Happy in Hawaii –- Aulani & Oahu with a Toddler ~ Updated 7/20: Final Update and link to new TR!

[AZMermaid]

Oh wow that class looks ADORABLE!!!

 

[Dugette]

Hey, everyone! Just a quick post to let you know that I might be a bit scarce around here for a bit (yes, even more than usual, haha! ) I will get to replies when I can. We leave on Friday for our return trip to Hawaii and will be there until the 18th. Then we go to Disneyland 2/5-2/10. Insanity! (In a good way). But I will finish this TR (and the others...) - just on the schedule. Who knows, maybe I'll even pop in from Hawaii. See ya real soon!

 

[cindianne320]

Have a wonderful trip!

 

[AZMermaid]

Have an awesome time!!

 

[alohamom]

Hope you had a wonderful time Dugette! We were supposed to be there just before you but we had to bump it to the summer. I am curious if Izzy remembers any of Aulani or Hawaii in general. Wouldnt it be nice if you guys could make it an annual trip!

 

[Leshaface]

It's so crazy how much her hair has grown from this picture to the recent picture I saw in your other TR with Santa!

She really just carefully lays down for dramatic effect.

Man, wish my child threw tantrums like that!

So sweet

And then she had to come back for a reassuring hug :

What a sweet heart.

Glad she started having fun with it!

Oh my gosh for reals?!

Hope you guys got to enjoy this on your trip!

This is a cool shot with the water drops.

Such a gorgeous day!

She's quite the character!

Love that they got a picture of you two in the moment!

 

[Dugette]

Oh Dugette-she is so sweet! and what a fantastic activity, looks like you both enjoyed it!

Thanks, it was really unexpectedly fun!

All caught up! I really would like to go there while the kids are still little!

I hope you can! I highly recommend it - especially after this last trip!

What a fabulous day! So many of your pictures of the pool look AMAZING - what a fun place to hang out for the day! I'm glad Izzy got brave and played in the fountains!

The whole pool area there really is amazing. And everything is so beautiful, looking out at the ocean.

In addition, what a great collection of character meets! It's too bad that you missed out on Minnie but I'm glad that Izzy took it in stride. The "surfing lesson" also looks really fun and it looks like Izzy was having a fabulous time!

We had a blast with the characters and the surfing lesson was a lot of fun too.

Oh wow that class looks ADORABLE!!!

It really was! We just went to meet Chip & Dale, but it ended up being a lot of fun before they even showed up.

Have a wonderful trip!

Thank you, we did!

Have an awesome time!!

Thank you, we did!

Hope you had a wonderful time Dugette! We were supposed to be there just before you but we had to bump it to the summer. I am curious if Izzy remembers any of Aulani or Hawaii in general. Wouldnt it be nice if you guys could make it an annual trip!

Aw, sorry you had to delay your trip! For what it's worth, they told us that the resort was very crowded right before we checked in, due to school breaks, so maybe it will be for the better that you are going later. I think Izzy did remember a fair amount. But we discovered early on in the trip that "Hawaii" means "Aulani" in her mind. She kept saying we had to go to Hawaii when we were already there. I wish it could be annual, but I doubt it. I'll keep an eye out for airfare deals, though.

It's so crazy how much her hair has grown from this picture to the recent picture I saw in your other TR with Santa!

It really has finally started to grow!

Man, wish my child threw tantrums like that!

I know, it's hilarious!

So sweet

Love that lazy river!

What a sweet heart.

Gotta love those toddler hugs!

Glad she started having fun with it!

Me too. She ended up really loving it once she got comfortable.

Oh my gosh for reals?!

I thought that was rather hilarious!

Hope you guys got to enjoy this on your trip!

YES!

This is a cool shot with the water drops.

I liked that too!

Such a gorgeous day!

I think all days there are gorgeous. It pretty much always looks like that.

She's quite the character!

So is Stitch!

Love that they got a picture of you two in the moment!

Yeah, they did a nice job of getting Photopass shots during the class.

