So much to report!

Whew!  Almost a month and no blog...  but it is for good reason and there is much to report.  On December 10th I took my oral exam for my PhD and passed!  Now "all" I have to do is write a dissertation and I will be Dr. Mott Lacroix :)  (The best part though is from here on out it is all about my own research, no more classes or exams... ever... unless I want to....)  Then on December 13th we left for Kauai, Hawaii for a 10 day vacation to celebrate a tough fall (for both Patrick and I... lots of work for us both) and to just relax the 4 of us.  And relax we did!  Thanks to Patrick's sister we had a fabulous rate at a swanky one bedroom villa in Princeville on Kauai and spent a lot of time at the pool and beach.  It rained a fair amount but it was warm and the sun always came out for a bit each day, which was glorious.  I think Izzy's favorite new words pretty much sum it up: mango, beach, pool, towel, chicken, tortuga and (my favorite) happy.  Here are a few pictures from the trip to provide the highlights.

Going down the slide... both girls went down this slide more times than I can count

Exploring the ocean (looking for turtles... which we never found... but the journey was great!)

Christmas hula concert...  totally awesome, Evie was all about hula for the rest of the trip

One advantage of all the rain was a gorgeous rainbow every single day...  we once even drove though the end of one (no pot of gold though)

Taking a hula lesson (jingle bells)

We managed one picture of all of us...  Izzy doesn't seem happy here but I promise she enjoyed the trip!

Exploring a little cave

Waimea canyon.. absolutely stunning!!

Dramatic hula pose...