THE SLIDESHOW: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ9E3v1wl6U
We moved in with our friends Jason & Kim who were ever so kind to have picked up all our boxes over the last few months (weighing 50 pounds each...and there were 18 of them), they got us a king size bed with bedding & generously took us & the pups in to their home for 6 weeks!!!
(our roomies Jason & Kim)
our room with only a few of the many boxes we had shipped!!
the doggies got to make themselves very comfy at Uncle Jason & Aunt Kim's house!
We lived with them for 6 weeks in which we celebrated Christmas with all our friends on the beach!
Mele Kalikimaka!
Santa's little helpers
how cute are they!!
Neither of us worked the whole month of December! It was amazing!! I had gotten a job after being offered 3 positions at the only hospital in town in the ICU. But, the island is s-l-o-w and I patiently had to wait weeks before starting my job...too bad huh!?!! Eric got a job from a friend out here at one of the golf courses! He gets to golf anywhere on the island for free! We enjoyed sunsets and days & nights with friends on the beach! The beach & working on our tans was definetly our full time job! We enjoyed sunsets almost every night...we were starting to find our way around town and learning where to go for good cheaper deals! Weird things are more expensive out here than the mainland...But luckily we already had so many friends out here that they were able to steer us in the right direction! Milk is not $8 a gallon and gas is under $5. Yes, things are expensive but when you live here you begin to figure things out and you learn to live without some things you thought you really needed! For example, I don't buy clothes every other week anymore, I now spend $5 for face wash, we share 1 car which is half the cost of gas and half the car insurance, we don't have to buy a shovel, salt, scarves or gloves!! HA HA!! When you get your Hawaii drivers license you actually get discounts on a lot of things!!
Our car finally arrived after about a month from when we shipped it from St Louis!! Our little mini was ready to live with her top down permanently finally!!
We were all officially Hawaiian!!
We were loving our beach walks with the pups & sunsets. The doggies were LOVING the sand!! Whenever we would put their harnesses on after dinner they would get so excited and strut themselves down to the beach with tails in the air! Whenever their paws hit the sand, we let their leashes go and they run!! They don't like the water quite yet and they run away from the tide! 
every sunset was just like vacation...your brain just turns off
Once we had our car we began exploring more of the Island! Many of these places we had done quick trips to see during previous vacations, but now that we were living here & we had all the time in the world to really relax, enjoy & learn about the Island culture and history. We didn't have to do it all in 10 days!!
Exploring West Maui.....Hawaii has more than just sand & palm trees you know :) We have mountains too!
this part of the West Maui Mountain drive is my fav....its gorgeous! And yet, now that I live here, sometimes it makes me remember that I am over 2,000 miles away from land...just livin on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and this part of the drive makes me remember that---there's NOTHING out there!!
we enjoy making picnics and just driving...Eric's favorite are the Maui Onion Potato chips!!
we often drive thru the sugar can to get most places outside of our town in Kihei
we were enjoying the winter waves! winter here has some huge waves and we enjoyed watching the surfers! We didn't catch "jaws" but hope to next winter!
the 'iao' needle
we enjoy walking off the beaten paths and exploring!
Not only did we start our new jobs, but we ended up getting our own place .... that we left quickly after only a month!! This place was listed as "garden view" and we were desperate to get a place that was pet friendly....not many places are pet friendly out here & it was hard! So we took the first thing we could. BUT this place was like the biblical plague .... we were infested with centepides, cockroaches the size of tennis balls, flying swarming mating termites....G-R-O-S-S!!!!!!!! So after only a month, we got out of the lease and moved back to the same complex that we lived with our friends at!! It was perfect! We now have a condo on the first floor with a fence, palm trees, A/C & only a 5 minute walk to the beaches!!! We were SO lucky & quickly made it our home! At the first bug infested place....we never took our shoes off, I often cried myself to sleep just being overwhelmed with change, a new job, missing fam & friends && wondering what sort of insect I would wake up to in the morning!! No joke, we searched our bed every night before getting in, we cocooned ourselves with our blankets so only our nose and mouth were sticking out so that no bugs could get to us hopefully! One morning, I woke up & thought my eyes were playing tricks on me...I swore that the large knot in the wood paneling was moving.....WELL, it was not a knot in the wood, it was a COCKROACH the size of a tennis ball!!!!!!! AND did I mention some of the cockroach's FLY??!!?!?!? Another morning Eric was driving me to work and as I was on the verge of tears over the humungous cockroach that was in the kitchen as I was preparing breakfast, I flipped open my overhead mirror in the car to a COCKROACH!!!!!!! Eric started dying laughing & I just started bawling!! SO...we quickly repacked and moved to the home near the beach that is insect free where we sleep easily at night and take off our shoes :) QUITE the "welcome to Hawaii" experience!
some of our "roommates"
EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW WWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!
more sunsets and beach time! we enjoyed exploring many beaches we hadn't been to...one we enjoy sometimes is Wailea beach where all the fancy resorts are and we sit & watch all the rich people...and pretend we are rich tourists on vacation staying at the Four Seasons!
they're loving their new home!
we go to the resorts and pretend we're matching tourists! not on a daily basis :)
the whale day parade!!
the whales come to hawaii in the winter & our little town has a cute parade!!!
even the whale gets a lei!!
out on the Kai Kanani for a whale sunset cruise
Spouts!
whale
tails!!
yacht cruisin ~~ what a life!!
celebrating Eric's first Island birthday with friends new & old ~~ sums up our new ohana!
SO, all in all our first winter and Christmas in Maui was great! We didn't miss family so much for Christmas because we had just gotten here and it was like vacation...forgetting that we weren't going "home....to Chicago"....we were now home in Maui.
They say 3 of the hardest changes in life are : marriage, a new job & a move & we were experiencing two of them.
The first few months here were like vacation...and then realizing that we weren't leaving... had to find jobs, afford to live here, missing our daily "normalcy" routines, sharing 1 car, finding a new home (twice), explore the island whenever we could together on days off, try & catch every sunset we could & relax. Towards the end of winter, we (more Kandi) started missing home some. You learn things when you move away... let alone 4,000 miles away! Some of the people you take for granted you really end up missing when you think it will be just fine. But we have eachother to take our minds off things and remind us why we came ... we've really learned how important having one another really is in life especially when you uproot and change everything! Winter was a time to start beginning and for firsts...firsts that we will remember forever!
