Moments with The Smith's: Honeymoon! Aloha!

Our honeymoon was one of the best vacations I've been on! We spent 10 days in Hawaii!! We left the Monday after the wedding and our flight was at 5:45 a.m. That meant we were up at 3:45 a.m. driving to the airport. We flew into Oahu and hopped in our rented convertible to drive to Turtle Bay Resort on the North Shore.

It was pretty windy but overall the weather was great! We spent a lot of time just hanging out by the pool and drinking cocktails! We did venture out to the Dole Plantation and got a pineapple whip ice cream cone. That was some of the best ice cream I've ever had! After 4 days on Oahu we jumped in a plane and went to Maui.

Maui is my favorite island and we had such a great time there!! My dad and step-mom got us our hotel on Maui for 6 nights at The Sheraton!! It was such a great room and we are so happy that we were able to stay so long in Maui because of their gift! Our room was so awesome. Here is the view from our private balcony. Thank you Dad and Diana!!

We got to our hotel in time for lunch and headed straight to Whaler's Village in Ka'anapali beach. We ate at Leilani's and loved sipping on fruity cocktails! The pina colada's were great!

We kept our vacation pretty low key with mostly just hanging by the pool/beach and eating good meals! Drew ventured out golfing one day and I headed to the spa to get a massage. We did have a beach day where we rented one of the little cabanas. This was one of my favorite days! It felt like our own little fort and we just got beers and stayed there all day!

Drew got in the ocean more than I did and after he came back one time he laid straight down on the sand! Growing up in California I have many memories of coming home with sand ALL over myself from being at the beach. When you are kid it doesn't really faze you but after I grew up a little bit I started to hate having sand everywhere! Sand is extremely sticky and it doesn't just wash off if you jump back in the ocean like you might think. When he laid down all of those gross sand feelings came back and I thought "Oh no! He is going to regret this later..haha!" I was trying as hard as I could to only get sand on my feet and he just dug in.

The Sheraton hotel has a nightly ceremony that is so fun! This is the description of the Hawaiian ritual. As the sun begins its slow dive into the ocean, torch lighting signals the nightly ritual of Lele Kawa (cliff diving). Legend tells us the last chief of Maui, Kahekili (Thunderer), proved his spiritual strength by leaping from sacred Pu’u Keka’a to the Pacific.

With sunset painting the sky, a young cliff diver honors his heritage each evening by re-tracing footsteps in the sand on Kaanapali Beach. A chant of old Hawai'i begins the progression of our warrior; the echo of the conch shell announces his arrival. He leaves a trail of glowing torches surrounding the lagoon as he makes his way to Black Rock. Upon reaching the summit, he offers his torch to the ocean below, casts his flower lei into the sea; and finally takes the breathtaking dive from Black Rock into the rolling surf below.

We also went to a luau one night. The food was so good and the entertainment was great.

At one point they had all the honeymooners stand up and they called all the guys to the stage to do a "love dance" for their new brides! It was so funny to see all the guys get embarrassed! Drew was the best one on the stage!