 

[Captain_Oblivious]

Looks like the surfing lesson was a lot of fun for Izzy. I'm glad you guys got to enjoy so much of what Aulani offers!

Hope you had a blast on the return trip!

 

[FantasiaMagic]

Hi Dugette! It's Alison again. I know I am very very late to this party but I am happy to be here! I enjoyed reading your WDW/DCL TR last night so much, I was excited to see you had an Aulani TR going on as well.
I just wanted ot say I am loving this TR so far. You give so much detail with everything, it makes you think you are there! Hawaii itself looks beautiful, and of course Aulani does too. That is defiantly on my bucket list to go to one day.
All the pictures are so cute - and how great you were able to do so many character meets.
Also, spending time at that wonderful pool at Aulani looks like heaven!
I look forward to reading more!

Also, I hope you and your family enjoyed your trip back to Aulani, and enjoy your time at DLR! I look forward to reading those TRs as well!

 

[schmass]

I just got caught up. This trip looks like it was amazing. I'm glad that you and Izzy had such a good time when Dug was at his work event. I don't know if I could have handled being on my own with a toddler as well as you did. I think I've said this before, but I am definitely going to have to revisit this TR in a couple of years when we head to Aulani!

 

[Dugette]

Looks like the surfing lesson was a lot of fun for Izzy. I'm glad you guys got to enjoy so much of what Aulani offers!

It was a really unexpectedly fun little class! So glad we did that. We tried to take advantage of what Aulani had to offer and I think we did even better on the return trip.

Hope you had a blast on the return trip!

We did, it was great. I have to say, it was awfully nice to have Aunty's Beach House available for free. Izzy loved it there and it allowed us some time off to hang out with the grown ups. Plus, Izzy was older and braver and much more willing to try things (waterslides, etc).

Hi Dugette! It's Alison again. I know I am very very late to this party but I am happy to be here! I enjoyed reading your WDW/DCL TR last night so much, I was excited to see you had an Aulani TR going on as well.

Hi, welcome! Glad to see you over here too!

I just wanted ot say I am loving this TR so far. You give so much detail with everything, it makes you think you are there! Hawaii itself looks beautiful, and of course Aulani does too. That is defiantly on my bucket list to go to one day.

Definitely keep it on your bucket list - Hawaii itself and Aulani are both amazing places. And I'm glad you are liking the detail in the TR - sometimes I think I am going overboard, but I like to feel like I am there when I look back on my own reports. Of course, details get harder to remember over a year later...

All the pictures are so cute - and how great you were able to do so many character meets.

Thanks! I really liked that I could call the pre-recorded line each morning and find out where and when to meet characters that day. And it usually was lumped together in a fairly short time frame, so we could knock a bunch out all at once.

Also, spending time at that wonderful pool at Aulani looks like heaven!

It is. It really is. And I'm not even that much of a pool person, but I could spend months there and be happy.

I look forward to reading more!

I actually wrote another update! Coming right up!

Also, I hope you and your family enjoyed your trip back to Aulani, and enjoy your time at DLR! I look forward to reading those TRs as well!

Both were fabulous! Now that we're back, hopefully I'll be on here more often updating these ongoing reports so that I can get to the new ones. I'm really excited to get started on those too! (And with no trips currently planned, I might as well re-live the past ones).

I just got caught up. This trip looks like it was amazing. I'm glad that you and Izzy had such a good time when Dug was at his work event. I don't know if I could have handled being on my own with a toddler as well as you did. I think I've said this before, but I am definitely going to have to revisit this TR in a couple of years when we head to Aulani!

Aulani and Hawaii really are amazing. Without a doubt, Aulani is my favorite Disney resort. It is truly heaven. By the way, on the return visit, having free use of the kids' club (Aunty's) made it even BETTER!

And thanks on handling a toddler solo. I have to say that taking those two WDW trips (summer 2014) was really good practice for me. I felt pretty comfortable roaming around an island with her, since I'd managed to fly solo with her and that's much more stressful.

