By the Far Side of the Sea

Aloha to all 14 of our loyal followers!! Thanks for the date night Grandpa Keith & Yvonne! It really has been almost 2 months since we took off from Seattle to start this crazy adventure!  I am sure you are all wondering- are the Russells still crazy or have we been able to settle down a little.  Well the answer is a little bit of both.  I don't think we will ever lose our touch of crazy after taking the plunge that we did- but this new normal is settling in just fine and we are figuring things out for the most part.  We still look up occasionally from dinner and see the ocean on the horizon and are quickly reminded, "Oh yeah- we live on an island!"  No "rock fever" yet, but time will tell.  For those of you who don't know what that is, it is where one gets to the point that if they don't find a flight off the island within 24 hours, swimming to the Mainland starts to look mighty nice.  To completely diverge off subject, speaking of swimmi...

Hi this is Logan sorry I posted this late, thanks classmates for that card that you made, and thanks Robbins for that  awesome time. Nathan, you're a really great friend, and thank you for choosing to come see me for your birthday (He could've gone wherever in the WORLD he wanted to and he chose to see me). While he was here we got to see dolphins swimming around us, snorkling, boogie boarding and hiking in petroglyphs. Right now our grandpa and grandma are here for a visit with us for 2 weeks, we're having fun showing them around the island. We recently found the public library and guess what... you had to pay a dollar for a movie! Farmers Market This little fella likes guava jelly Place of Refuge Anyways miss you all! Hasta la vista...er...Aloha,    Logan

   Sooo....we had some 'surprise' visitors last week. Logan had no idea that his classmate Nathan and his dad (who happen to be renting our house in Bend) were coming to visit for Nathans' 10th Birthday! It was hard to keep it quiet because Chris and I were so excited for him! He has no idea why we went to the airport and told him to sit on this bench!   Oh my goodness! Seriously!!!?  They were both pretty stoked! You can't tell, can you!?  "My momma always said life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what your gonna get"      We went kayaking to the Captian Cook Memorial - incredible! We had dolphins all around us. It was so exciting! Logan even jumped in and snorkled with them!   The monument is beautiful, the snorkling is out of this world!!!   We hiked a Petroglyph trail  We...

Aloha- I have been asked to share a little about my experience working as a PA in Hawaii.  I have to thank Luke, my best buddy, for coming up with "Magnum PA".  Unfortunately I don't have a Ferrari...yet- it's just backordered:)  I also don't have nearly as much chest hair as Tom Selleck, to roll out of my unbuttoned shirt which also does not flow in the wind with my make believe Ferrari.  ANYWAY- The clinic is an impressive organization who really have a vision for this surprisingly poor community and actually get things done.  They do more than just talk about it and have lots of meetings- things happen which is very refreshing for me.  Not only have they expanded the clinic building I work in 5x (at least), but also have a pediatric clinic, pediatric dental office, mobile dental van, another clinic opening up north, and a homeless clinic.  It is exciting to be a part of such a dynamic organization.  I had the opportunity to work at th...

So many wonderful things we are discovering! We discovered rombutan - Yummy! Rombuton and Longon! Sweet, juicy fruits (once you take off the funny looking outside!) Papaya from our own back yard (& cutting board from our bud Casey!) I cannot get over the beautiful sunsets we get to see every night from our lanai! Awesome & huge avacodos from the farmers market - 2 for $1! (Evie's owie is another story...poor sweet baby=( ) Beautiful dolphins we got to see while visiting my Bunco buddy Crystal & her family who were vacationing at the Waikaloa Hilton.

Hi this is Logan, we're having a great time here in Kona looking at beaches, snorkeling, and boogie -boarding. Yesterday, we went to Place of Refuge A.K.A Pu'uhonua o Honaunau.  I got to see a lot of Native Hawaiians houses, temples, and totem poles. There is a very important game they played that is called "Konane"(ko-nah-nay), If any of you want to play here are the rules Setup Try to find a huge flat lava rock and carve 170 (maybe less) tiny craters so it makes a square, then put black and white rocks in the craters (can be different colors). To check if they are in the right place they should be the same color diagonally from every corner.                                                     ...