This is one of our favorite restaurants despite a few items that I don’t care for here. The food is excellent and the service is usually pretty good. Two things I don’t like? 1. when we walk up to the host/hostess they ALWAYS ask us, are you visiting? No. we live here. in fact we come here about once a month and have been coming here for years. Are you visiting is not a polite way to greet a guest. How are you, How is your day are more appropriate greetings. 2. When the host/hostess walks you to your table, the put the menus on the table and stack the napkins and silverware on the table. They do not set the table, they do not pass out the menus. that’s just rude, in my opinion. I have mentioned it to the manager and he said it’s a style of service. I say, you mean lack of service? so then I shouldn’t leave a tip then? but the friendliness of the servers (tonight we had anthony-excellent) and quality of the food are so good, we do overlook it.

seriously, can you not tell we are from here?

thanks for stopping by! Come back tomorrow for the Samantha Walker Creative Crafter’s blog hop!

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy :)

Today’s prompt is about what takes your breath away. Of course my family makes me happy, but so many other things make me happy too. Blue skies, white clouds, clouds colored by the sun, the sun, flowers, lighthouses, old buildings, wood fences, textures like canvas and burlap and lace and yarn, glitter, washi tape, rainbows and I could go on and on and on. Do you know what else makes me happy? This tower on Ford Island.  They rebuilt or refurbished or whatever, they fixed it up, good as new. isn’t it pretty? and if you look up on the right side, you can see the moon too. :)

you know I took more shots. one that included my shadow. and one from the other side of the tower with the sun peeking around. and the bottom shot is just the sun in the sky. no power lines, no buildings in the way. just happy sun. :)

Tell me, what makes your heart happy?
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Love Love and Blog you Later,
Joscie, rhymes with bossy :)

we also saw a shave ice machine and tray, a miniature plantation store, type for a japanese newspaper, a mochi pounding bowl, a pocket watch, a notary seal and whip, and a kendo mask. Outside the Science Center where Jordan sat on a nene goose, inside with Jalen in front of the silver discs. the planetarium, oh yeah and the death star, hee hee. science on a sphere. click any of these photos for a larger view.

thanks for stopping by!

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy :)

Unfortunately he came through a different gate than the one we where we were waiting… so he ended up standing curbside wondering if we had forgotten about him.

There was no cell signal in the little area where we were waiting.  Finally we walked out and found him. smiles all around.

Since Troy has been home, we’ve been hanging out and I’ve been a sewing fool! I finished up our costumes today, I am so pleased with the results. I’ll be back to share more scrap and I’ll be getting back on the blog wagon.

Thanks so much for all your prayers while he was gone.
I appreciate you all!
Love Love and Blog you Later,
Joscie, rhymes with bossy

We received Jalen’s Halloween costume in the mail this week. He’s going to be Green Lantern and the costume is super cute. It’s a little big, but I’m sure we can make it work. He says he’s not trick or treating, he wants to give out candy at the house. We also got Troy’s Top Hat in the mail, it’s cute too. I’ve been sewing a little at a time. I got all our pattern pieces cut out and started by sewing my dress first. I have been really precise with the patter cutting, pinning and sewing for this dress and I’m really excited to see how it fits. I was worried the top might not fit quite right and had to seam rip a few times but I think it’s on the right track now.

I bought a few black plastic pumpkins and black rats at Target last month and I am using them for Halloween decor. I took the rats and used a small sharp scissors to cut out the little red bubbles they had for eyes and stuck on some clear gradient adhesive gems. I also glittered my pumpkins with glue and black glitter. I had a little craftmergency when I used up a whole tube of doodlebug glitter on one pumpkin. Thankfully I avoided a craftastrophe by picking up a big jar of black glitter from Martha Stewart. ;)
I also created some cute hybrid decor, you can see here on the Design House Digital Blog tomorrow.

Last Sunday we took a trip down to Pearl Ridge after church for lunch at CPK and then around the mall to check out their “Can Struction” event. We rode on the sky tram, visited the photo booth.

This weekend we are picking up the disc of photos from our shoot with the ever fabulous Marina Miller, I’m so stoked! I am going to get some cardmaking done on this world cardmaking day and then back to sewing. We are looking at just over a week until Troy’s expected return home and we are super stoked about that.
Thanks so much for stopping by!
Love Love and Blog you Later,
Joscie, rhymes with bossy.

But anyway, as the post title would infer, today was another big day for our family, deployment day.  This is Troy’s 7th? deployment, my 6th, Jalen’s 5th, Jordan’s 4rd. can you even imagine?

We dropped Troy off at the ship this morning, came back home for some breakfast and to settle some nerves and then we headed out to Hickam AFB (Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam) and waited out by the channel where the ship would come by. We brought a blanket, a snack, some bottles of water and umbrellas and waited.



I scoped out a good spot.

then right before the ship started to come along, these neighbors came and gathered right in the view of my wide angle lens (hello 10-22mm).

