought we were going to get to go dancing again.