Meeting Christine

I received a message from Christine of Christine's Blog several months ago that she and her family were coming to Hawaii from Canada.  I could hardly believe it.  Thank goodness they were arriving between our overseas trips as well as family arriving in Hawaii.

Still, we did have our bonsai, tai chi (and teacher's birthday party), Zumba classes as well as doctor's appointments, Meals on Wheels, Mother's Day parties with family, etc. during that same week.  This has been a crazy spring.

Our only option was to see Christine and her family right after our bonsai class in Kailua on Saturday which is on the other side of the island from Waikiki where their hotel was.

We thought about places we might take them before we had to drop them off at Pier 2 to catch their cruise ship.  Our options in town were Iolani Palace, Tantalus, the State Capitol...

When we got to their hotel, I rushed in to make it just at our appointed time.  As soon as I saw Christine, it felt like I already knew her.  She felt like my friend.  Amazing!  We met her beautiful family and we became friends right away.  Art was amazed at how comfortable it was to talk to them all.

We discovered then that the tour they took the day before had already passed by the places we considered taking them.  Instead, they were hoping to try some shave ice.  It's called shave ice on Oahu, not ice shave (Big Island) or shaved ice and certainly not snow cones (mainland US).  Unfortunately we know the best place in our area, but not in town.  The hotel doorman helped me out saying Waiola Shave Ice was the place to go.

We'd never been there but had heard about it.  The ice was indeed very fine and it was good, but we're still partial to the stand we go to at Waikele.

Our next stop was Ala Moana Shopping Center which now caters more to high end stores.  I wish we had more time because we could have taken them to Waikele Outlet Mall.  Aha... more reason for them to return.  We walked around the shopping center, just enjoying our time together.  It was fabulous!

Too soon, it was time to part.  We drove them to Pier 2 where a gigantic cruise ship awaited them.

Christine gave me the original art for the painting she did of the rose I once posted on my blog.  I love it.  I couldn't wait to frame and hang it up in my office to enjoy and remember meeting such a lovely blog friend.