All We Want for Christmas....

Is gift certificates to Hawaiian Airlines! You had to see that one coming! We've been asked about what we would like for Christmas a few times and couldn't come up with much. You see we have more than enough stuff (are still working on getting rid of more) and don't really need anything besides some more supplies to finish restoring the house. As much as we love getting house projects done, it's not very much fun to always say we'd like stuff for the house. Plus, we love our trips to Hawaii!

Hawaiian Airlines gift certificates are always a great gift idea!
{source}

Introducing....

Moloka'i, Maui & Lana'i; our new chickens. Yup, you read that right! We finally got chickens. We are officially urban farmers and we love it!

We'd been planning on getting some chickens for a while now. Our original plan was to get them next spring when we'd also be putting in our raised garden beds. However, some friends of ours had some chickens that they needed to get rid of so we offered to take them off their hands now. It was a bit of work getting everything ready for them, but it was worth it and we are so glad we did.

Drew had to work fast and build them a chicken run so they'd be able to get out of their coop during the day, but not rip up our yard. Have you even seen how fast chickens can rip up a yard? They did damage to our's just while he was building the run.

Tikis in Paradise: Wahine Party

The Wahine party was just for the ladies. No boys allowed as Nicki so awesomly put on the invitations. A day of lunch and getting our nails done before the wedding the next day.

We all meet-up in Kahului at Da Kitchen, a locals' favorite, for some Hawaiian grinds. Their menu is pretty extensive and had something for everyone on it. A few who'd never had musubi before were intrigued by it and I encouraged them to give it a try. Everyone who did, loved it. Especially, Mykie!

Love the bracelets in our wedding colors given to me by Honey at my first bridal shower.

Chickens

When I was living in Hawai'i I remember chickens being all over the place. After Hawai'i, we lived in Bodega Bay and had a large number of chickens at our home with the ocean right in our backyard. They were so much fun to feed, collect the eggs from each day and even chase.

My mom and I got chickens, again when Amanda was a baby. Our chickens, Pina and Colada, were very friendly and we could pick them up and hold them pretty much any time. They were great at natural pest control and fertilizer and I swear that's why we grew such wonderful raspberries.

Ever since moving to Portland and finding out that they allow households to own chickens here I have been wanting to get some chickens to once again add to our family. We will finally be able to get them after we buy our house. I'm not sure exactly what kind of chickens I want to get, but I know I want them to have some pretty crazy feathers.

I also want to build them a really great chicken coop. I have an idea in mind, but I want it to be a surprise for everyone. Guess you will all have to come to our huge house warming party we are planning on having to find out what it is. Maybe we will even make it on the Tour de Coops route one day!

Now we just have to figure out what to name them. Any ideas?

Da'Hui

We have a new tiki bar in town, Da'Hui. Well, it's more Hawai'ian than tiki, but hopefully it will come around. Drew and I headed there on Friday night, after the Rose Festival, to check it out. We heard they had pretty good Hawai'ian lunch plate and had to give it a try ourselves. The macaroni salad was great. We liked that they had shrimp and tofu options since neither of us eats meat or poultry. The teriyaki sauce was a bit lacking in the flavor department. Both of us would have liked to see them have some actual tiki drinks on the menu. The bartender told us that they were still in the works of figuring that part out since they have only been open for a few weeks. Over all we liked the place and I am sure we will go back again for the food and in hopes of those tiki drinks.