Ian and Amy Jack's Family Blog: Labor Day Luau

Last Monday we went to a Labor Day Luau and it was a lot of fun. The food was great and the setting gorgeous with the sun setting and the waterfalls in the background. There was a live band that played great and amazing Polynesian dancers. The kids got to go up on the "stage" at the beginning and dance to the music - which they loved. Noelle and I went up and learned how to do a hula called the hooki-lau (We're pulling in fishing nets in the picture below.)

At one point, they were showcasing dances from New Zealand and the dancer, who was painted like the guy below, came out into the audience with crazy, googly eyes and his mouth wide open and his tongue flicking in and out. He was searching for someone from the "enemy tribe." He had a leaf, which, when placed in front of the enemy, symbolized a peace offering. So, this guy comes out and sets it down in front of Shaylor, who just looks at him, wide-eyed. (I, meanwhile, am frantically trying to take a picture of this, and the camera was set on timer somehow and I couldn't get anything until it was too late!) Anyway, the main singer is explaining the peace offering to the crowd and everyone was waiting for Shaylor to pick up the leaf to symbolize that he accepted the peace offering. Shaylor just sat there staring. The Guy talking was pretty funny and said, "That's ok, little buddy, take your time; we'll wait." Shaylor finally picked it up and everyone clapped. It was cool. We saved the leaf!

At the end of all the dances (2 hours worth) these two fire dancers came out and amazed us. Ashlyn couldn't watch! One guy was putting the fire on his tongue and holding it with his feet. It freaked her out! I loved it though.

During all of this awesome entertainment, we had a lot of hard times too. It poured rain for about 24 hours before the show, so the ground was soaked. We brought a blanket, but it didn't keep the wet from seeping through. We finally had the idea of sitting on Gracie's diapers, which prevented us from getting more wet, but the damage had already been done. When the sun set and it got cold, our wet bottoms made us even colder.

Then, in the middle of everything, I look down and Gracie had, shall I say, "made a stinky" and it had gotten all over me. So, I move her onto Ashlyn's lap, thinking I had contained it all and was trying to clean myself up, only to find that Ashlyn had it all over her now. It was on the blanket too. It was so weird, I still don't know where it was coming from! So, I tried to change her diaper, but, oh ya, we had used all of her diapers to sit on. We found one that was ok and used it. Poor girl. Ian, being "funny" in the middle of all of this craziness looks over at me and says, "Ugh, that stinks, could you do something about that?" I almost flung poo at him!

Let's see, cold, wet, gross-ness, what else happened. Oh ya, we lost Shaylor...twice. He would come off the stage after dancing and go to find us. We were only one row back from the stage, but he thought we were much further back, and was trying to find us. The first time, I saw him about 20 rows behind us at the top of the hill, wandering around. I leaped over people and blankets to get to him. The second time, he was nowhere to be found. I went up to the announcer and gave him a description. He was going to announce it after the song (Uh, no, how about right away...you doink!), and I was scanning the crowd and saw a man bringing him down the hill. Again, crazy woman bounding over blankets and people to get to her lost little boy. It was so scary - for all of us. We didn't let go of him for the rest of the night.