Fun in the Sun!

We got the best Christmas present in the world this year......a family vacation to Maui!! It was such a wonderful escape from reality and we really enjoyed our time together as a family.
We stayed in Kihei, and there were different beaches every few miles so we spent each day exploring all of the the fun beaches! It was easiest to let Hayden run around naked, otherwise the sand got caught up in his diaper!

We loved to spend the evenings sitting on the beaches and watch the sun set.

We caught some amazing sun sets!

We had a wonderful condo that was right on the beach, so the first evening we walked down to check everything out and a big wave took out Hayden's feet from under him. He was a little timid about the ocean for the first day or so. After that, we couldn't keep him out of it!

He would run to the water all by himself and fill up his bucket full of water. I couldn't believe how fearless he was of the big waves crashing in front of him.

We rented a boogie board a couple of the days we were there and as you can see, Chris was a pro at catching and surfing through the waves!

Hayden enjoyed his lessons in surfing as well, but he mainly loved to just sit on the board and cruise through the waves.

Our favorite beach was Big Beach, it had miles of beach, wasn't crowded, had great boogie boarding waves, and was beautiful and peaceful.

Hayden built castles and creatures in the sand, but mostly enjoyed flinging sand everywhere!

After a long day in the sun, Hayden crashed in his stroller!

Of course Hayden couldn't leave home without his hockey sticks. They had a miniature golf course on the lawn in front of our lanai, so whenever he was outside he was playing "hockey"!

Out of all the days we were there we booked a luau on the one night it rained. Luckily they were able to move it in doors and we stilled enjoyed the awesome show and food. Hayden was mesmerized with the hula dancers. The picked Chris out of the crowd to go up on stage and show the audience what he got!! He is so outgoing and went up there without hesitating and shook his booty with the gorgeous dancers (and he was mighty good at it if I don't say so myself!)

At the luau we learned that the green coconuts had the sweetest milk and water in them so we had to get one to test it out. Sure enough that was a true statement, it was great...and Hayden enjoyed it as well.

The whole vacation Hayden had this smile on his face, he had such a wonderful time!

We took a break from the sun one day and went to the Maui Ocean Center. It was a really neat aquarium that had some awesome creatures in it.

Hayden did not want to leave the shark tank and through a huge fit when we tried to pull him away. So we decided to test everyone's theory and just walk away hoping he would follow us and stop crying. He stopped crying all right and walked over to another exhibit happy as can be and could care less if we weren't there!

We went hiking on the most recent lava rocks (from the late 17oo's), and saw the beautiful coastline of the southern part of Maui.

We went on a snorkel cruise to a crater in the ocean. The ride there was awful and the ocean was very rough, thank goodness it was calm and peaceful on the way back!

It was the peak of the whale season, so we were able to see whales jumping out of the ocean all afternoon. It was so cool to see them up close and so active!

When we went snorkeling they had a platform that had a Plexiglas bottom and Hayden laid on top of it and was able to go snorkeling with us. He was a little unsure about being on the platform swimming throughout the ocean, but enjoyed seeing all of the fish underneath him.

We had a pool at our condo, and Hayden played in it for awhile....but he was in love with the hot tub. He would sit on the little step and ham it up in front of the old people, they just ate him up!

Every morning Hayden would get up and run out on the grass and catch ladybugs. He would let them crawl on his finger and up his arm....he is braver than me!

We were very fortunate to be able to go on such a wonderful vacation and had such an amazing time together. It was definitely a week of Fun in the Sun:)