 

[Dugette]

Cuteness Overload

Well, friends, we left off 2 months ago (sorry! ) with Izzy in “surfing” class and Chip and Dale had just made an appearance. Izzy went running/dancing up to see them:





After dancing around them a bit, she found Chip free and ran in for a giant hug:





Photopass was right there too, so that was great:





Then Izzy and this other little girl pretty much followed Chip all around:



So, he was awesome and played with them:





Followed by some more playing around:



Then there was going to be a group photo, but Izzy had run off, so Chip went to retrieve her. One of my favorite pictures :



Izzy and Chip’s new little friend joined in too:





Haha, you can totally see me back there taking pictures.

Almost there:



Here’s a rather lengthy (3 minutes) video for anyone who wants a better taste of this class. It was really a cute activity for the little ones and it was free! Lots of dancing and goofing around. And Chip and Dale were very patient to put up with all the random hugging and such:

(click to watch)

And then the Photopass photographer had the difficult job of trying to take a picture that has all these young kids looking at the camera, preferably smiling. Well, Izzy and her friend were having too much fun to be bothered by that nonsense:







Enough of standing in place, time for more dancing :







And a bit of video from that:

(click to watch)

Izzy was having such a great time with her new friend that she didn’t even notice when Chip and Dale left:



I pointed it out to her and she was very upset she missed their exit. The other girl’s dad came over because he thought maybe his daughter hurt Izzy. Told him not at all, she was just sad they went bye-bye. By now, Izzy’s new friend was also sad because Izzy was so sad.

We said our farewells and I took Izzy off to a bench at the side. While we’d been playing with Chip and Dale, Dug had tried to Facetime us, so we Facetimed him back now. Thankfully, he was able to cheer Izzy up with some funny faces.

In better spirits, we headed off to dinner. It was about 4:40pm, so we had plenty of time to walk across the street and hit the fantastic happy hour at Monkeypod Kitchen. You just walk down this sidewalk from the Aulani entrance and cross at that crosswalk:



We hadn’t made a reservation, so we received a buzzer and just had a very short wait. We checked out the signage:



Window shopped nearby:



Looked back toward Aulani :



Here’s the patio we’d end up being seated on (which was very nice):



Waiting outside:



I guess Izzy found herself a flower:



And then wanted to hold the buzzer:



And then we were buzzed and seated!

Up next: Mmmmm….and one of my favorite evenings of the trip.

 

[alohamom]

Awww-Dugette, she is just too cute-thanks for keeping up the report too!

 

[schmass]

That activity looks like so much fun for the little ones. I love how Aulani just looks so laid back. Too cute that Chip went to go retrieve Izzy.

 

[Imagineer5]

What fun! That looks like a blast and I LOVE that photo of Izzy coming back with Chip! How cute. SO nice you were able to facetime Dug too, I'm sure he missed you guys. Looking forward to hearing about the evening plans!

 

[FantasiaMagic]

Those kiddy surf lessons sound like a blast! I love how Chip and Dale come for the fun as well!

Photopass was right there too, so that was great:

Precious! She looks so happy!

Then there was going to be a group photo, but Izzy had run off, so Chip went to retrieve her. One of my favorite pictures :

She is so cute!!!

Looking forward to reading more!

 

[Dugette]

Awww-Dugette, she is just too cute-thanks for keeping up the report too!

Thanks! I know I'm slow, but I will finish this report. Honestly, I do them primarily for myself to look back on, so it'll get done. (maybe just not speedily )

That activity looks like so much fun for the little ones. I love how Aulani just looks so laid back. Too cute that Chip went to go retrieve Izzy.

It is really laid back there. Very different than the running from FP+ to ADR of WDW. Chip was great with the kids!

What fun! That looks like a blast and I LOVE that photo of Izzy coming back with Chip! How cute. SO nice you were able to facetime Dug too, I'm sure he missed you guys. Looking forward to hearing about the evening plans!

Thanks, I loved that photo too (actually got a free print of it when we bought our Photopass CD). This evening is so nice - looking forward to covering it!

