It was an early wake up call, but I was more than happy to oblige when my alarm lit up the room with its 4:45, “We’re leaving for Hawaii!” announcement.

We were out of the house by 5:15 and arrived at the shuttle just in time to miss it. There was a collective sigh, but it was only a 15-minute set back, we were still good on time.

When we hopped on the freeway, rush hour had already reared its ugly head. We started and stopped and started and stopped and I’d just started to revisit my breakfast when we arrived at our terminal. We thanked our bus driver and caught sight of the clock on our way out: 7:20, we were still good on time.

Each of the 5 members of my family had a bag to check, so we shuffled in amongst the chaos like a herd of cattle that accidentally discovered Noah loading the ark. There were 10 lines open, but only 5 workers bopping around to lift bags one by one onto the belt. A clock hung on the wall to the left of us and when we loaded our last bag it ticked to 7:50.We were still ummm…good(ish) on time.

Security went relatively smooth. We had our shoes off and phones out 50 yards before we reached the front of the line and once through, we had our hips moving like moms in Sketchers on a Sunday morning walk.

As we rounded the corner towards our gate, my sister got a whiff of caffeine a brewin’ and turned on her heel into the line at Coffee Bean. We followed suit, all eyeing something on the menu, all subconsciously tapping our feet on beat with the second hand of the store’s kitchen themed clock that hung above their breakfast specials. 8:15. We were still barely good(ish) on time.

At 8:22, our plane took off.

Yes, we were on it. Caffeinated, fed, and totally good on time.

Once landed and knee deep in palm trees and humidity, we picked up our rental car and made our way to lunch. Spoiler alert: We ate too much. However, there was a strategy involved in this; one which we totally planned ahead of time and didn’t formulate later when we were bloated and regretting our culinary choices. Straight after lunch we headed to Costco and since we’d eaten enough food to feed a flock of condors mama bird style, our choices were based on a calculated necessity for a week’s vacation, not spur of the moment starvation. (Example: We grabbed 2 family size packs of sliced turkey for a weeks worth of sandwiches, rather than 3 full sized turkeys we could eat in the parking lot 15 minutes after checkout.) And after some serious TLC in stacking the food amongst our bags, we put our rental car in drive and made the trek to our hotel.

Once checked in, unpacked, and relaxed, we made Mai Tais, because that’s what you do when you’re on vacation and you have to mentally prepare yourself to wear a bathing suit 24/7. Cheers to these legs! Cheers to this tan-less skin! Cheers to the cellulite you’re bound to see somewhere at some point, except for on that guy’s butt. Cheers to that guy’s butt! Cheers to this sunset that’s so pretty it makes me want to cry and pee, wait what? maybe that’s the Mai Tai…

Cheers to you Hawaii, may the weeklong love affair begin!

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Read Day 2 here.