A visit with friends from Elk Ridge
Our friends from our ward in Elk Ridge had a cruise to the Hawaiian Islands planned before we left on our mission. They told us that they would message us before they arrived in Kona Bay and that they wanted to go to church with us that Sunday. The Hermansens are not only friends and neighbors, but Joy Hermansen was one of my visiting teachers and Hal served in the High Priest presidency with Alan before we left on this mission.
Joy and Alan Hermansen
We met them at the ward building that is across the road from the temple and attended together.
It was nice to see some friendly faces from home and have a chance to get caught up on what is happening in our ward.
Alan and Joy were traveling with Alan's brother and his wife who also live near us but are in Evan and Kelly's ward!
We gathered for dinner at Elder and Sister Walker's apartment and enjoyed soup, salad and dessert.
Mike and Shannon Walker enjoying dinner
Sister and Elder Cox
This nativity was the only nativity that we saw as we drove around Hawaii and of course, it was on the temple grounds. Listening to the radio, we heard very few Christmas songs and those we did hear were mostly about jingle bells, Santa, Christmas trees etc. etc. It made us sad that the beautiful meaning and music about our Savior has been all but lost in commercialism. Who knew that Christ could be taken out of Christmas? We then began to look for the symbols of Christmas as represented by the evergreen tree (eternal life), Santa (giving, kindness and love of children), the colors of Christmas (red representing the blood our Lord shed thru the atonement for us and green representing everlasting life), the star (representing the new star that appeared at his birth), the candles and Christmas lights representing His light to all the world) etc. This new look at things and of course, the "Light the World" campaign helped us to feel the Christmas Spirit. We both also felt this true "Christmas Spirit" as we served in the temple. We are coming to better understand and feel our Savior's love for all souls on both sides of the veil - this has been a great blessing to us.
Here are photos of our apartment decorations of evergreen trees and Christmas colors.
We put together Christmas goodie plates with brownie snowmen, lemon bars and blonde brownies with macadamia nuts. We gave them to neighbors, the other missionary couples and friends.
Views from the deck of the condo
Kona has the most beautiful sunsets. We learned that this is because of "vog" -volcano gasses plus fog = "vog" which makes spectacular sunsets!
The prime rib was delicious and we enjoyed getting to know the Cox's children and the other guests.
Sister Cox is giving Angela some of the yummy chocolate torte that we had for dessert. Angela Cox is a sister that works at the temple (same last name but from a different family) . We picked Angela up and brought her with us to the party. She is a lovely person and we were glad for this opportunity to get to know her better. Elder Cox and one of his daughter-in-laws are looking on.
Elder and Sister Walker
Elder Walker shows Brother and Sister De Marcus (a couple that serve in the temple) a feature of Family Search that allows you to identify your relationship with anyone in a group that has an I phone and logs into family search under this feature. It was fun to learn that we were all 9th, 10th, 13th or some kind of cousins!
It was a fun evening with good food and good friends!
Everything was delicious!
Alan and Joy were traveling with Alan's brother and his wife who also live near us but are in Evan and Kelly's ward!
Dinner and Making Gingerbread Houses
After dinner, each couple worked together to assemble and decorate a gingerbread house. With the high humidity here, it was a challenge to keep the houses together the frosting/glue would NOT dry! The roof would slide off or the walls would slip away and the structure would begin to fall apart! The photo below is how they should have turned out! We gave ours to the neighbor children that live across the hall from our apartment.
Christmas in Paradise
Christmas Eve
On Christmas Eve, we went to the Waikaloa Village area as guests of Elder and Sister Cox (one of the senior couples serving with us). We joined them at a beautiful ocean side condo for dinner. The Cox's family was visiting Hawaii and staying there and they graciously invited us, Elder and Sister Walker and other friends from the temple to come for a prime rib dinner and to spend the evening with them.
Kona has the most beautiful sunsets. We learned that this is because of "vog" -volcano gasses plus fog = "vog" which makes spectacular sunsets!
Sister Cox is giving Angela some of the yummy chocolate torte that we had for dessert. Angela Cox is a sister that works at the temple (same last name but from a different family) . We picked Angela up and brought her with us to the party. She is a lovely person and we were glad for this opportunity to get to know her better. Elder Cox and one of his daughter-in-laws are looking on.
It was a fun evening with good food and good friends!
On the way back to our apartment, we stopped to photograph the pretty Christmas Lights in front of the Hilton.
Mele Kalikimaka!
Hal and I spent a quiet and relaxing day together on Christmas. In the late afternoon, we went our to dinner at the Fish Hopper and enjoyed crab cakes, clam chowder and Waldorf salad.
Another beautiful Kona sunset!
ALOHA!
It is fun to hear about and see your Christmasing. You both look so good! Happy New Year!
ReplyDeleteI loved reading about your Christmas Eve and Christmas. Sounds like it was different than the usual Christmas but enjoyable none the less. Hope you have a wonderful 2018!!
ReplyDeleteLooks and sounds as if you are meeting and getting acquainted with many wonderful people on your mission. How wonderful that you can share the holidays together and celebrate with with people you have so much in common. This will be a memorable Christmas because it was different and it gave you time to reflect on the important meaning.
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