Da Keiki Blog

Ever since Leilani was allowed to ride Cookie last year in Ohio she has been talking about wanting to ride a real horsie again.

For a while, the desire (asking and not too much begging) was channeled into the kiddie rides outside of stores (she knows them all: horse at Walmart but it’s broken and we don’t shop there often, fire truck at KMart, even the merry-go-round in ‘Ele’ele from camping nearby twice), and we’ve shamelessly used it as a bribe to make our shopping more pleasant. Ever since we’ve been back in Austria, she’s wanted to ride the horse on the main street, which she remembered the first day we went there. When the jet lag was causing her to wake up cranky and crying in the middle of the night, we used that horse ride to bribe her into going back to sleep. But she must’ve remembered Cookie because she started saying that it was a pretend horse, not a real horse (she really is talking a lot, and talking about her own thoughts, which is really amazing to us parents used to having her only mimic or talk about topics that we introduce). Which led her to ask repeatedly if she could ride a real horse. Today her dream came true (Andy says that sounds like Mommy has been infected by Disney-speak).

Alexandra, a teacher and friend of Jutta has a (big) pony named Inka who does therapy with handicapped children. All of her horses are friendly, very well treated and so well behaved that it was hard to believe.
(Leilani thought she was still leading Inka)

Before one gets to ride, the horse has to be brushed…

…and lead out of the stable.

Then we all went for a walk in the woods. Leilani sat on Inka for at least 45 minutes.

Alexandra and her daughter Lea were very nice about having two crazy American(ized) parents (and one Oma) running around and ahead to take pictures and movies.

Leilani was all smiles at first. Then she got quiet and seemed to be bored—she was definitely tired because she skipped her nap again—but she said she was enjoying it. Towards the end, she got crabby for a second and said she wanted off, but as soon as Mommy was holding her and she realized the ride would be over, she begged to be put back on.

When she was done riding she helped to clean the horse and take the leg guards off and feed Inka some bread.

Leilani needed a lot of room in the plane. But she behaved really well considering we had 4 flights and 3 layovers.

(from previous trip, Leilani got a sticker on her boarding pass)

We were tired, after 2 redeyes and close to 30 hours of travel, but still in good spirits. Leilani had enough energy to stop at the highway restaurant again, the one with the huge slide and indoor playroom.

Gleisdorf is really pretty at this season:

Leilani went into the swimming pool while the bystanders wore pants and jackets:

She still loves all the horsie rides Gleisdorf has to offer. She talked about the horsie not being real, and just a pretend horse though.

Gerd, Andy and Leilani walked Lara (whom she gave the noble title of “my friend the dog”) …

… and Leilani took the opportunity to pick flowers for Oma and Mommy:

At the playground near the Gleisdorfer Volks Schule (elementry school):

Up, up, up we go….

…Ooops…

Andy and Gerd found this pretty chapel while bicycling

“Hoffest” the organic farm Scharler had a fair: Tomato and pepper plants for my mom, and lots of attractions for Leilani:

There are rainbows in Austria as well:

Saturday we went up to Koke’e. It was our happiest day in a long time. By the time we arrived it was almost noon, so we had a lunch picnic near the museum, and then hid from the rain for a while in the museum. Although Leilani really likes museums, this one was not her favorite, and fortunately the rain stopped soon.

Here we are starting out hopeful for a rain-free hike, on the Kokee meadow

We tried to go along the watertank trail, but turned around when it started raining again and and we went walking along close-by dirtroads and trails – just staying close to the car because of the weather.

When the rain finally got too much we went to the Kalalau lookout, where the weather was much better, not only did we enjoy views and the meadows to run around in, we also found lots of strawberries – Leilani loves the small wild variety. Koke’e strawberries never turn red, they are fully ripe and still white, it took me several years to figure that out, and I needed to search through several books to veryfy that, but never learned why. White or red – Leilani gobbled them up, and wanted to pick them herself too.

“Can I try the big hat?” Andy later realized in all these years he had never come that close to loosing the hat forever….

Although there were clouds, the views were spectacular, as always.

We saw lots of wildlife. This is a native Apapane bird, searching for insects in a native tree called Ohia Lehua.

This is a plover, called Kolea, they are fairly common. In the summertime they fly all the way to Alaska, to brood, and in fall first the adults come back, and remarkably the fledglings start their long journey across the Pacific a few weeks later, alone, without a guide (and still find home)

We also saw lots of beautiful flowers, Leilani loves them and we let her pick a few, she carried around a pretty pink Banana Poka for a long time. This, we think is a white Montebretia, very common in orange, but the white variety we have not noticed before.

We came home just in time to see the sunset through the rain behind Nounou mountain, the Sleeping Giant.

We have been packing for our big trip to Austria. Leilani was allowed one small bag of toys and a small bag of books. Not enough for her. While I was not watching she packed a few books into her suitcase, when came back and I asked she replied. “Its OK, my dad and I packed the books…” I did not believe it and asked Andy, who was innocent. So the books went out. I left the room once more, and a while later I had to rearrange a few items in the suitcase, and this time I found the books buried under quite a layer of – still nicely folded – clothes.

Leilani readily admitted that she had hidden the books, seemingly expecting that we’d reward her resourcefulness by letting her take more books. Although I had to smile, I did take them out – we are shooting for 3×50 pounds, and that is not easy…

“There you go, Mom!”
“Since when do you call me Mom?” (still used to being Mommy…)
“There you go, Sonja…” (without missing a beat)

Andy comes in “Are you ready Leilani?”
“Not yet. I will be ready in a few minutes”

When we then put on the sunscreen she started to sing:
“You are my sunscreen, my special sunscreen.
You make me happy, when trees are green.
When trees get yellow…”
to the tune of “You are my sunshine”