Against all reason, we took the kids to Hawaii the first week in March. Bolstered by the fact that Ian had done so well on our long car trip over the summer as well as the last couple flights we had taken, we figured we’d go full bore and stick him on an eight hour flight over open water.

I’m not freaking out, YOU’RE freaking out

This largely sprung from Maya’s infatuation with Moana. I vaguely recall some conversation, probably over cocktails. Ha ha, wouldn’t it be great if we could take Maya to a tropical island and get her out on a boat like Moana? See if we could spot a dormant Te Fiti from afar? Do it before she’s old and cynical like us?

Little did I realize at the time, but Sean took what I considered an offhand notion and started looking into hotel costs and airfare. Oh, and he found a way for Maya to meet Moana. The Venn diagram in Sean’s brain has a big section where lifelong Disney love, the desire to make magic for his kids, and a long-nursed impulse to relocate to Hawaii overlap. This overlapping section is neatly colored in by the Aulani Disney resort on Oahu.

A view from a room …

It’s not a theme park. It is instead a sprawling resort along the beach that also has several pools, a lazy river, splash pads, lots of kid-friendly activities, and Disney character meet and greets. Once I realized our vacation was on, I tried negotiating. We could stay in the swank resort half the time and at an AirBNB the other half of the time, right? No, evidently we could not.

I kept at it too. All the planning that I did revolved around things *not* at the resort. We had half a mind that we might rent a car one day and drive up to north shore to tool around in “actual Hawaii.” Maybe on our last day there, we’d head over to Honolulu and be tourists. In the end, we spent very nearly our entire time on the property and were never at a shortage for ways to pleasantly fill our time.

As mentioned, once we decided we were willing to shell out for the vacation, the toughest hurdle to overcome was the flight. We left on a Saturday. The quick hop from Austin to Dallas was no problem, of course. The long flight from Dallas to Honolulu tested our mettle though. Things got off to a glorious start with a nearly hour-long delay, spent on the plane. I knew it was going to be rough when, before we had even taken off, Ian had already peed once and asked if we were at Hawaii yet a handful of times.

We have a standard configuration when we fly: Ian and I in a window and middle seat in one row and Maya and Sean in a window and middle seat directly behind us. This time, each of us had a sleeper in the aisle seat. Masks on, headphones in, conked out. Great, right? Not so much if your kid decides he needs to urinate every hour. Even Maya, who has a giant bladder, forced Sean to wake up the lady next to him a full four times. And it’s not like they were drinking much (I was actually worried about how little they were drinking). Also, neither of them really slept. Ian had a fitful hour of sleep maybe a couple hours before landing. Before that, he had been a squirmy pill. After that, he was a crying, squirmy pill.

As with most things, we eventually made it though. Usually, it takes us AGES to get out of an airport. This time, we were only about an hour from the time our plane pulled up to the gate to the time we were exiting our shuttle at our hotel, luggage in hand. It was amazing.

We told her we would swim the next day. It was literally less than 5 minutes before she was soaked.

Maya and Ian (especially Maya) were complete lunatics by the time we got in. The plan (the dream, anyway) was that the kids would sleep too much on the plane and that would be fine because it was four hours earlier in Hawaii than it was in Texas. Oh well. We managed a quick dinner and a walk down to the beach before giving up and calling it a night. I think we were all asleep before 8:30p local time.

On our first full day in Hawaii, we just let our internal clocks wake us. Ian managed to sleep till 7:30, if you can believe that. I was up just before 6 and Maya around 6:30. We had a harrowing period from 3:00 to maybe 4:00 where Maya had woken up and tossed and fidgeted, but she eventually went back to sleep.

After a quick breakfast at one of the on-site cafes, we went to sign the kids up for Aunty’s Beach House, the resort’s answer to child care. The basic stay and play was covered with our room rate. Some extra activities were also covered, and some required an extra fee. We signed the kids up for some of each. After that, at long last, we got the kids into the water. They had an absolute ball. Ian enjoyed floating along the lazy river with me. Maya fussed and fidgeted over her flotation, effectively un-lazying the river for her and Sean.

The kids both enjoyed swimming in the big pool, with its warmer water and zero entry. They goggled up, put on life vests, and motored around as they chose. Maya practiced jumping off the wall and swimming to us, again employing her level identifiers to signify varying styles and degrees of difficulty. Surprising us all, Ian ditched his life vest and free-swam for a few feet between Sean and I over and over again, barely pausing for breath between iterations.

MOANA!!!!!!

