Back from Hawaii!

I returned today from a wonderful trip to Honolulu to see our friend Shan get married. It was such a beautiful wedding (and beautiful bride don't you think!) and everything went perfectly :)

I arrived Thursday late morning and started off the food journey of the trip with a 'plate lunch' from the Rainbow Drive-In followed by freshly made (i.e. piping hot!) Malasadas from Leonard's Bakery. My friend Matt and I spent the late afternoon and early evening on the beach.

On Friday morning, Shan and Brian took us on a drive up to the North Shore where the waves were anything but huge. Turns out the big 60 foot waves roll in during November and December.

Waimea Bay

After making a couple stops to take beach photos, including the famous Waimea Bay, we went into town for shave ice at Aoki's - yum! I had pineapple, melon and lilikoi with ice cream on the bottom.

After that we headed to one of Shan's favorite beaches which was actually one of several small bays within a very lovely resort. We hung out a bit here and even went for a swim:

20 weeks - on the beach

That afternoon we met back up with our friend Susan who flew in that day and made it to a super yummy 'friends' dinner at Phuket Thai.

Saturday Susan and I spent the morning and early afternoon helping Shan put together the favors for the wedding...which were super yummy brownies. We were also going to help her uncle with the flower arrangements but he was just too fast! Once we headed back to Waikiki Beach, Susan, Matt and I made a mad dash (literally!) to hike Diamond Head crater (before it closed at 6:00).

View of Waikiki Beach from the top of Diamond Head

We hiked up through the bowl of the crater and made our way through two of the steepest stair cases I've ever seen as well as a really neat tunnel. When we reached the summit we could see over the whole city from on top of an old WWII bunker.

I also took a little video of the 360 view:

Here's a view of Diamond Head from Waikiki Beach:

Sunday morning to afternoon was the wedding at the Halekulani Hotel, complete with some really great food (including a whole Kobe beef thigh!) and cupcakes for the wedding cake, which made me very happy. We spent the rest of the afternoon lounging around the Halekulani pool (our hotel pool was under renovation so we were allowed to use the pool across the street...which was way better!)

Monday we were able to get a late check out so we were back at the pool for the morning and early afternoon, then it was shopping and walking the city until our airport shuttle arrived for our red eye flights back to the 'mainland'.

All in all a very wonderful trip! Lloyd was also a trooper and except for reminding me a couple times that I was squishing him, he seemed to have a good time as well. He was particularly fond of Red Mango frozen yogurt and would wiggle quite a bit after I had some...and I did have it on a couple occasions ;) This trip also marked the first time total strangers asked me about being pregnant...so I guess it must be obvious enough now!