Hawaiian Happiness

Well hello there! Or should I say ALOHA!

Hawaii was - in a word - AMAZING. My mom and I spent six and a half glorious days in Maui and the entire trip was just what we needed - relaxing and so fun!

We stayed at the Grand Wailea and it was gorgeous - here's the view from our room...

I loved the lobby of the resort - so lush and tropical!

When I was little we used to go there as a family every year, and it was so funny getting to experience the same things as an adult! I couldn't convince my mom to go on the famous water elevator or Tarzan rope swing with me, but don't worry - we did lots of other fun things...

Like going to a fantastic Hawaiian flea market/swap meet early one morning! That type of thing is right up our alley - we love little tchochtkes and tiny booths and interesting local vendors. I stocked up on Hawaiian shirts and hot sauce and delicious truffle oil - but by far my favorite score was coming across Jeff's Jams & Jellies. I brought home a TON of delicious things - guava butter and coconut jam and passionfruit chutney - YUM!

Here's something hilarious - one morning I surprised my mom with an acrylic painting class on the beach. There was just one other woman in the class so we basically had a private lesson with a really talented instructor, and we all worked on the same scene throughout the morning. 

Here's my painting:

And here is my mom's. 

HAHAHAHA. Poor Martha Jewart is probably glaring at the computer screen right now but I couldn't resist a little teasing. The best part? The instructor felt so bad for her that she gave her her own painting... so now we have THREE of them! (I kind of want to hang all three in a row... just for a good laugh!)

The days passed so quickly, but we filled them with lots of swimming and tanning and  gourmet meals and meeting interesting people and exploring little island shops and falling asleep every night to HGTV, plus I had an AMAZING massage. This was where you could usually find us every day - reading books and magazines by the fancy adult pool and ordering chocolate smoothies and diet cokes. HEAVEN ON EARTH.



And the best part? We came home so tan! :)

Tomorrow I'll be posting about another REAL important part of this vacation... the food! The blogger in me couldn't resist photographing nearly every meal we ate, so you'll all get to reap the benefits and eye candy of that :)

This may have been my favorite vacation I've ever taken and it's all thanks to my lovely, beautiful, GENEROUS mother. 

Mommy, I had an amazing time with you - let's do it again soon, what do ya say!?