Eventually Ian was shivering and Sean was uncomfortable, so we ended our swimming and hurried to get dried off and dressed for a visit with Moana. It’s interesting the way these Disney folks have it set up. We could call a number each morning and find out where and when the kids could meet different characters, and if it was relevant, we could sort of plan our day with those things in mind.

Maya dressed for the occasion. When she met Moana, she told her all about her Te Fiti shirt and her Moana shoes and her little brother Ian. She chatted about how much she loved Te Fiti, and Moana of course agreed. We took lots of photos and the kids both received very nice hugs.

Later on that afternoon, we stopped by to see Moana again, just so Maya could snap a photo of her with her own little Polaroid camera, which Moana then graciously signed. Maya had also brought Moana a big leaf to use as a boat for Hei Hei the rooster. Basically, Maya was on cloud 9.

MINNIE!!!!!!

We chanced a visit with Mickey and Minnie Mouse because they were so close by. While not as committed as his sister, Ian does nurse a pretty big soft spot for Minnie. She had on a pretty dress and pretty shoes and was doling out some pretty sweet hugs, so Ian was happy. Mickey actually played with them a bit, hunting for leaves as pretty as the ones the kids had brought for him.

Later on, with exhausted, exhilarated, un-napped children, we took a crack at an ohana (family) hula. By that point, Ian really only wanted to be held and Maya just couldn’t resist adding her own flair to the dance. I think Sean may have been the only one who got to dance it properly.

At the kids’ repeated request, we went and had Mickey Mouse shaped shave ice. Ian got an ear, Sean got an ear, and Maya laid waste to his entire head. She was a red-fingered, sticky-faced, shivering mess, but she was a happy one.

We tried to then wander over to the fire pit to hear Uncle tell us some stories. Uncle was an engaging and dramatic story teller, and Sean and I could have kept watching for a while. Unfortunately, Ian was busy running through rows of chairs and trying to weave plant leaves through tabletops. Maya was busy fussing about being bored or not liking the smell of the fire. Lucky for us, Moana showed up toward the end to help Uncle tell his stories about Maui and that at least garnered some of Maya’s interest.

Beautiful sunset

After a rather long, drawn out dinner with an admittedly beautiful sunset, we took the kids to our room for a quick bath and a long sleep. Sean and I, after a bit of planning, were not far behind them.

On Monday morning, we had our first big-deal event planned: character breakfast at Makahiki, the buffet restaurant at the resort. It was easily the best meal we had eaten thus far. Sean had gotten the kids an autograph book and ink pen with the specific intention of collecting up the characters’ autographs, and this was their first chance to use it.

Mickey, at the character breakfast

The character breakfast started with a corral past Mickey Mouse to have photos taken with him. The kids’ buffet was right up front with Mickey waffles and what turned out to be Maya and Ian’s favorite: chocolate muffins. The kids also tried out and loved POG (passion-orange-guava juice). Minnie and Pluto stopped by their table and spent some time signing their book and taking photos. The kids were invited by Aunty to follow along in a sort of conga line through the restaurant. They donned fish puppets as they walked along and then played a coconut shell instrument along with Aunty and Minnie Mouse. We took our leisurely time, relaxing by the koi pond and nibbling on all manner of breakfast treats.

Character breakfast

Eventually, we moved our well-fed selves over to the open house at Aunty’s Beach House, so the kids could get a look at things before we left them there later in the week. As predicted, they didn’t want to leave. (We later found out though that this was because we were there with them.)

Ian decided he loved the water!

Afterward, we got swim-suited up and tried out the Menehune Bridge, which was sort of like the splash park part of the property. There were some really great slides there and lots of intricate and well-themed structures to climb and play on. The kids had a lot of fun, but it was cold with the breeze, so we pretty quickly relocated to the main pool. Even there, after an hour or so, Ian was all a-shiver, so we gave up and went inside.

We all loved Stitch

Everyone had had a pretty early morning and we were all still full from breakfast, so we actually headed back to the hotel room for a nap. Rested up and marginally less grumpy, we headed out to visit Stitch, Donald, and Daisy and collected more autographs and took a few more photos. Stitch in particular was very huggy and the kids adored him. Maya confirmed that yes, Stitch was still good, just like he was at the end of the Lilo and Stitch movie. We had to briefly visit Moana again so that Maya could give her a picture she had drawn for her.

Moana’s autograph featured a heart-of-Te-Fiti swirl

We went for ice cream and treats as an afternoon snack to tide us over till dinnertime. I discovered “Dole Whip” pineapple ice cream. Maya had a packaged ice cream bar and Ian had part of a cookie and some giant sprinkles. Sean enjoyed a pina colada doughnut.

