"Are you for Scuba?"

Update on the past few weeks....

The week after my surprise visit back to sacramento for my sister's birthday, brother's birthday, and Mother's day, I came back to Maui to find my cousins visiting! John and Calandra come to housesit for my aunt every year, sometimes multiple times, when Candy and Nane go out of town. Which means we got to see them since our studio apartment is attached to my aunt's house. So, I got to send some time with them during my time off!

They brought with them some friends. Two couples: Rachel and Brian, and Janna and Jeremy (friends from church). I joined them for burgers at Cheesebrugers in Paradise off Front Street in Lahaina the first night they came in. I mooched off of their homemade dinners multiple times that week and one morning for breakfast as well. They showed me a new beach I didn't even know existed: Slaughterhouse Beach. Quite the name huh? Apparently that's where the imported cattle from neighboring islands were dropped off to be slaughtered for maui islanders. That story didn't really make me want to go there (thanks John) but it was a beautiful beach! The girls came to my Zumba class that I was subbing for one morning. Twas their first time and they did a great job! Zumba naturals!

Newest Adventure: My cousin John taught me how to scuba dive in Kapalua Bay! I wish I could have gotten a picture to show proof on the blog, but it never happened. It was so fun though! Pretty freaky at first, completely trusting a mask to whole heartedly breath IN while underwater. Breathing out is no prob, but IN... purdy scurrrry! I could only get down to about 15 feet because my right ear wouldn't pop. You know when you go too far underwater your ears hurt? You're sappose to plug your nose and blow out and they pop like popping after an airplane ride or high elevation. Well, my right ear never cleared :( lame sauce... But I thoroughly enjoyed it! I'd love to go again, but to go on a scuba diving trip I'd have to have my diver's lisense (re-read that: DIVER'S lisense not "driver's" haha). That means we'd have to get certified and buy gear and read up on good spots and figured out which fish are which so we know what we are looking at... Eh, with this new Maui attitude, that sounds like too much work. Maybe someday if we are bored we'll look into it. For now, I'll just dive with John when they come to visit :)

Modeling

I got back some of the professional photos from the project runway fashion show I modeled in (see previous blog post "Runway Shows and Hidden Trails" for story)

Last minute I was asked to model in another Runway Show in late May. Mary Kay Cosemetics invited all of their top sales associates to Maui for a retreat. One of their last nights they put on a dinner and show for everyone. The show included musicians and a few fashion shows. South by Andy South and Cloth Hawaii showed their lastest collections for this very expensive high end show (It was put on at the Four Seasons in Wailea... enough said). Andy South was a designer for the very popular reality tv show Project Runway season 8 fashion show that I was involved in last month. He is probably the most well-known Project Runway contestant that was at the last show and he has definitely been successful since being on the reality show. The other designer was Cloth Hawaii, also from O'ahu. Cloth Hawaii is a vintage repurposed and reproduced designer. As compensation for modeling in the show, Cloth Hawaii will be making something special just for us models :) most likely some kind of jewlery or accessory. I'm used to modeling for free so I'm stoked to get something out of this! We haven't yet received the event photographer's pictures of the show but here are some backstage photos: 



Cloth Hawaii





South by Andy South



Cloth Hawaii with deisgner Micah in the middle (black dress and headband)



South by Andy South
(funny pic)

Andy and some of his models :)

The runway photos will show up on another blog sometime soon hopefully. And maybe even more from the first fashion show...

There was a Zumba Party put on at the local gym Sports Club Kahana last Saturday. Fellow instructors lead the 2 hour Zumba part-ay and I stayed after to make some connections with the gym owner and hopefully I'll be helping out with the next Zumba Party. It was free for everyone. Great advertisement for the gym. There was a good turnout and we had oodles and oodles of fun :D

Yesterday Jonny and I explored a new beach called Airport Beach on the other side of Black Rock. Here is some video of our time playing in the water.

The end of this week also finishes our 2 weeks of housesitting for my aunt and uncle. We've loved being in charge of 2 little fur balls! Boy do we miss having pets of our own. Their pameranian named Kea (Kay-uh) is a darling pup attached to my hip (and attached to Jon after his shifts and licks the salt off of his chest, neck, arms, etc...Weirdooo). And Kiko is one of those talkative cats that responds everytime you say her name, or when she just wants some lovin'. Kea gets the luxury of sleeping with us since our mattress in on the ground there's no way of  keeping him off except from completely excluding him and closing the door. Then he'll bark all night. I know it's like childcare and you're not sappose to give into his cries, but it was keeping me up and honestly we don't mind him sleeping with us. And we figure he can be spoiled every couple weeks when we housesit.

My friend Melissa will be gracing us with her presence next week. I'm superrrrrrrrrrr excited!!!!