I snapped what I could while helping point out where Troy was on the ship and we waved.  I must say it went better than I thought it might. I’m glad the boys didn’t lose their minds.



We are looking ahead. thankful that he does not have to complete this whole deployment and will be home pretty soon to report to school and a new job. one with a desk. on shore.

We welcome prayers for comfort and peace and the safety of Troy and his shipmates. Thank you again for being the best ever.

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy. :)

We hit the freeway to head on down to the Blaisdell Center for the Made in Hawaii Festival.  It was a classic holiday lots of traffic in the middle of the day kind of day. 89*, blue skies, white puffy clouds.

We just traded in the boys’ old DS and DSI for the new 3DS. The boys have been playing this game where you have to move the console around to play. it’s quite funny to watch.  After we finally made it through all the traffic, the LOT WAS FULL. not fun. We circled this large city block. twice. and no spots available. I finally told troy to head back up the way we came and we scored a parking spot at the First United Methodist Church. $5. and made our way down to the event.

We brought some stale bread to feed the fish. It’s always a winner.

Jordan is a master manipulator and got Troy to carry him. Jordan weighs 50lbs.

As we made our way through the aisles, there was a lot of food, jewelry, tshirts, hats and the like.  This was the first booth we came to where I loved the items at once. Hello, houndstooth? wood grain? polkadots? neutral +1 color? yes please.

treehouse designs facebook | Store Paia, Maui

it was a tough choice but I got a neutral woodgrain purse:

Jordan and Jalen liked these Angry Birds and thieving pig earrings and pendants. We did not buy. gorgeous, but too much for the budget.

Another favorite stop, The Hawaiian Force  Hilo, HI

Jordan got two shirts, Troy got one and I got one.

We also picked up a few Tshirts from Papaya Press dba idkwhat2wear | facebook Mililani, HI

Organic Honey and Chocolate Coconut Peanut Butter from North Shore Goodies Waialua, HI

Melting Moments Cookies from Sweets Fanatic Honolulu, HI

Other exibitors I liked but didn’t buy:

kyote designs – modular jewelry

Sweet as Sugar- Cake pops and other custom baked treats

Nuinani- clothing, bags (save 10% on an online order code: NUI10)

There were others that I did not get a card from and can’t remember their names. It was so busy and no hassle Joscie was on a mission.

On our way back to the car, I could not resist snapping this shot of the Academy Art Center. I always say I love their yarn balls… although they look more like grapevines but whatever. they are cool.

After coming home and relaxing for a bit we headed down the street for an early dinner at one of our favorite Chinese Places Wah Kung.

That pretty much wraps up our family fun day. Thanks for coming along. Guess what? I picked up an extra bottle of organic honey to giveaway along with some tea. Are you interested? leave me a comment and I’ll pick a winner on Monday, international comments welcome too.

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy

my three boys ready for some animated action… :)

I thought it was so cool, it said on the little marquee: Tino’s show

here we are filling into the theater, notice how fast jordan is. haha…

we had a little trivia and giveaways.  One guess who was the first to answer? that’s right, Jalen answered for a free poster.

saw some friends: Ed (@nctrnlbst)

my classmate Kehau and her family :)

We saw Ryan(@Hawaii) and Jen( @mrshawaii) and their kids, i got to meet Fran( @franmag) for the first time IRL (she usually is busy beating me at hanging with friends), Kyle ( @madmarv), and Burt ( @bytemarks). It was a fun little adventure this morning and we are thankful to have been invited!
Thanks for stopping by, we’re heading out for lunch with my family this afternoon.
Love Love and blog you later,
Joscie, rhymes with bossy :)

there were two school busses of kids on the trail with us today.  They walked up before we did, so by the time we were up and ready to have our group shot taken, this guy was willing to snap a quick pic for us.  a few minutes later as we were looking out, I noticed about 6-8 kids standing at the edge of the cliff to our left.  They were close to the edge. like their feet were about 6″ to the edge.  I yelled at them to get away from the edge and some of them moved back. but as they moved back, more kids stepped up to the edge.  I yelled again and then went in search of this guy to let him know if those were his kids, they were at the edge of the cliff. Thankfully, no one fell while we were there!

here were are  on the walk down the trail. :)

In the parking lot discussing lunch plans. While we waited for one of my friends to load up in her car, another line of kids walking through the /parking lot right here.  Their bus was parked way up there on the highway, and these 20 or so 4 year olds walked right behind this line of cars. with one adult at the front of the line.  One boy was lagging behind and I started to get out of my car to get him up with his group but then the adult turned and yelled for him to hurry up.  I was so anxious and annoyed. I thought surely there should have been another adult at the back of the line or all the kids should have been holding hands or a rope or something to keep them together!

we all went down to LikeLike Drive-in for lunch, the kids got together for a little shot:

It was a fun fun day with my classmates and our kids.

Thanks for stopping by!

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy :)