Austin and his Bobo and Yaya

Austin has pictures framed and put on his headboard of his Nana and Papa and his girlfriend, Hope. We haven't ever gotten good pictures of Austin and his Bobo and Yaya, so we took the opportunity to do so during this visit.

The timing of the day wasn't that great since the sun was pretty brutal, but they were leaving that evening, so sunset wouldn't have worked! We did get some great pictures though! They are getting printed and will be framed and in their right place soon! Austin just loves having pictures around....so he's excited about having more to look at!

Deep Sea Fishing...a success!

While Bill and Mary were here, the boys got to take a fishing trip! Brian coordinated with a few of our great neighbors and they all went out deep sea fishing. Brian has been before, but came back empty handed. In fact, I don't think there was even a bite on that trip! This trip, however, had a VERY different outcome!

I think the trip started out well...then after eating, most of the guys ended up feeling sick...and ended up at the side of the boat a time or two! That didn't ruin their trip though....since shortly after, they got their first bite. Then, at the same time, got a second bite! Two Pacific Blue Marlins were hooked at the same time....but only one ended up caught. If you haven't been on a fishing trip like this before, the boat is lined with all these rods that are baited and just waiting for something to bite. When there's a bite, someone sits down and starts reeling it in. I'm sure there's a little more to it, but that's basically the jist of it.

Brian had the first bite, but the Marlin wasn't hooked correctly and got away. Our neighbor, Doug, had the other Marlin and ended up reeling it in after 30 minutes. This wasn't just some little fish....they estimated it to weigh about 156 pounds or so. It was 82 inches long...NOT including the nose (or whatever it's called).

After the Marlin was caught, another neighbor of ours, Dan, caught a KawaKawa (pronounced kava-kava). I looked it up online and it's also called a Mackeral Tunafish. Don't ask me which type of fish it is...I couldn't find much on it! It was about 15 pounds...which the workers on the boat said was big for a KawaKawa.

It was a long day since they set out on the boat around noon (but had to wait for a submarine to move for them to get out of the marina) and didn't get back home until about 8:30 that night. When they did get home, I cut a few steaks for the fishermen out of the Marlin and a couple of steaks of the KawaKawa and grilled it all after marinading it in Italian dressing for about 15-20 minutes. I think it was a hit since there wasn't anything left!

Here are a few pictures from the trip....

The red thing sticking out of the fish's mouth is it's stomach...gross but I guess that's just how it is when you're dead!

Yaya and Bobo visit...

Austin has been missing all of his family. Being in Hawaii definitely has it's drawbacks...and the cost to visit family is at the top of the list. When he heard that Yaya and Bobo were coming to visit, he was ecstatic! He's really excited about moving to "Arsansaw" and seeing everyone else, but this visit was great since it's been so long since we've seen anyone!

Bill and Mary have both been here before, so most of the touristy stuff has already been done. This visit was really relaxed and we just enjoyed hanging out, whether it be at the beach or just the house!

We did enjoy a few touristy things: renting a party barge boat with our friends, Randy and Leslie and taking Yaya and Bobo to the sand bar at K-Bay (even if the tide was a little higher than we anticipated!); eating at the Cheesecake Factory in Waikiki (even if they don't have my favorite cheesecake anymore!); swimming at the pool at the Hale Koa, and eating out at North Shore then heading to see the turtles that ended up NOT being on the beach! :-)

We had a great visit and can't wait to be closer to ALL of our family when we finally get to move back to Arkansas in November!

Here are some pictures:

Silly Faces

Austin loves to look at the pictures on the camera. He's not always into getting his picture taken, but has learned to humor his mommy anyway! This particular day, he was having fun making silly faces for pictures, then looking at them on the camera. I had to share them!

Austin told us....

And he was right!!!

Austin's getting a baby BROTHER!!!

We went in for our ultrasound and there was no arguing with the facts here people! This baby is definitely a boy as he was very proud of what he had and showed us often throughout the long ultrasound!!!

Austin was very funny. The day before I had asked him, "what if it's a girl?" He had been saying all along that he wanted a baby boy...not a girl. I was starting to get worried that we'd have a very upset 3 year old on our hands if we didn't prepare him for both. This was our conversation:

Me: What if it's a girl?

Austin: I want a boy!

Me: We don't know yet if it's a boy or a girl...but what if it IS a girl?

Austin: I don't want it!!!

So, I had to talk him into the idea of it MAYBE being a girl. The next day at the ultrasound, when we said we were having a boy, he said, "I told you it was a boy!!! I told YOU!!!" It was really funny and he was ecstatic that he was right about getting a brother.

Yaya and Bobo got to be in the room with us for a while before Austin got bored. It was a long ultrasound with lots of measuring and checking to make sure he was a happy, healthy boy. Everything looks great...but we weren't able to get great pictures of his face (to rule out cleft lip) or a certain angle of his heart. The tech got shots of both after flipping me over on both sides, my belly, standing me up and having me walk to get the stubborn Steele Boy to move! She didn't know if the doctor would like the pictures though since they weren't text book. I might have to go back to see if they can get those shots, but they haven't called yet, so the dr. might have been fine with what she got. One thing is for sure...this baby is already stubborn and wouldn't move an inch even with all the movement I was doing!

Austin got bored though and Yaya and Bobo took him to the PX to play on the playground while we finished up. Then we joined them for a bite to eat and then headed back home. Here are some pictures of the ultrasound:

Feet...the top is of one foot and the bottom is of a foot and the other leg crossed over his ankle.

His hand and arm waving at us...and the bottom is a profile picture.

Two more profile pictures....

And the shots of him being a boy...This is from a different angle. It's like he's sitting on a glass table or something and you're looking at his bottom from below.
You can click on any of these pictures to see them a little bigger.

To answer a question that has been asked a lot... No, we don't have a name yet. We are working on that right now. It's harder this time since we didn't have anything picked out from the beginning. We'll keep you posted....