Until next time

Maui No Ka Oi

Surprise Visit Home



Mother's Day card
"There's no place like Mom"

 The week after Mother's Day I planned a stealthy surprise trip back to Sacramento! Jon didn't come, he was holding down the fort. He had work and he'd just seen his parents when they came to visit. It was definitely me missing my family, and them missing me :)

 My schedule that week had Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday off. So I got my Tuesday shift taken care of and got my Zumba classes covered and flew in Monday night. I didn't tell ANY immediate family. I wanted to surprise them all one at a time! That week was Mother's Day, my brother's birthday, and my sister's birthday was the following week. I thought a plane ride ticket would be a nice present.

So I did my homework to make sure everyone was going to be available that week at some point so I could spend time with everyone. I had my sister's husband, Andrew, pick me up Monday night from the airport and bring me back to stay at their place. He told Heather that he was heading over to hang out at a friends, which was a common occurance so it didn't cause her to think anything of it! He came back home an hour later and brushed it off like, "eh, it was boring there" and then I knock on the door. He tells her to answer it. And she's like "... uhhh NO! It's 11:00 at night!" but he says trust me.

After many tears and excitement, we settled in and chatted the night away. The next morning I had my sister-in-law Kristy K take me down to my mom's work (also one of my previous employers). Kristy wasn't sappose to know, but I had one of my mom's co workers check in to make sure my mom would be at the office when I came in, and she thought that I had already told Kristy, so she mentioned something to Kristy. A bummer for the surprise factor, but Kristy helped to make sure everyone else's schedules were figured out for the next week.

Kristy walked in first and got the camera ready. then I walk around the corner and say "Happy Mother's Dayyyyy"  :D

After a very long wide-eyed gasp, my mama burst into tears and hugged me many times. It was aweosme. She's not one for surprises, but I thought she'd like this surprise, and she did! Kathy is my mom's BFF and works with her as well, she cried longer than everyone else :) Haha and continued to cry if she talked about the surprise later that day. Love ya Kathy!

My mom took the rest of the day off and drove me around. Just like the old days before I got my lisense, my mommy- the taxi cab :) We went over to my sister-in-law, Christie's house (yes I have two sister's named Christie/Kristy, and yes both of their last names are now Vicars. and.... yes they have the same middle name!! hahaha Ann or Anne (right?) Aside from different spelling, they have the same name!) I contacted the girls babysitter and Christie's mom and aunt to make sure Christie wasn't off running errands the day I planned to come surprise her. My mom went in first and got the camera ready. Then I knocked and put my finger over the eye hole so I could see the true reaction.

She opened the door and said "oh hey" .... "OH... HEY!!!" realising that I was not actually sappose to be there... I don't live there. Haha. Sienna, who is now 3 1/2, was so excited and ran around the house like she was on caffine for the next few days. My other adoreable niece, Chloe was woken up from a nap to see me. She is now 8 months (right??) and last time I was her she was barely 4 months. What a huge difference! She is so much bigger!!!

I gave the girls pink flower leis and spent the next 2 days with them and Christie. That day we went out to lunch to The Habit (miss that place!) then headed home to surprise my dad.

Sadly I didn't have a way to make sure my dad was at the right place at right time for me to get a proper reaction from him since I didn't tell many people that I was coming into town. He was on a long distance call when he walked into the house and saw me there. He looked around and saw a buncha people, saw me, and waved and kept talking.... and then did not a double, but a triple-take and realised who I was and had a huge smile and started laughing. But he had to finish his call with a client before talking with me. He later told me it was such a great surprise, and it brought tears to his eyes :)

That night I walked in and sat on the couch with my brother Josh. He all of the sudden felt all eyes on him. He looked at everyone then finally at me and started laughing and got up and gave me a hug. When I saw my other brother Shane on his birthday on Thursday, my mom said "I've got a surprise for you..." and I walked up and he gasped and couldn't stop smiling :)

Overall, the reactions were all awesome and fun and I'm glad I got footage of most of it! I then spent Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday with everyone.

Lunch with Chloe, Sienna, Mama, and Christie

My mom made dinner the first night for everyone,
 and my favorite dessert Pinapple Crush cake! MMMM Grandma's recipe!



Went to the Zoo with Sienna and her preschool

Exhausted baby after Zoo adventures

Wednesday night my old BFF, Caitlin told me she had an extra ticket to Cirque du Soleil, so how could I turn that down?!? I LOVE Cirque! (Real Cirque du Soleil shows, not Maui Cirque du Soleil)

Rope Dancers. Right after I took this
the security guard came over and told me to stop... oopsies

I dropped by Jonny's parent's house where we abandoned our kittens. Yet they are far from abandoned. Spoiled, kitty treats every day, huge house to roam around, regularily cleaned littler boxes, toys, and a dog they rule is a bit of a step up form our old place! If you didn't know much about me before the move, I was OBSESSED with my babies. Fergie and Kona. They grew up with me from little ones to cats. BUT they don't remember me :( When I dropped by to hang with them they were standoff-ish and kicked their way outta my arms when I picked them up. Well FINE! It helped me be okay to give them up to Tracy and Bill because they are better off at their house.

