Hawaii 2011 Part II

BYU - Hawaii Graduation

On Friday there was a special evening for the graduates and their guests.    Judy and I accompanied Erika. There was some speakers and a different buffet tables set up around the room.   My favorite was the sushi table (sorry no pictures of the food because there were plates in both of my hands)

There were some speakers but the highlight of the program for me was Joseph Ah Quin.  He's a Laie resident who has been singing for years.   We were sitting in the front row and he sang Let There Be Peace on Earth and the Laie Song.   During the second song he came and shook my hand and held it for a close to uncomfortable time.   I visited with him later and when I told him I was from Canada he told me he studied at the Banff School of Fine Arts and has performed at the Jubilee Auditorium in Calgary.

Joseph Ah Quin

If you grew up in the Church you have seen Brother Ah Quin before but you probably won't recognize him.   He is one of the main characters in the original Johnny Lingo.  

He was Mahana's father Moki and he had the best line in the movie.

Who can forget "Mahana you ugly!"

Saturday was the graduation.  We went and got these seats that Luke said that his dad would approve of.  We had a good view.  We were "stacked" as opposed to being spread out along one row.  That allows us to visit easier.   We were also on a corner so it made it even easier to visit. Luke said "Scotty would be proud of us".

Elder Nelson was the guest speaker.  Here is Erika shaking his hand.   

 In Hawaii they load up the graduates with lei's.   

 It was great to have the entire family together.

Hawaii 2011 Part I

On April 7th we headed to the airport to catch a flight to Hawaii.
We were going for Erika's graduation ceremony.  And to visit our grandkids of course.

There was a direct flight from Calgary to Hawaii but because I'm too cheap to pay the extra $60 per person we had a 2 hour lay over at YVR (Vancouver Airport).  Nice face Jamie.

I can only think of two things I don't like about going to Hawaii.  One is that my butt doesn't do good on flights longer than 3-4 hours.  (Plus I had a bad experience on a flight once that still seems to affect me,  It will have to be a blog entry for another day)   The other thing I don't like is coming home.   

Our first views of Hawaii as we prepare to land.  

It was evening by the time we arrived in Laie on the North Shore of Oahu.

  Brylie had this great sign on their door to welcome us.

When we originally planned our trip to Hawaii Alana and Luke weren't going to come.  They didn't know if they could because they were waiting for Alana's visa to go to the USA.  Alana did get her visa but they planned a trip to Arizona to visit Luke's parents.   A couple weeks before we were to leave we did get tickets for Alana and Luke to join us.  They flew in from Arizona for a few days.  But we didn't tell the folks in Hawaii.  We wanted to surprise them

Alana knocked on Angie's door.  Angie was surprised

5 of my girls and Luke at Angie and Mike's.

We didn't see Erika until the next day because she was studying for 2 exams.  

When she saw Alana she was even more surprised than Angie.

We rented this house for 10 days

There was a large common area were we could hang out.  

WARNING:  The next picture contains nerdy stuff.  Viewer discretion is advised

I brought some things from home so we could have our own network.  My accessories include at wireless router, a VOIP box and a phone.  So we had wireless internet and our second phone line from Calgary working in Hawaii.

The house was only a couple hundred feet away from Pounder's beach. 

Our house was to the right at the end of the beach

and through this path

The first morning Judy and I spent some time with our grandkids.

Judy did some serious reading with Tyken over breakfast.

And then we walked Brylie to school.
(What a great backdrop)

More pictures to come.

I'm back!

As the title suggests my blog is back after a long vacation.

And I'm back from a vacation in Hawaii.

We went for Erika's graduation from BYU Hawaii.

It was great to have the entire family there.

I will post some vacation pictures in a series of posts. I'll also try to catch up on some of the things that have been going on while my blog was on vacation.

In the meantime you can check out the Angie, Alana or Erika's blogs for posts about the trip.

Photo Update

In my post about Alana and Luke's wedding I had a picture with 7 1/2 of the Anderson siblings.   I hoped someone had a picture with all of Betty Lou and would send it to me.    Well, no one sent me one but my niece Lindsay did have this photo on Facebook.  Hope you don't mind that I used it Lindsay.

Grandma Anderson with 8 of her 9 kids