Aloha!

We have finally made it to the airport in L.A.! Hawaii (and the beach) is mere hours away! After months and months and months of planning, orders changes, packing, and hauling crap all over creation, we are within reach of the promised land. Woohoo!
Our flight to Honolulu departed from LAX on time, and yes, we and all of our baggage were actually on the plane. If you've ever traveled with even one small child, you know that by now I am terrified that my children will behave like the typical heathen children that they are and run screaming through the plane for the next five hours. Enter the mommy plan: ear plugs for the kids and all surrounding passengers, followed by a first course of benadryl for the kiddos. This, surprisingly enough, seemed to work. We managed to survive the flight relatively unscathed, even if I did have to go into the teeny airplane bathroom at least once with each child. Houdini even slept for about half the flight, which meant that I didn't have to spend that time making sure that she was still in her seat and not trying to decompress the cabin by opening the door. The in-flight movie happened to be Gray Gardens..eh....alrighty.
So, we land in Honolulu, and the luggage circus begins again. I had already reserved us another rental mini van, so the plan was to go downstairs to the baggage claim, get the luggage, and leave my poor husband with all four kids and 13 bags while I took the shuttle bus to get the rental car.
Enter....my husband's sponsor! Finally, an Army program that comes through like it's supposed to! His sponsor, who is a very nice and very very patient man, immediately sizes up the catastrophe in progress and calls for reinforcements in the form of more soldiers with big vans. He also offers to take me over to get the rental car. So off we go. Rental car acquired, we return to the terminal in time for the other vans to arrive, but due to the fact that I have rented a van, and SuperSponsor has a large SUV, we wave off the reinforcements. Thanks, anyway! We load up both vehicles and I pause to marvel that we even got all that stuff into one van in the first place.
If you've never PCS'ed to Hawaii, then here's a little tip: when you get here, you MUST drive all the way from Honolulu to Schofield Barracks and check in at the Inn there. At the Inn, they have a little deli with frosty beverages. The pleasant staff there will politely inform you and your hot and sweaty jet-lagged party that you must now turn around and go back to downtown Honolulu to the Hale Koa Hotel in Waikiki. Don't get me wrong, even though this adds about an hour to your settling in time, this is actually a good thing.
The Hale Koa in Waikiki is AWESOME. Let me say that again: It is AWESOME! The lobby itself is completely open air, and there is a HUGE banyan tree named Gus in the courtyard just inside the lobby. We were given adjoining rooms at the end of the fifth floor with NO neighbors. The kids got their room, and Hubby and I had ours. Woohoo! Not only that, our rooms each had their own balcony with a stunning view of both the ocean and downtown Honolulu. Very very cool. This is yet another thing that the military has done well for it's beneficiaries. Thank you!
After we spent some time settling in, we meandered downstairs for dinner at one of the restaurants at the hotel. By now, No. 1 has figured out that we're finally in Hawaii, and her focus in life has become the beach. She wants to go to the beach. Now. Right now. She doesn't want to eat dinner, she doesn't want to rest, she wants to go to the beach. Of course, it's getting dark, so no beach. She has to be content with seeing the beach from the open air porch at the restaurant. Bummer. After a tasty dinner, we all go back upstairs and turn in. Aloha and good night!