Sisters, Wine, Dancing. Don't Get Much Betta

In the beginning of November I surprised my parents with a secret trip to Sacramento for 5 days. My sister picked me up from the airport and we went straight to In-N-Out

After that we went to our parent's house. I set up 2 cans of their favorite Moana Loa Macadamia Nuts with a heart formed by sand. Then a rather splotchy trail of sand leading them to me, where I was hiding around the corner. I have video of my parent's reaction, hopefully the video will upload correctly.

The next day my family got together for some dinner and wine. I brought a slideshow of my Europe trip pictures and shared them with everyone. I also gave my mom and sisters their souvenirs from Europe. I created a slideshow for them to really understand the gift I had for them. In Florence I bought 5 Florentine scarves at a street market shop. All the same style but in different colors, the color that I thought each person would love and fits them well. In addition, I would choose that person's delegated scarf to travel with me for one day in a town or city that I felt really embodied them as a person, what they mean to me, a place I know they  would really enjoy, etc. For that day while I wore their scarf it was as if they were there with me.

The funniest thing is that the colors I chose for everyone matched that evening's outfit perfectly!

It turned into a girls night. Movies, junk food, wine, and a sleepover

For the next few days I spent quality time with each sibling and parents, met up with a few long lost friends, and even applied for colleges.... Something about the mainland kicks my butt into a more productive gear I guess.

My sister and I hung out all day and went out dancing that evening. We chose to go to Badlands, a gay bar. The best part of a gay bar is that no one is looking at you as a female. You can have a drink at the bar and dance on the dance floor with your girlfriends without having to deal with ruthless players trying to hit on you :D And laugh at some funny situations while you're there.

It was packed!

One of the main reasons for visiting Sacramento was to see my darling nieces. I spent more time with them than I thought I'd be able to because I took them for a full day when their mommy was sick. It was so much fun getting to spend time with them , getting to know Chloe better (she was barely 1 when I moved to Maui), and seeing my darling Sienna tall and talking full sentences and understanding so much!

Sadly I had to return back to what I now call home, other people call in Paradise :D

Chamber and Chambers put on a wine tasting, free to employees of the major restaurants on Maui where the vendors and sales people of the vineyards could pitch their wine to the employees of the restaurants. So basically I was invited to a FREE four hour wine tasting, including free refreshments. Yes Please.

We went out to breakfast before

It was held in a dinning room in the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Kapalua

My best friend on the island, Toni

By the end our teeth were getting purple and we were getting goofy

dancing...

Maui is the "transplant" state. People "transplant" themselves here for a year then move away to go on with what ever life brings them. And the easiest industry to get a job in is the tourist industry. So because of that the restaurant business has fairly high employee turn over rate with new and old employees coming and going often. Our restaurant, Hula Grill, knows there are many employees without the luxury of having a family home cooked meal on the major American holiday Thanksgiving. It's also because they won't allow us to ask for that day off because we are way too busy for every employee to ask for it off... So Hula Grill puts on what they call an "orphan dinner" where all us little orphans without families can come together as a family and have a home cooked thanksgiving meal after the restaurant closes. They serve us what is left of that evening's Thanksgiving special, which is a lot, and provide wine and dessert as well. I think that is just so thoughtful and considerate to want to accommodate and give back to the employees of their successful establishment.

Cruisin' on the beach until it was time to eat

A friend of ours also put on a little thanksgiving party at her place that week

It became another game night :) The best kind!

And this is what I actually did and ate on Thanksgiving. House and pet sat for my auntie while she and  uncle got to see our family back in Sacramento for the holiday haha. No worries, I was JUST there, I just thought the situation was funny.

I don't think I have EVER  been up in time for a black Friday deal. But a cheap laptop at Office Max, actually ON the West side, was worth it :)

At Office Max in the morning darkness

Hawaiian turkey. Happy Thanksgiving!!

Maui No Ka Oi

Hawaiian Halloween and Birthday

This post is long overdue. I've been having too much fun lately on my day's off with no time to blog. So here's what happened in October.

My birthday was October 23. So I had my close friends over for a game night. It was so much fun. I introduced them to some new games they'd never played, which were the games we always played back in Sacramento. Catch phrase down at the pool after Jon cooked a huge amazing meal for everyone (he's the best husband ever). Then I put together a Minute to Win it style game for back up at my condo. No one had played this before. It's from the TV show where people have one minute to complete silly or stupid games before the minute is up and move up in the ranks. The winner got a Jamba Juice gift card. This game was a definite hit. After that we all hopped in the back of a truck (because that is still legal here, and so fun) and drove down to Maui Brewing Company to get a drink.  Here are some photos:

My friend gave me a hand made lei from the plumeria tree in her front yard, to sport around at work. And my Zumba ladies got me a bouquet of flowers! I was feeling the love on my birthday, made the fact that I had to work on my birthday no big deal

Catch Phrase by the pool

You have 2 teams and when it's your turn you are given a word that you have to get your team to guess without actually saying that word

Minute to Win it game. Land the CD flat on the cup 3 times

Put a stack of 4 quarters on the endge of a cup with a dollar bill underneath and pull the dollar out really fast so the quarters don't fall

Tortilla Head, using bagels. You have a plate tied to your head and flippers on and you need to flip the tortilla (or in this case, a bagel because I didn't have any tortillas) up onto your plate. This was the finale game. Toni won!!

