Halloween time!!

It's my favorite time of year again at the parks (came around so fast this year!)!! 

Halloween time!!

Per one of my most favorite traditions, we went up to the park for the first weekend of the Halloween/Fall decorations! Such a fun time in the park! New fall foods, Haunted Mansion and Space Mountain have a holiday layover (of which both we LOVE), the characters are dressed up and halloween has just consumed the park. : )  

They add a ghost to Space Mountain, which is supposed to make it scarier...but it's more funny to us! We love it, lot's of laughs! But we'll let him think he's scary ; ) (as shown below) 

The haunted mansion is redone with a Nightmare Before Christmas theme! This is my favorite thing!! We kinda wish it was like this all year round. : ) 

Made a stop for a favorite treat of ours, beignets, before taking another round on the Haunted Mansion. And caught some of Fantasmic as we ate. Perfect : ) 

Got our photo with the GIANT Mickey pumpkin and knowing I LOVE Zero (from Nightmare Before Christmas), Brody got me a little Zero to take home!
I'm going to hang him up as part of our Halloween decorations. : ) 

SUCH a fun night!! Can't wait to go back and enjoy the rest of the fun they have this time of year! 

Slow cooker BBQ Chicken

I've been itching to fire up our slow cooker lately, and am looking forward to getting more use out of  it this fall and winter. For it's first run of the season we chose to try a BBQ Chicken recipe I found on my favorite site called all recipes.com...I love reading everyones tips and reviews on the recipes! : ) 

We first used the chicken for sandwiches, and then as recommended in a review, we used it for a BBQ chicken/bacon pizza. Which the reviewer said was the best pizza ever! I thought that was a little dramatic, until I tried it---it really is some of the best pizza we have ever had!! : ) 

Everything was so good, that I had to pass it along to our blog world. you can find the recipe {HERE} 

Reading some of the reviews, the following was suggested: 

* Use Famous Dave's bold and sassy BBQ sauce

* Add a teaspoon of liquid smoke

*Shred the chicken and let it sit for the last hour

For the pizza:

*Use Pillsbury rollout dough 

*Mozzarella cheese

*Cut up bacon bits 

*Famous Dave's sauce

*and of course the shredded chicken

And follow the cooking directions on the dough... 

So excited for more slow cooker adventures! : ) 

Aloha!

We recently returned from another wonderful summer vacation in HI with my family---minus my sister who is serving a mission on Temple Square, and was missed very much on the trip...but we know she is where she is meant to be at this time. : ) 

We got to spend a week in paradise, and as you can imagine, it was nothing short of a fun filled week! 

I LOVE landing in HI, right when you get off the plane you are instantly greeted with the warm floral fragrant air and relaxed feel of your vacation ahead! The Kona airport is especially fun for it's throwback on tarmac walk off! You almost never get to walk off a plane in this way, and walk though a virtually open air airport. It's even smaller and more open than Long Beach. We just love it, and took advantage of a little photo opt---hard not to when you have a photo lover on board your trip (hehe)! : ) 

(The pineapple was growing outside the patio of our condo, and the bottom right was part of the view on to the golf course)

As always, I have SO many photos of the trip, but here are some of my current favorites. : ) 

We stopped at this beach that is off the old airport runway. It was beautiful, and when we got out there was a hawaiian family gathered around a picnic table signing together---it was the so cool to explore around while they sang. I tried to tape some of it, but my phone mainly picked up the ocean, so it was too hard to hear them. Mom caught the photo of me taking a photo of Brody (I love it!)...which is the photo to the far right of the middle row below.

We ended up with some roaches in our car, which ended up in our can of macadamia nuts! (eesh!) So gross. But we took care of them with a bug bomb. : ) 

The bottom photo is on the property of the condo we stayed in. Such a beautiful area!  

Relaxing at our pool! : ) 

We had the chance to go to Pana'ewa Rainforest Zoo. The nations only rainforest zoo. It was so pretty! And it was really great for a little free zoo. Their big attraction was a Bengal tiger, that I fell in love with! He was just so cute and playful! And on our way out Dad surprised me with a little stuffed tiger, I LOVED it! : ) 

Such a crack up! We happened upon another drag racing weekend while we were there. It was in Hilo, and proved to be just as fun as last years! Nothing like a good local drag race! : ) 

An evening in Kona

The Kona Inn is a beautiful restaurant on the water in an old hawaiian plantation style. Before dinner we happened upon the rowing clubs torch parade, so fun! Then we went by the Hyatt to see the HUGE manta rays that feed in a cove off the hotel. They look so huge and graceful, it's always such a fun stop! 

Oh...recognize those snow cones? ; ) 

On sunday we attended church next to the Kona temple. Such a beautiful temple, we couldn't help but to take some photos on the grounds. I just love how they came out! : ) 

(Gotta love the self timer on our camera!)

In relief society as a visitor they gave us these amazing hand knit leis!

