maui

To say that i was a little anxious about flying to maui with finley would be putting it mildly. As you may or may not know she's not the most laid back kid in town. Let me just tell you...there was a divine intervention on both plane rides. Our little fiery, rambunctious child was an ANGEL! No fits. No tears. No pacing the isles. Thank you, Lord! Of course, it had a little something to do with the enormous bag I packed stuffed with food, and the portable dvd player we borrowed. But still, I was one proud mama! It was icing on the cake when we discovered that the man sitting next to my dad was the CEO of Ergo baby carriers. Side note: I've always an Ergo carrier, and thought about asking for one for my birthday. Finley outgrew her Bjorn a year ago and now we have nothing. Brian describes a scenario involving me leaping over the chairs to tell the nice man how all my friends have one and looooove theirs. Apparently, my enthusiasm paid off, because he offered to send us the new sport carrier that he designed. HOORAY!

With the first plane ride under our belt, we headed to the beach. Finley was absolutely terrified of the sand. Every time her feet touched the sand, she'd cry "ewwwww" and ask me to wash her feet. She even tried to clean the sand off by licking her feet (much like a cat) which only made it worse because then she had a mouthful of sand. We were determined to get her liking the sand, because nothing and i mean NOTHING was going to hinder our beach fun. The next day i left her shoes on while we walked up and down the beach. We watched other toddlers running and playing and enjoying the sand and it's like a switch went off. I took off her shoes and she ran through the sand and water like it was the best time of her life. HALLELUJAH!! She had so much fun splashing in the waves and going out in the deep water to swim with us.

We spent our days suntanning, body surfing, swimming in the pool, playing at the coolest park i've ever seen, eating yummy meals out, feeding the fishies, watching whales (soooo neat!), going for walks, watching the amazing sunsets, and checking out different beaches around the island. Regretfully, we didn't take pictures from the first half of the week, but we took lots during the last half. Check out the rest in the maui album.