The kids had been after us all day to go back to Aunty’s so they could play some more. Since we had an hour or so to kill before dinner time, we figured we’d let them give it a try.

With the kids safely tucked away, Sean and I took a walk to a nearby shopping center. We stopped by an ABC store and got some packaged cereal, milk, and POG for breakfast the next day, and some pineapple wine for us to try out. We tucked the cold items into the mini fridge in our hotel room, whose temperature setting turned out to be “arctic” and so it froze most of our stuff. We found out later on that evening that while it did not freeze like the other stuff, the pineapple wine was not really our thing.

We were just walking back to fetch our kids when the nice folks at Aunty’s called us to let us know that Ian was ready to see his family. Maya, predictably, cried when we had to leave.

After a too-long pizza dinner, we changed into jackets and pants and headed out to the big lawn area to spread out on woven mats and watch Toy Story under the stars. After a fun trivia game and a not so fun video hawking the Disney Vacation Club, the movie started and it turns out we got to see … Coco!

Sean and I were excited. I love the idea and aesthetic of Dia de los Muertos, and that particular holiday was central to the story. Maya, on the other hand, was disappointed. She has a difficult relationship with movies. She gets very caught up in the fates of the characters and worries and has cried through many of the movies we’ve tried to watch with her. Toy Story was something she had seen before and wasn’t nervous about, so she thought that would be fun. Instead, she got a movie she had NOT seen before and like all good stories, it wasn’t all sunshine and daisies. She cried through most of the movie. Then she cried some more at the end because the happy parts were over so quickly. Ian, for his part, had to pee once during the show and at the end was starting to get fidgety. But, the movie was great, and getting to watch it outside on a mild spring evening in Hawaii was not a terrible way to see it.

The next morning, we saved a ton of time, money, and frustration by simply having a breakfast picnic in our hotel room.

The whole family’s gone crazy. Ok, maybe just Maya.

Since we had had such action-packed days on Sunday and Monday, we decided to take it a little slower today. We took a long walk along the ocean-front path, peeking down at tide pools and big white waves and soaking up the sun and breeze. The kids were all excited about the infinity pool at the resort, so we got suited up to give it a try. Holy WOW was it cold. Probably, I’ve just gotten old and particular, but I couldn’t get out of that water fast enough. It took quite a while for us to coax Ian in, and once Sean carried him over to the edge to peek out at the ocean, it was no problem getting him back out again. Even Maya was ready to get out once we promised her we could go over to the warm pool the kids preferred to play in.

We all took another spin through the lazy river, because Ian couldn’t stop talking about how much he liked it. Maya again did her very best to un-lazy it. Ian on the other hand was braver this time through, actively seeking out opportunities to get splashed by waterfalls and fountains instead of avoiding them. From there, Sean and Maya went down some gigantic water slide in their tubes that Ian was too young for, and reportedly, Maya giggled the whole way down.

Science is serious business

After this, we dried off and ate a quick lunch. The kids had some iPad time as a means to rest and unwind a little since there wasn’t time for napping that day. After that, they were off to their afternoon outing at Aunty’s – Stitch’s Space Goo. On the way over, Moana happened to walk past us, and she called out, “Hi Maya!” Sean and I were stunned. We looked at Maya and said something along the lines of “Hey Maya, Moana knows your name!” To which she responds, “Of course. I told her my name.” Yeah, just like those long lines of other kids did. As Sean says, Maya is memorable, even to Moana.

Once the kids were dropped off, Sean and I sat at the beach bar and had an Ace Pineapple beer/cider thing. I didn’t care for the pineapple wine, but that cider was really good. During our remaining, post-cider down time, we wandered down to the beach to sign up for an ocean canoe ride the next day.

The kids both seemed happy when we came to pick them up after their event, and each of them had a plastic sack full of some kind of gack that they had created in a “lab” at Aunty’s. We were told that Stitch had come to visit them as well.

Pounding taro root to make poi

We quickly freshened up for the big event of that day, the luau. We had to wait for about 20 minutes to get in, and our un-napped, antsy children were all over the place bouncing around the other people in line and playing with the mulch, leaves, and dirt. On our way in, we received beverages and necklaces and were shown to our places at the big communal tables. We set down our things and made the rounds to participate in various activities. The kids pounded poi, and incredibly, they both tasted it! Un-incredibly, they did not like it. They did some traditional ink stamping on paper, and we all received “tattoos.”

I was prepared to be underwhelmed, but the buffet had some seriously delicious stuff. The Imu pork was incredible, the tuna and tako poke were both so fresh and flavorful, and the suckling pig was fantastic – doubly so once Sean found the crispy cracklin’ skins. Maya actually had me walk up with her at one point to get more of the pig skin, she liked it so much.