We all stopped in to Hapuna Beach for sunset before dinner one night, apparently one of the top ten beaches in the world! The sand and water were amazing!! The sunset was beautiful in pastel! 

continued below..... : ) 

Aloha! Part 2

A friend of ours recommended to us a place called The Coffee Shack, above Cooks Cove. She said the food was great and the view maybe even better---so glad we made time to stop by! This place was amazing! The view, the food, the decor, it was all so charming! 

They put these little jam containers out for the geckos, and they attracted so many of them. It was really fun to see them coming and going. I got to get up really close to one and see it's little tongue go in a out real fast. They are so cute! 

Cooks Cove 

There's a little gecko on that leaf 

(click on photo if you want to make it larger)

A little skin diving at our favorite spot on the island, and it's on a black sand beach. It's always so fun to swim these amazingly colorful fish! : ) 

Brody played the last of the 3 courses this trip (he played the first two the last time we were here). We got a great deal, and i'm always excited about a deal! He got a discount on playing 9 holes, and then they let us play the other 9 as well for no charge, AND didn't charge for me as a rider! So great! : ) 

It was a really pretty course, and it was FULL of goats!! Which was so fun! I love going golfing with Brody, it's so relaxing, beautiful and I love taking golf photos. 

Exploring the island we found the king Kamehamha statue, and stopped for a closer look ; ) 

Little overlook and hike 

(See Mom and Dad beyond all the warning signs, tisk tisk, haha) ; ) 

One night before dinner we stopped at A Bay and got the payday of sunset shots! : ) The top right is Mom and Dad, and the other is us (another self timer camera set up, that turned out amazing!). And Brody had the idea and took the photo of me sitting on the tree, I love it! : ) 

We had such an amazing trip! And as always feel so grateful that we are able to enjoy such wonderful trips with family! Memories and happiness that will last for eternity!  : ) 

(Brody surprised me with leis for us. They smelled AMAZING! And kept for a couple days, making our home smell just like Hawaii!) : ) 

Oh....it's not over yet! Brody and I signed up to swim with dolphins, and that is a whole post in itself. We have some photos and video from it. It was SO fun! Stay tuned for that...I'm just trying to put the video together. : ) 

Some thoughts...

A lot of little things happened this past week, that in my heart, as they added up made me feel extra grateful. So much so that I started listing them down as blessings. Some are more personal and close to my heart, but a couple I'll share here...

As you all may know by now, I have been coming out stronger from a major trial that I can only now see as such a blessing in my life in so many ways! As I have said before, I have never been so sure that our Heavenly Father knows us and loves us individually and has a very tailored plan for each of us, as I have these past few years. This week I went to the dentist alone while Brody was out of town, to get 3 teeth worked on and a long time bad tooth pulled. While for some going to the dentist may not seem like a huge deal, but for me this was huge, this was in my mind a major milestone in a journey of personal recovery. And gave me a HUGE boost of confidence.

For a girl that because of anxieties and panic, at times couldn't even walk into a post office alone without the very real feeling of being seconds away from death (and at times, didn't leave home), this was nothing sort of a miracle and testament to how far I have come, and how much I have fought to regain my mental strength and independence back! 

The visit went great (even with a few obstacles), and I left feeling pretty darn proud of myself! : ) I am feeling so great lately! Even when I have a little bump in the road, I know how to handle it, I have so much peace and resolve in my heart, and I am SO grateful for the comfort the gospel brings to me so quickly. I could go on forever on this, and maybe soon I will do a followup to my 'Personal Trials' post. But for now, I just needed to gloat a little on how happy I am, how nice it is to feel stronger again and to note this step in my never-ending process of growth and learning in this life. 

Plus, it helped that I got to go from there to lunch with my Mom! I am so blessed to have such an amazing family who is always there for me. : ) 

About a month ago now Brody had some moles removed and this crazy mutant wart on his thumb treated. Every night he has to put a medicated cream on it, and was told to wrap it up good overnight. One of the first nights (maybe the 2nd) I noticed him struggling a little bit to put the bandaid on, I took it from him and offered to help place it just right over the bit of cream. Ever since, he or I have reminded each other that its time to zap the wart, or I'll hear him ask me to come help him with it all. 

This past week he was out of town for work for a few nights, and zapping the wart came to my mind. When he got home I asked him how he did without my help, he nicely explained that he did it every night that he was gone, that he could always do it just fine alone, but has enjoyed my help. Instantly I was reminded of how happily and tirelessly he has been right by my side over many years helping me through surgeries, miscarriages, medications, endless panic attacks and more---and it was then that I knew he could see that it meant a lot for me to give back some in return to him, even if it was just a small act. The whole thing made me feel even more loved and needed, and was another nice reminder than greater things are brought to pass by the small and simple things.

So still, every night, I help my hero with zapping his wart.

Printed part 2: Updated!

The print version of Brody's article (talked about in an earlier post), came out this month!! It's so fun to have it in the magazine to hold, all on glossy paper! : )

 Still so very proud of him!! 

A piece of the NB Temple

We recently came into a piece of the Newport Beach Temple! I LOVE it so much!! It's all hand painted with gold accents. It's beautiful and we really love having it in our home, it's another beautiful reminder of such wonderful blessings and peace we have access to. : ) 

I just can't say enough how much I love it! : )