Those kiddy surf lessons sound like a blast! I love how Chip and Dale come for the fun as well!

It was a super cute class - I was impressed, considering it was a free one (since they charge quite a bit for some classes).

Precious! She looks so happy!

She was!

She is so cute!!!

Looking forward to reading more!

Thanks, more to come soon, I hope!

 

[Dugette]

Hawaiian Sunset

Our buzzer went off at Monkeypod and Izzy and I were seated on the lovely patio:



I appreciated the fact that Izzy’s chair had arms on it, to keep her contained (she was newly over high chairs). She started off with some milk, a pouch, and some freeze dried strawberries (all that I brought along).

I took a peek at the kids’ menu for her:



And that’s when I noticed what you see over on the left: free meal for the under 3 crowd! Awesome! So, she got the noodles and cheese. (In case you’re wondering, on our recent trip, she got the Quesadilla and it looked so tasty that adults in our group ordered it too - and enjoyed it ).

Then I checked out the appetizer menu, as they were half price during happy hour:



Thanks to reviews on the DIS, I knew the Pumpkin Patch Ravioli was excellent, as well as the Garlic Truffle Oil Fries. And I had to get a Mai Tai, of course – also discounted for happy hour. And I put in my notes: not eating a lot and being sick makes drinks strong! (Though, for the record, I got a Mai Tai there again last month and it was still strong ).

Here’s part of my tasty feast:



That ravioli was SOOOO good. I ordered it again this last trip and it was as tasty as I remember. Yum! You can also see my lovely drink there.

Izzy’s noodles and cheese ended up being a HUGE hit! She loved them and gobbled them up. I love this sequence of pictures:







Meanwhile, the fries showed up too:



Very good, but I ended up bringing most of them back to the room, as I just wasn’t hungry enough to eat many. Izzy continued to enjoy her cheesy noodles:



Eventually, she discovered that our table had a handy silverware play slot, so that kept her occupied for a while:



Despite not finishing my fries, I had to order one more thing. I remembered reading in Captain Oblivious’ TR that the chocolate cream pie was a special treat – so I got one to go. And, with that taken care of, we made the short stroll back to Aulani.

First order of business once we got back was to stop into the gift shop and visit the Photopass desk. For events like the Chip and Dale one earlier, you stop in and tell them you want to get your photos. They pull up the event photos and you go through one by one and select the ones with your kid in them. I was happy to see the photographer did such a great job capturing Izzy’s fun with Chip and her little friend. They got them all added to my card as a CM played peek-a-boo with Izzy (very sweet ).

After that, I made a stop over to the front desk (background decoration):



I paid off our room-charge balance thus far with the gift cards we’d brought. Figured I should do that while I had time to make sure they didn’t automatically charge the linked credit card instead. The CM was very nice and helpful – even reversed a valet charge that shouldn’t have been on there (it’s free when you’re checking in).

After taking care of that, I glanced down and noticed someone was getting very sleepy:



I figured this would be a good opportunity for me to try some of the outdoor Menehune Trail. I stopped into the Pau Hana room at about 6:20pm to pick up the tablet and start my adventure (with sleeping toddler):



I got to make things light up:



I think this thing lit up too (lobby floor), though you can’t see it here:



Soon, I decided to head down to the beach because the Photopass CM said they sometimes have someone down there to do sunset photos. I didn’t find anyone and Izzy was asleep anyway, so I just took a few pictures of my own:



Not as good as a Photopass pic, haha:



Then I decided to just walk along the waterfront and enjoy the sunset while I had the chance. There is a nice walkway that goes along the beach and past all the neighboring resorts. I took a picture of part of the sign so you can see:



I walked down to the Ko Olina Beach Club. Passed the wedding chapel:



Sweet freedom stretching in front of me :



After having been solo with a toddler for a few days, I was really enjoying the ability to “go off on my own” and just enjoy a walk along the beach – at sunset!