Just like in Lilo and Stitch!

The kids went to the bathroom several times each over the course of the evening, which was really great because each time, it required a walk to a not-so-nearby restaurant. Between bathroom breaks, they did manage to eat Moana cupcakes, participate in the keiki (kids) hula, and watch most of the show. Maya even managed to stay awake to see them twirling and throwing around fiery batons. She’d been looking forward to that part of the luau ever since she had made her peace with the Lilo and Stitch movie a few days before we left. Poor Ian missed the fire; he had fallen asleep by that point.

Since the breakfast cereal and POG picnic had worked so well the day before, that became our new standard for the rest of our vacation. The next day, after breakfast and a bit of play time, we took the kids down for their canoe ride. We boarded the boat and went “beyond the reef” and out into the open ocean. Ian nestled into Sean’s lap and largely refused to move, though later when asked, he told us he liked the boat ride. I had to keep a careful eye on Maya so that Ms Gung-ho didn’t dump herself into the ocean. It was a one-hour ride, perfect for the kids’ attention spans (the other option we had looked into would have put them on a boat for four hours). Maya even got to see “Te Fiti” sleeping off in the distance. She kept shushing us because she was worried we’d wake her, and we’ve all seen what she’s like when you piss her off (cough-Te Ka-cough).

That’s sleeping Te Fiti in the background

The guys working the boat filled our heads with Polynesian history, fun things to do in Hawaii, why we should own a boat, and (once they got wind of Sean’s desire to relocate) all of the wonderful schools available in the area.

Ian stuck close to Dad

We had already decided that today would be beach day, so once we were back on land, we borrowed a sack of sand toys and hunkered down to play. Earlier that morning, Sean had bought a waterproof cover for his phone, so he had fun taking photos of the kids (mostly Maya) playing in the ocean.

After a couple hours of sand and surf, we had lunch and headed to the room for a nap. After our nap, we all got cleaned up and went back to the beach to catch the sunset. Maya and Ian tried to draw pictures of it. Sean took a few photos, and the resort’s photo pass people tried to take photos of our whole family.

Family beach photo!

Then we ventured off property to have what turned out to be a really solid dinner at Monkeypod. Sean and I started our dinner with some incredibly welcome mai tais topped with this lilikoi foam that we’ve since sort of managed to recreate at home. Everyone’s food beautifully prepared, but a little difficult to settle in and enjoy with our wiggly kids. Afterward, we wandered over to an ice cream shop and let the kids have treats before a quiet walk back to the hotel.

The next morning after breakfast, we walked down to the pool to get photos and an autograph from the elusive Goofy. After that, of course, we went swimming again. Maya talked Sean into doing the big slide with her a couple more times while Ian and I played in the pool. Once Sean and Maya rejoined us, Ian again ditched the life jacket and swam, swam, swam between Sean and I for a long while. (He was a changed man when he got back to his swim lessons at Austin; they couldn’t believe how much more confident he was.)

Woohoo! Big slide!

Once the kids were good and cold, we put on dry clothes for lunch and then headed to the Haleiwa lawn to see the last characters that we hadn’t met yet. Maya used her little Polaroid camera to snap wonderful photos of Daisy Duck and of Chip and Dale. She is such a natural little photographer. It’s amazing to watch.

The characters posed for her and, when they had articulated fingers, autographed as well

We wandered back upstairs and let Ian have a nap. After that, we headed back to the beach so Maya could try out a boogie board and Ian could play with a giant connect four game that had caught his eye the day before. Maya managed to get up on all fours, and Sean drug her all around the bay. Ian decided the connect four game was pretty boring, so we borrowed more sand toys and played while Maya boogied.

Dad and Ian in the actual ocean!

We all zinged through the shower so that we weren’t quite so sandy for our Menehune Mischief dinner at the Makahiki restaurant. This time the kids were fitted with green paper crowns, and the corral took us past Donald Duck for photos before the dinner. Maya giggled and told him he was a quack-o-pus. Donald giggled too and waggled his tentacles for her.

Ian loved Chip and Dale (and no, I don’t know which is which)

At our table, we were visited by Stitch and by Chip and Dale. Chip and Dale in particular were a total crack-up, pestering the kids and being generally mischievous. The kids got to participate in the show a bit. Between kid-wrangling and getting food from the buffet, I didn’t really keep the thread of the story that Uncle was telling about the Menehune. Maya and Ian seemed to have a really good time though, and I ate some beautiful fresh seafood. Lots of ahi and tako poke. Lots of seafood on ice. Some slabs of pineapple with li hing powder sprinkled on them. It was a pretty swell dinner.

