On Monday, Ben had a school program celebrating Utah. They sang lots of songs and Ben seemed to know all the songs and did great! Other than that, he had a pretty good week with karate and scouts. He also played with Nico and even played with Caleb who lives behind us. Neighborhood boys are hard to find now, but they do exist.

Bethany had karate this week, too. Writing this is reminding me that she hasn't had her piano lesson from Cali yet this week. I will have to remind them! She and Ben went to their monthly "carpool activity" this week. I carpool with this really wonderful lady who does such fun things for her daughter and she is expanding her efforts to include Beth and Ben. She took her daughter, Eden, as well as Beth and Ben after school on Friday to Burger King and then to the Provo Rec Center for hours of swimming and rock climbing and then even had food for them in the car on the way home. It was great for B&B! Wow! I should do cool things like that, too! Right now, I'm just glad we have her!

Cali and Chey had basketball practice all week and a meeting for fundraising. They also went to a basketball referee training for Springville rec (trust me, I tried to talk them out of that one, but they insisted). They do about four hours of homework everyday and still manage to do stuff with their friends 3-4 times a week, too. On Friday, they invited friends over right after school to make pizza, then they went to basketball practice for an hour and half, and then they invited all their friends to come back, play games, and make more pizza.

Sarah had bridal pictures taken and "first look" pictures. That's a thing. That's where the photographer is there to capture the groom's first look at his bride in her wedding dress. Sarah and I learned a lot about hair and makeup and how to be less stressed next time and what not to forget! Ha ha! Really, though, the photo shoot went super well and we had lots of fun with the Griggs after Sister Grigg stopped crying! She's known Sarah since she was a baby, so it was tender. The Capozolli's came beforehand and did makeup and that was more cherished friend time. What great people to help Sarah celebrate.

Savannah has been doing more things with Ian. She also found a car she'd like to buy and she and her dad drove up to Kearns yesterday to see it. She will probably finalize this next week! School and work is both going well.

Kevin was called, sustained, and set-apart as Elder's Quorum President in our ward this week. He has done this before in different ways and he will do a great job. It will also be a great way for him to get better acquainted with the people in our ward. The funny thing is that both his counselors are men who moved here from Brookside. Brookside pride? :)

I've been busy with wedding stuff and writing and accounting and family. I can't wait to see Mariah next week and Megan the week after that and see Sarah get married the week after that! Let the good times roll!

Benjamin was a "Hansen Hero" this week which is the award that the principal gives out weekly to kids nominated by their teachers. His award says, "He always works hard, is helpful, and has a positive attitude." Go Ben! We think he's pretty cool, too. He had karate twice this week, scouts, and a guitar lesson. He went to Mia's birthday party on Friday night where he was the only boy in attendance which is basically his entire home life so I'm not sure he even noticed. Ha ha! He went to a guy friend's house on Saturday and they rode scooters and played four-way chess. Fun times! Here at home, he has started a crusade to get us to buy him a Nintendo switch. We will see how that goes!

Bethany also had karate twice this week. We have discontinued piano lessons with her usual piano teacher and have hired Calianne. They both seem excited about the new arrangement so we will see how that goes! Beth played more on her own this week. She still really likes Barbies and making slime and bath bombs and does those things with her friends when they come over, too.

Calianne had a first in our family on Saturday when she attended her first debate tournament! She competed in the area of oratorio. She prepared a ten-minute speech and then presented it memorized with no notes--three times! She was really unsure going in but ended up having a blast throughout the full-day event. What a great opportunity! I am really happy for her.

Speaking of being happy for our kids, Cheyenne and Calianne tried out for basketball this week. They both made the sophomore team and are super excited! Practices have started every evening from 5:30 to 7:30 and games start November 26. In other news, they had a party at our house last night with about a dozen kids, boys and girls. They watched a movie, hiked the mountain, and played Werewolf. Fun times!

Sarah has started working afterschool for McKay's brother, Shane, helping with inventory in his online business. She sometimes even goes back after dinner. She is one busy little duckling but I do manage to pin her down to help make wedding plans, too!

Savannah worked 18 hours this week and studied and took her big test in finance, too! Way to go, girl! On Saturday, she made poutine for the big YSA event where return missionaries were sharing food popular on their missions. After that, she and Ian went roller skating. She did not get seriously injured from any of her falls and had a really fun time.

Kevin and I are still ticking. Kevin is helping people at work and typing on his book whenever he gets a chance. I'm working on the wedding and other odds and ends, sometimes I even take walks and take pictures of ladybugs perched on the top of shoulder-high grasses. Can you see it?

We came back from our trip this week late Tuesday night. We found out that the kids had a fun Halloween. Ben went trick or treating with friends. Beth and her friends went trick or treating with Sarah and McKay and other Hatchs. Cali and Chey watched a scary movie with friends and Savannah hosted the two trick or treaters who came to our door (ha ha!) and also took the kids to Grandma's house as per tradition!

The kids seemed to do really well without us. My favorite story was when Sarah came into the kitchen to find water all over the floor and in containers covering all the counterspace. Ben was in the middle of it. When she asked him what he was doing, he responded that he had learned about the water cycle in school and had plans to give our family a continual water source: he was working on making a cloud. This made me laugh and laugh but I have to admit I was glad I didn't have to part of the clean-up.