Penny Hose. Grab the pennies at the bottom of stockings with only using your hands, you can't touch your hand to anything else

 Bradley put on the pantyhose afterwards

Transfer 10 cotton balls from one bowl the next using your nose covered in jelly

Cookie face. Put an oreo on your forehead and only using your facial muscles, move the oreo down to your mouth without it falling.

Standing on one leg, bend down to grab the bags of varying heights using only your mouth

My flower shower on my birthday

Riding in truck beds with friends :)

Also in October there's a little holiday called Halloween. We celebrated it a few times. 

I did a Halloween dress up fashion show for a local bikini designer Pakaloha (the most popular and worn bikini in Maui) and I was Little Red Riding Hood. It was more of an act than a fashion show, as I was paired with the Big Bad Wolf. We posed and did a little role play for our characters on stage. I'm still waiting on the photos from the actual show but here is a back stage photo:

My favorite Halloween celebration was the night before Halloween. I put on a Halloween themed Zumba class where everyone dressed up in a costume. I did a few Halloween themed songs like Ghostbusters and Thriller. And had a raffle for Zumba prizes for those dressed in costume.

Haha in the middle of calling out the next dance move

Right after Zumba I booked it down to Hula Grill (which is only 1 minute away from the gym by car). I met up with my friends and participated in the Halloween Costume Contest. I figured I was already in a costume, why not try to win some prizes. There was a keiki costume contest (Kid's contest), where they won gift cards to Walmart to get toys haha. It's always so cute to watch that portion because they do a little acting for their costume while on stage. Then it was the adult contest and everyone went up on stage to act out their character. 

I knew the MC, he was a bartender at Hula Grill dressed as Elvis Presley. He knew I could dance so he wanted me to be his closing act. I plugged in my IPOD and performed a belly dance routine that I personally choreographed and do regularly in my Zumba class. Easy. I knew that routine like the back of my hand. I'm very used to performing in front of large crowds. And I know how to get the crowd pumped. Dave and I played off of each other as I attempted to teach him some move on stage as well. I was the only act that grabbed the attention of every person in the restaurant. Needless to say, I had a pretty good chance of winning.

The prizes were good. I believe third place got a hotel stay at the Sheraton for two. Second place got about $100 to Hula Grill for dinner. And first place got 2 tickets for a doorless helicopter tour to Molokai (a neighbor very mountainess island).

I GOT FIRST PLACE!!

Meeting up with friends

Bronson dressed up as a Hula Grill waitress because in the last few years there have been like 10-15 pregnant servers. At one time there were 6 pregnant bellies running round the barefoot bar floor. 

Keiki contest. Our co-worker Seanna's son as a jelly fish

Dressed as tourists  

Top 3. Black swam who did a dance too and "big mama"

When he announced Big Mama as second place, so I had just realized that I won! So I look over to my best friend in excitement (Toni who is holding the camera)

Accepting my helicopter tickets :)

And it kept getting better. As I was chatting with my friends after the show, a women and her daughter come up to me and hands me a paper with a rainbow colored on it. The mom says "excuse me, my daughter drew this for you. She loves your costume and your dance and everything about you and wanted me to come with her to give this to you."
:D
awwwwww

This completely warmed my heart. It was so adorable. She scurried back to her table with her mom and I went back to visiting with people. Then when I wasn't really paying attention the little girl and her friend came over by me and kind of did their own belly dance version, giggled, and ran away. I looked over like- what just happened? And the table by me said "I think they wanted you to do more dancing for them but got too nervous to ask."

SO I did them one better and went back to their table of moms and 4 different little girls and some little brothers too and said "Do you want me to teach you how to belly dance?" They FLIPPED out in excitement. So I took them back to the stage and taught them how to dance, my favorite thing to do.

All the moms had their camera phones out with huge smiles on their faces

Some adults joined in as well

Look at how stoked that little girl is, made me so happy

I put the coin skirt on the girls and had them take turns dancing in it

The moms handed me a 5 dollar bill afterwards and thanked me.  I tried to refuse saying I didn't do it for any kind of compensation, but they said "it's only 5 dollars, thank you so much," blah blah...Well wasn't the first time I've been tipped for teaching someone to dance.

And afterwards we went out for a drink where Kristin's boyfriend was bar tending

Best Friends

The actual evening of Halloween we went down to front street for a little bit. thie is the thing to do on Halloween here on the West side of Maui. Everyone dresses up craxzy, trying to be the one that everyone wants a picture with. So it's really fun to see everyone's wacky costumes. The later in the evening the more adult costumes come out (fair warning). Jon and I just wanted to do our own thing on Halloween. So we went down to front street after getting groceries to make dinner and hung for a little bit. then went home and watched scary movies and ate dinner.

A band playing on one of the lawns

this guy was driving a blown up huge cat around front street as his costume.. haha

Costume contest up on stage

A UFO and his aliens

Jon was Indiana Jones. Only bought the hat for it. That leather jacket is from Florence :)

I was Laura Croft from Tomb Raider

And that's it for October for the most part. Life here is so fun. I don't want to leaveeeee

Maui No Ka Oi