Friday, Dec. 16- Later that day

 After breakfast and some house re-arranging, we took off for Pounders beach. It is a great place to Boogie Board, but the waves really do POUND you !!!

It all looked so peaceful and calm to start with…

But when you get out in the water…..

We started with more exercises for Devon and Kaden

Then some beach shots of those of us not heading into the water

Tanner

Nana and Brooke - thanks for the Umbrella Mahaffeys!!!

We even found another swing for Ashlyn

In the winter when it is high tide, it brings up a lot of sand…and it can get pretty deep to walk through!

Alas, one wave hit Kaden particularly hard, slammed the boogie board out from under him, scrapping up his abs and face!!!

But, no time to rest as they had an appointment at PeRl Harbor next:

It was Devon’s 17th birthday, so on the way home they stopped at Seven Brothers to get him a hamburger!

They even stopped by the Visitor’s Center where we were working and said hello!

Friday, Dec. 16, 2022 - early morning

 As usual, when people come, their internal time clocks are off and they wake up very early - also because it gets light earlier here, and because the road traffic is VERY noisy! So, most people head straight out to the beach behind our house!

Kaden began the adventure with his early morning exercises!

But soon Brooke and Austin joined in the walk/runs on the beach! It was a beautiful morning after all….

Kaden, Brooke and Austin

Pretty soon, we were ALL out there….

Tanner and Nana

Kaden and Papa

Kaden, Chad, and Papa

Then we got our the Boogie boards to do some body surfing….

Austin in background, Kaden in foreground

Ashlyn 

Kaden

Devon and Papa

We played for awhile, then the Youngs came over to see M1 and M2 - as they affectionately called Tanner and Kaden who were their MTC teachers.

Of course, after EVERY time  you go on the beach. Especially if you are in the water, you must hose off every part of your anatomy to get as much sand off as you can. The drains and water pipes in our bathroom don’t handle the sand too well.

Thursday, Dec. 15, 2022 - Monroe‘s come

 Thursday evening the Monroe’s came to town. As per our other guests, it was mattress city.

Actually, We started a little differently though. The apt. downstairs had been occupied by a new senior couple the Young’s. Tanner had been their teacher in the MTC. But the office had told them they could probably only stay a month and would be moving to a smaller place to make room for two single senior sisters. The two sisters didn’t want to move until after Christmas, so that left the apartment vacant. So for the first few days we moved Brooke and Chad and Tanner downstairs in the two bedroom apartment. Then our housing coordinator told us that we couldn’t have them stay downstairs, so we moved them upstairs intoour apartment - that’s when we came mattress city. One queen in the middle of the living room, 2 twins under the windows behind the living room chairs, 1 queen in the dining area, and 1 folded foam piece plus chair cushions in the kitchen! (Bless you Devon for being willing to sleep there!)

Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2022- SNOW DAY !!!!

Every year the PCC (Polynesian Cultural Center ) puts on a fun day for the community kids!  They make snow for days and then has a SNOW DAY for everyone!

They section off part of the parking lot and dump all the snow. You can see on the left,  they build a stairway up to a sliding ramp. The kids all line up to slide down the ramp on a saucer.

Mostly, they just have fun throwing snowballs and playing in the snow!!!  Who says we never have a white Christmas??

Tuesday, Dec. 13, 2022 - it is that time again!

 It was transfer day today.  Because they didn’t want to have the regular transfer during Christmas, they moved our six-week transfer schedule up to just a four week transfer. Next time we will have a 8 week transfer so we can get back on schedule.

So, that means it is sewing time for the muumuu’s ! 

This time things went really well because we had a lot of help!  In this pic you see left to right- Sr. Gwinn, sr. Cannon, Sr. Bushman, and Sr. Dallin. We had 18 muumuus to sew, and since we had so much help…we got them all done on Tuesday morning! Even though, Sr. Gwinn and Sr. Dahlin only got to be there for 2 hours, and Sr. Cannon was only there for 3 hrs…it went so fast!

Friday, Dec. 9, 2022 - Christmas Cards

 Without a lot of time, but wanting to stay in touch with friends and family, we decided to just send post cards of our beautiful Hawaiian temple this year!  Here is a shot of the front and back!

Thursday, Dec.8, 2022 - Christmas treats

 So, we decided to give all our missionaries a treat for Christmas before transfers next week! We baked sugar cookies, pumpkin chocolate chip (with a dab of chocolate frosting and sprinkles on top), and some brownies!  We made special plates for the ones going home.

It was a real labor of love, and so many thanked us and appreciated the time it took us! We have some great missionaries!