Thursday night my sisters and my mom and I all went out to dinner to celebrate Heather's birthday. Girl's night! We went to Z Pizza in Roseville. a Picca place that has good gluten-free pizza! It was lot's of fun and great to catch up. The pasta I got was horrible, but everyone's pizza was good! That's what I get for getting non pizza at a pizza place :-/. We stayed up late chatting and I hugged out my goodbyes.

The next 24 hours is a bit of a blur.

My flight left at 6am Friday morning. Which means I had to be there at 4:30am. Which means I got up at 3:30am. Which is 12:30am in my biological time. Tranfered planes in LAX.Then I got about an hour of sleep once I got back to my home in Maui. Then worked until 11pm that night. One very tired crazy day, but then it was over with and I had great memories of my trip back to Sac

ALMOST got 3 seats all to myself. Until the other pasengers hurried in last minute
and diminished my hope for a comfortable ride

I hope everyone had a great Mother's Day to all the Mother's surrounding them. Wives, Grandmas, sisters, coworkers, etc.

Maui No Ka Oi

Runway Shows and Hidden Trails

Anyone seen/know/heard of Project Runway? It is a reality TV show for fashion deigners that is extremely popular and has huge stars/designers/important fashion people judging the contestants. Each week they are given some kind of theme to design a garment around and  they have 1-2 days to complete it. Then the top 3 or 4 go to New York to show a collection at world famous Fashion Week in Bryant Park.

Why do you care?

Four of those memorable and top contestants from last season of Project Runway were in Maui and needed models to show their latest collections at a fashion Show at the Hyatt. By God's grace, I had a connection.

I have been in many fashion shows back in Sacramento for local designers and friends. I love the thrill of a runway show and I love fashion. There's not much going on in Maui as far as the fashion scene, so I was oh-so excited for this oppertunity.

It's pretty surreal interacting with someone in person when you had watched them on T.V. every week for 10 weeks. One of the contestants that got to the top named Andy South actually lives in Honolulu, O'ahu. So he invited some friends from the show to present their clothes at a fashion show in Oahu and then they hopped islands to show in Maui as well! The designers were Andy South, Christopher Collins, Casanova, Mondo, and Michael Drummond.

Project Runway website: Project Runway Season 8 Designers

I wore Michael Drummond and Mondo's designs. Mondo has a very different style, funky, weird, odd, awesome. I had an umbrella- enough said. Micahel Drummond descirbed my look as a Japanese beachy-chic style. The dress was made out of steel. Sounds weird, but it was beautiful and calming.

I don't have the best photos from the show yet, just some shots I've found from random people that uploaded them to Facebook. The professional shots will be released to me in a week or so for my "portfolio."

I'm ready for my close up! :)

Being dressed backstage by the designer

Micahel Drummond with his models

Mondo's designs

Mondo with his models

All of the models

 After the show was my second favortie part of the evening, because there were maybe 20+ people flashing their cameras at all of us models, like we were famous or something! What a rush :)

The show was sappose to start at 6, but didn't start until 8:45pm, so Jon was able to see to show :) He was stopped and asked by 4 different people if he was in the show. That's what he gets for wearing a wife beater...

I loved all the runway shows I walked in back in Sacramento, but Maui didn't seem to have much at all going on in regards to fashion shows (not much goes on here anyways). So this show helped me make a lot of great connections to the fashion scene here in Maui. Fellow models that are in a lot of the shows, media coverage, hair stylists, and event coordinators. I was even stopped by a lady after the show and she gave me her business card and said they'd love to do a photo shoot with me for their new website. I felt like a rockstar that night. The next day I was recognized by a few people at yoga, from work, and at the store. Thank you God for such a wonderful experience!

In other news...

Now that Jon quit his other job, we have more time together! We went to 'Iao Valley on Wednesday.



The 'Iao Needle

 

The 'Iao Needle referred to as the phallic stone



Pesky hair... Minus that: great pic!

Found a hidden trail

Trail markers



We left our own

 

Tru wuv

  

Another pile of trail markers, with a cool warrior lookin guy carved into the stone

Look ma, no hands! (kinda)

YIELD
 Chicken Crossing

  

We drove around the north side back to West Maui which is mostly a one laned windy scary road.
 It was training for our Hana trip



Pitstop
"Julia's Best Banana Bread on the Planet"

  Maui No Ka Oi