The day after we got back was the Pinewood Derby! Since our ward only does this every other year, this was our first derby ever. Since the church ends its BSA program in January, this was also our last derby ever. Wow! This ward also invites the activity day girls to participate so Beth and Ben both participated. This meant that Kevin got to make two cars! We think we would eventually get good at it, but the learning curve was definitely not in our favor. In any case, it was a lot of fun. Beth and Ben both came in 4th (out of 4) for their first two heats and then made adjustments to their cars and came in 3rd and then made further adjustments and came in 2nd. I'm calling it a victory.

Other than that, I spent a lot of time getting caught up on accounting. Kevin had an IITAP conference to teach in Salt Lake City so he was gone Friday, Saturday, and part of Sunday. Poor guy! At least he didn't have to be in any more airports. I also resumed my job as taxi driver taking Cali and Chey here there and everywhere! That's a job I think Sarah and Savannah are glad to hand back over to me. Well, that and dinner and keeping the kitchen clean. Oh, and putting kids to bed and making sure rules are followed. Not to mention keeping clouds from being made in the kitchen. Maybe they did miss me while I was gone. . .

Friday night Kevin stayed in SLC because he had to be there early the next morning. Chey, Cali, Beth, and Ben went to Grandma's for a fun late night -- going out to eat at IHOP and seeing a movie. Sarah and McKay worked late for McKay's brother, Shane. Savannah worked until about 7pm, but when she came home and found me alone, she offered to watch a movie with me. Yay! We watched Hunt for the Wilderpeople. It was alot of fun. Now we can sing "Happy Birthday Ricky Baker" together. Ha ha!

On Monday, we carved pumpkins! We missed our Megan and our Mariah but we had everyone else with us, even Grandma and Grandpa Gazdik. It was a fun time!

Tuesday we were busy getting ready for our trip. We have been planning a trip to Beijing since August. Tuesday we packed and gave Savannah and Sarah as many instructions as we could think of so things would run smoothly while we were gone!

Wednesday we woke up before any of our kids, drove to the airport, and flew to LA to board our flight to Beijing. Only . . . they wouldn't let us on the flight! What? You need a visa. It takes three weeks to process. We watched the plane take off without us on board.

It was a very sad moment. All the plans! All the dreams!

The airline took pity on us and let us change our flight to somewhere else. Where would we like to go? How about Hawaii?

And that is how we ended up in Maui with long pants, knit hats, and sweaters and where the only place I took a picture of the Great Wall was in a Panda Express after we arrived.

We put our happy faces on, bought some new clothes, rented a car, and stayed at a lovely resort on the beach in Lahaina, which turned out to be a really good guess at the right place to stay!

On Thursday, we took our guidebook's advice and drove The Road to Hana. It was beautiful! But very long. The nice thing was that because it was Halloween (who knew?) we had the road pretty much to ourselves from 4pm on. All alone in paradise!

Coconut Ice Cream

After flying all day Wednesday and driving all day Thursday, we were pretty exhausted and took Friday nice and slow. We spent the morning sitting in lounge chairs on the beach watching the waves roll in and enjoying our view of the other islands. After a lunch of fish and chips from the local fish market, we went to the activities desk and booked a luau for that night and a snorkeling trip for Sunday. Then we went to a time share presentation to get both things half price. I must have looked as tired as I felt because they kept offering me coffee! Ha ha! That night we tried to go to the luau but after eating in the rain, they cancelled and let us reschedule for the next night.

Kevin "working" on the beach!

Designer free ponchos!

On Saturday, we drove to Haleakala. Which is the tall, tall extinct volcano mountain that makes up the main part of the island. Beautiful! We were above the clouds, at the same level as the observatory, and it was magical.

I got to wear the clothes I actually packed!

After that, we drove to Iao Valley and saw the Iao Needle. Beautiful! On the way back, we stopped for smoothies and mine was purple! We swam a little at the beach after that. Then the clouds rolled in and they cancelled our luau again. This time, before the food. That's ok. We split a steak and grilled pineapple at the hotel restaurant on the beach. Yum!

Sunday was our scheduled snorkeling trip. They fed us breakfast and lunch and we boated out to Molokini which is a small crescent island off the shore of Maui and has great coral and tropical fish. We got to see it! Then they took us to another place on the southwest shore of Maui and Kevin saw a turtle! For lunch they grilled Maui Wowee burgers on the boat which is a cheeseburger topped with pineapple, barbecue sauce, and a hot dog. We passed on the MaiTais, but we did try the slide into the ocean. Fun times! Oh, and we saw dolphins.

We rested a bit after that, but then took to our car again and went North where we visited the Nakalele blow hole. It was beautiful! Everything was beautiful. What a place. And yes, I did hike in my muumuu.

That evening wasn't raining! So, we got to see a sunset and go to our luau.

It was very hot in Hawaii and there were flowers everywhere--every tree, every bush like children in Utah. We had to leave on Monday but the calm of Hawaii had soaked into us and even though we missed some very specific children in Utah, it still made it hard to leave.

Banana trees in the landscaping!