Rest in Peace Baby Usaia

Baby Usaia

07.17.07-08.29.08

My thoughts and Prayers go out to Diana and her ohana! Baby Usaia passed away this morning after a year long battle of being sick! He was just over a year old. My heart goes out to you Diana! Baby Usaia will be forever in our hearts and dearly missed!

To work or not to work? That is the question...

Okay, so I said I was gonna stay home for awhile with "The Little Sir!" Well, I lied. Dante thinks I'm crazy but I'm gonna go back to work. I've debated about it for awhile and it's probably best that I do. I've thought of every reason why I should stay home and every reason why I should go back to work. Bottom line, if I work hard now while he's little, the more money and time I'll have for him later.

And it's not like he has to go to daycare! My mom isn't working anymore and Dante's mom has her own daycare so he'll be with his grandma's. Oh and Dante is off on Wednesdays so that's a plus too!

The only real issue I had with me going back is that I don't want it to be like LJ is being raised by his Grandparents! With both of us working, he'll be with them a majority of the time so there will be a variance in everything for him. He'll be spoiled as all hell being with them all time but I guess there is no avoiding that. Dante did promise me that he'll start going to work earlier so he'll get off earlier, then he'll pick up LJ right away. That relieved me cause the latest he'll get off is probably around 3pm depending what route he's on. He's usually home between noon and 2pm anyway. So the earlier the better.

Oh, so where will I be working? I accepted a position at a design company called Lumicor, I'll be in the Accounting Office as the Assistant to the Controller. It's in Renton. It's actually less than 10 minutes from Dante's Moms, so I can go there on my lunch to visit and feed him. I won't be work a full 40hrs at first, I'm gonna ease my way into it that.

I'm happy that I'm going back but hesitant at the same time. It'll be hard at first but the good thing is Dante is on vacation next week. So I won't have to cry in front of my mom or his mom when I leave him at first. It'll just be Dante so who cares! Wish me luck!

How my "wittle" family came to be...

So a lot of people always want to know how Dante and I met, how we got together. So here's the story from the beginning. It's how this whole family was created!

In 92' I started dancing hula in Seattle for Lehua's Hula Hale which is now Ke Liko A'e O Le Lehua. I love dancing hula so I was so excited to start dancing for a big halau. There I met and became friends with Theressa Irigon and our parents became friends as well. Her mom, Auntie Felicita being the recruiter that she is convinced my mom to bring us to the FYA drill team practice. I so didn't want to go. I just thought it was weird, a bunch of Filipino's marching around? How fun would that be? I had no idea what I was getting into. So we went, when I got there I was litterally scared. It was so intimidating! There was like 100 kids ranging from like 7-18. I watched for an hour or so before getting thrown into trying it out. But while I was watching I saw this boy and he was fricken "hot" or wait back in that day the word I believe was "fine!" He looked a lot older than me so nothing ever crossed my mind. He was just a "fine ass" boy named Dante that I saw at this Filipino drill team practice.

So needless to say we joined the drill team. Me and my brother. I made a lot of friends those first few months but never really talked to Dante. I think the first time I ever spoke to him was a few months later when we had our Variety show. He was the team leader of our group so I was forced to talk to him. I was so nervous and had some major anxiety everytime we practiced for this variety show thing. I totally thought he thought I was such a dork. We exchanged phone numbers during this time because we had to talk about our performance from time to time. So after the variety show was finished we continued to talk to each other and that was that. It evolved from there. So for the next few months we would talk on the phone. All the time. Litterally! I laugh now because it was insane how much we talked on the phone. I think one time we stayed on the phone for like 23hrs. I counted. We would run our cordless phone's dead talking to each other. Crazy...I know.

So after just "talking" for awhile. We officially became a couple on my birthday, Oct. 30th 1994. And we've been together ever since! We've had some tough times like being banned by the parents from seeing each other which we still did, the whole thinking we might not be able to get pregnant era but we're still hangin tough. He's my best friend and I'm so lucky to have him! So I'm thankful that I joined that halau, met Theressa, went to the Filipino drill team practice. Or god knows where I would be right now. So Theressa if you happen to read this, Thank you! It's because of you why I have this great family!