Aulani

Sean even managed to sneak out for a while once the kids were in bed so he could recapture his life as a childless photography enthusiast, quietly spending as much time as he liked composing shots and fiddling with settings on his camera. (It may shock you to know that Maya and Ian don’t have much patience for that.)

By Friday, we realized with some sadness that we would have to start picking and choosing which activities we could still squeeze into our last bits of time on the island. We didn’t really have time to fit much in between breakfast and the kids’ activity for the morning, so we let them play a while. The program they went to was called Fish are Friends, again at Aunty’s beach house. This was one of the ones we had to pay extra for. They learned about ocean creatures and then made food for the fish and went out to Rainbow Reef to feed the fish. After that, they had lunch.

Fish are friends (and food)

While all this was going on, Sean and I went souvenir shopping and had a quick bite to eat ourselves. No one called us about unhappy kids, and sure enough, when we picked them up, they were all smiles. They came out with Fish are Friends bags and blue ray discs and stories about what they spent their time doing that day.

Ian at Aunty’s

After that, Sean and Maya took a walk to the lobby to handle a few housekeeping chores while I coaxed Ian into a nap. After some rest and playing, we actually took them right back to Aunty’s so that Sean and I could enjoy a grown up dinner at Ama Ama, the fancier restaurant on the property. The food was really good. The fact that we were sitting outside and staring at the beachfront and water certainly didn’t hurt. The mai tais didn’t hurt either.

Toward the end of our dinner, the folks at Aunty’s called to let us know that Ian wanted to go home. We let our server know that our kids were wanting us, and bless her, she stepped up her pace from relaxed to zippy without even a change of expression. This allowed us to finish out our very pleasant meal, but still got us back to Ian in reasonable time, not that the folks at Aunty’s were rushing us.

What’s more colorful, Ian or Hawaii?

Saturday was a whirlwind of activity. We had done some of our packing the night before, but we spent a fair amount of the morning packing as well. We had sort of a “brunch” (read: we ate breakfast really late, so we made sure it was larger) to make sure the kids were fed early enough for their Kakamora Chaos program at Aunty’s.

Decorated her paddle with an octopus, of course.

This was the big one. Moana was there, and Maya was beside herself with excitement. When we picked the kids up afterward, they were each armed with a very sturdy paddle that they had personally decorated. Ian, naturally, immediately tried to hit stuff with it. A really neat souvenir, even if it’s a bit dangerous.

At my repeated request, we went and tried to take family ukulele lessons. Ian didn’t even want to hold a ukulele. Maya was wild and dangerous with hers. Sean, wonderful spouse that he is, wrangled the kids while I sat and played the ukulele.

Bye bye, Moana! I hope you visit us in Texas!

After our ukulele lesson, we snuck in one last ice cream and dole whip treat. Then we visited Moana one last time so Maya could say goodbye. We tried to take one last swim, but Ian almost immediately bailed on the idea because he was too cold, so it was mostly a Maya and Sean swim. After one final Hawaii dinner, we packed the last of our items up in a final bag shuffling frenzy and boarded our shuttle to the airport.

Bye bye, Hawaii!

Maya was in rare form by this point. She chatted up Jeff the shuttle bus driver, Eddie, the poor man behind is in line to check luggage, and several flight attendants.

Our flight was actually easier than the flight out had been, I think. Everyone had emptied their bladders pretty well before we left, so there weren’t many bathroom visits. We managed to get the kids a bit of fitful sleep, although it required us supporting them in such a way that neither of us actually slept at all.

Our connection was in Phoenix on the way back. We arrived early and had a reasonable layover, so we had time to at least try to eat breakfast. Ian was pretty all done with travel after the flight from Phoenix to Austin, but we made it through without incident.

As we drove our weary selves home from the airport, thoughts of Hawaii took on a glamour-shot haze in our sleep-deprived state. If we let our eyes de-focus a bit, we heard the ocean waves, smelled the mai tais, and saw Maya and Ian being carefree and playing, chattering excitedly to Moana and giggling at Chip and Dale’s antics. It had been a great vacation.

More Maya photos

I have my few personal quibbles with the way some of the things at the resort were handled, and it was maybe a little early in the year to be in the water as much as we wanted to be, but by and large, it was a very positive experience. The kids were so happy. They got to play in the water nearly every day. They met a pile of Disney characters while they were still young enough to believe in them. Vacation was pretty low-stress for us because there were just so many things to do, and they were all things we could walk to. And, even if we were in a somewhat manufactured vision of paradise, we were still firmly in paradise.