My phone really couldn’t capture how beautiful it was:



But I did get this shot of Izzy napping in paradise:



I think this was the Beach Club resort:



Looking back toward Aulani:



I really loved the peaceful walk. But I had to turn around and get back, as I still had the Menehune Trail tablet and it needed to be returned by 7:20pm. When I got back to the resort, Izzy was still out cold:



I popped into the restroom and then stopped over to the Ulu Café around 7pm to fill my Refillable Mug o’ Diet Coke:



Then I took my last 20 minutes to finish up most of the outdoor Menehune trail:





I had heard that it was better to do the outdoor trails at night because you can see things light up better (and it’s not as hot).

This is an “owl” in hiding that I unlocked:



When I returned the tablet, the CM there remembered that I was planning to take Izzy to the Chip and Dale event and asked how she liked it. I told her we had a great time and she was happy to hear it.

Throughout her stroller nap, Izzy had briefly awoken a few times, but gone right back to sleep. I got her up when we returned to the room, though, hoping to just get her in jammies and into her pack ‘n’ play. However, she was wide awake now. She agreed to jammie bottoms, but not the top, so I left her shirt on. Then she wanted to play with her new Aulani figurines, so she did that while I pulled up our Photopass pictures on the TV. I thought that was a really nice feature at Aulani – easy to check out your pics. After we looked through them, I told her it was bedtime. She was NOT happy about this at all and decided to throw a tantrum, complete with kicking and heavy breathing. I asked her why she was so upset and she couldn’t answer me – probably just exhausted (remember, she’d skipped naptime this day). I offered her a hug and she accepted and let me hug her until she calmed down and wanted to get in her crib.

It was around 8pm and I decided to "go nigh-night” then too, in order to help her fall asleep. I just planned to nap until she was out, then get back up for a bit. A little dark to see, but that’s my view from the bed to her crib:



I woke up around 11pm, but didn’t feel great (silly me, trying to eat food after a stomach bug ). I decided to go back to sleep for a bit longer.

When I woke again, I felt better, so I got up and showered and made some notes and wrote this update in the PTR:

http://www.disboards.com/threads/it-all-started-with-a-massive-price-glitch-aulani-nov-2014-ptr-updated-12-6-tr.3316668/page-8#post-52618387

So, if you read that, you may have seen the mention of pie. Yes, indeed, I had middle-of-the-night pie:



Mmmmmm. After all that fun, I finally went to bed for the night around 2:30am. (of course, it was only 10:30pm at home, so really not that bad...

Up next: Horseback Riding on the North Shore!

 

[FantasiaMagic]

Here’s part of my tasty feast:



That ravioli was SOOOO good. I ordered it again this last trip and it was as tasty as I remember. Yum! You can also see my lovely drink there.

Yum That looks god! Glad you and Izzy both enjoyed your dinner!

Soon, I decided to head down to the beach because the Photopass CM said they sometimes have someone down there to do sunset photos. I didn’t find anyone and Izzy was asleep anyway, so I just took a few pictures of my own:

Wow..That is gorgeous!

I walked down to the Ko Olina Beach Club. Passed the wedding chapel:

That seems like a perfect spot to get married. That would be so romantic

After having been solo with a toddler for a few days, I was really enjoying the ability to “go off on my own” and just enjoy a walk along the beach – at sunset!

That is great you were able to get some time to yourself to enjoy the beautiful night! You must have been so happy that it worked out that perfectly since Izzy was napping!

So, if you read that, you may have seen the mention of pie. Yes, indeed, I had middle-of-the-night pie:

That pie looks SO good! Seems like a perfect nighttime snack!

 

[hokieinpa]

It seems like Izzy had a great afternoon partying with Chip and her new friend!

It looks like you and Izzy both had delicious dinners! That pumpkin ravioli sounds really good. And great bonus that Izzy's meal was free!

What a relaxing night - just you and sleepy Izzy! The sunset pictures are amazing!

I'm happy Izzy finally agreed to settle down. And there isn't much better than middle of the night pie!