So the first addition to our family was our pug Louie. I had wanted a pug for as long as I could remember and I was always telling Dante how much I wanted one. So in December of 2004 Dante brought home Louie to me. We were at Tavia's birthday dinner at his Mom's house and Dante and the rest of the guys left during the party. They told me they were going to go look and possibly buy a car. I was pissed! We had just sold a car and now he was going to go buy another one. Nobody would answer their phones, they were all really rubbing it in. So when they finally got back like almost 2hrs later, I didn't even want to look at him. Jon Frederic was trying to force me off the couch to go look at my "new car." I was being crabby and stubborn and I just sat there. Well in came Dante and I didn't notice him at first but in his front pocket of his coat was this baby fawn pug! I was so excited! He was the cutest thing ever. I was soooo happy but also embarrassed that I had acted so dumb! I named him Louie because I was so sure that I was gonna get a LV bag for Christmas but he was a way better present.

Almost 2 years later came Juicy. So she didn't start out as my dog, she was actually Jon Frederic's dog but he was working a lot and couldn't be home with her to train her. She was supposed to stay with us until she was potty trained and then go back home with JF. Well I became attached...way attached so I kept her!

Less than 6 months later we had our 3rd addition, Brady. Well he wasn't supposed to be. When our fam bam crew was all still together we had crazy Secret Santa Christmas's. People would go all out for their secret santa person. Well Dante pulled Clyde's name. Clyde had been talking about getting a pug for a whole year so Dante decided to buy him one as his secret santa gift. Well let's just say things didn't work out and Clyde couldn't keep him. So since I stole Juicy from JF we decided to give him Brady. Brady is a handful, he's really hyper and he has to be either on you or licking you. He just demands a lot of attention. So one day JF went to Cali and asked me to watch Brady and he never picked him back up. I didn't care because I love Brady. So that's how I got number 3!

Okay so number 4 is Coke. He is the offspring of Juicy and Brady. Dante always wanted to breed Louie so when it was time for Juicy to go into heat everyone assumed that Louie would be the one to do it with her. He was such a horny puppy, he humped everything so I guess that's why we all thought he would be the one. So it was such a surprise that Juicy and Brady were the ones getting in on through her heat cycle. Louie wasn't even interested. So anyway, Juicy gave birth to her puppies. She had 3. Coke was the only boy and the oldest. Tavia, Dante's sister originally took Coke but couldn't keep him because of the house she's living in doesn't accept pets. So we got him back right away. Dante's co-worker took him but then her other dog was very jealous so she had to give him back as well. I felt bad that this dog was being passed around all over the place, so we decided just to keep him. So that's the 4 pugs and I wouldn't have it any other way!

And last well hopefully he won't be the last. Hopefully we're just getting started. We certainly had been waiting along time for him but he finally came. We had our son, Leland John Kahe'enaluokekai. He was born June 16th of this year. Tupac's birthday! His Uncle Bobby was quite happy he was born on that day! He is the best thing and he's brought so much joy, happiness, and perspective to our lives. It's truly amazing how your life changes when you have a kid. People say it all the time and it does. I understand that now. He makes me so happy and he brings so much joy to my heart. I wish that everyone will experience that at some point in their lives! LJ has such personality, his smile, laugh and his way of talking to you is heart warming. I just love him so much! I can't say enough about him, that's why I started this whole blog.

So that's my ''wittle'' family. Each of them makes it special and I wouldn't ask for another one. It slowly came together but we're all here now and that all that matters! And hopefully it will only continue to grow!

My First Official Blog! YAY!

Hello, Everyone! So this is my first official blog! I've been contemplating whether or not to start one for awhile now. I have friends that have them and I love reading them and getting an update on everyone's lives so I figured what the heck! I love being nosey so now everyone else can be nosey and find out about us!

So what to write, what to write? Well, I've decided that this is gonna be an audience participation blog, so for those of you who read my blogs feel free to leave comments and ask me anything you want about me or my family. I'll then answer your questions the best that I can during my next blog.

Okay, so a little about me! My name is Noelani, I'm a girlfriend/future wifey (hopefully sometime in the near future) & a new mommy to a beautiful baby boy named Leland John (LJ). My other half is named Dante. We've been together for 14 years now. I don't call him my Boyfriend cause he is so much more than that to me and after 14 years it's just weird to say boyfriend. I have 4 pugs that I love to death, that I also consider my children. Their names are Louie, Juicy, Brady, and Coke. With a new baby and 4 pugs life gets pretty crazy around here at times.

Okay, okay enough with the introductions. It's getting boring. Let the blogging begin!