Surf Watch!

Oh, my goodness, we have never seen anything like it. We have had a Surf Watch for 3 or 4 days now and it goes until noon tomorrow. How the weather casters can tell it will be over by noon I don't know. Anyway, the waves have been 12 to 15 feet high here. They are crashing over the rock wall barrier onto the road. There is a fine salt mist in the air. Car windows and glasses get speckled. It is really beautiful and amazing the power the ocean has. This morning while we were walking, a road grader came along and had to scrape the sand that had washed up across the road. It reminded me of snow plows in Utah clearing the roads during the winter. The surfers have parked their cars on the road at Pakala and it must be a quarter mile long almost up to Makaweli on both sides of the street. Some day Wally and I are going to have to park there ourselves and hike down through the fields to see that great surfing beach.

Zone Conference.

Here we are at Zone Conference being taught by the AP's. You can see how busy we all are taking notes. We were told we'd better take notes because we wouldn't remember what was said 5 minutes after it was finished if we didn't. Sister Dalton handed out little rocks to everyone and told us we should be "solid as a rock". Also we should Be Bold in our teaching. She talked about how missions had affected the lives of her sons and had prepared them for life. I am going to talk to my boys and see what they have to say about how their missions have prepared them for life. Get ready to answer boys! I know what Wally and I think. We'll see what they say. You can see I am prepared with my talk. It is right there on the table and I am so prepared I just want to give it. Alas, not so. I guess I was supposed to write it just for me to think about! Dinner tonight with Vince and Lois was wonderful. I made chicken salad croissants with a fruit plate and chocolate chip cookies bars for dessert again, a request from Vince. Dinner was yummy but our lesson was fabulous. We reviewed the Gospel of Jesus Christ and then talked a little about the Restoration and taught prayer again. We asked Lois to pray and she did. It was so wonderful. Oh, her scriptures came and she was so excited to start marking them and making notes for herself. We can feel her sweet spirit and it is so humbling to see the spirit touching her life.

A Peaceful Sunday.

You can't see this picture really well but it is a collage of our Relief Society sisters. We have such a varied and fun bunch of ladies in our ward. Relief Society is a great place to be on Sunday.

This week our lesson was on letting "things" go and getting on with life. It was taken from a conference talk. Sister Alna Mecham had a balloon tied to each of our chairs and at the end of our lesson we were to go outside with our balloon and "let it go". You can see my little pink speck of a balloon going up. (It was hard to let it go and take the picture at the same time). How really freeing to think of something that was really bothering me and then to give it up and let it go. I'm so glad to have gotten to know these sweet sisters and have my life touched by theirs.

Another Sign...

As we were coming down Kekaha Rd. heading for home we spotted this sign. Actually, Wally spotted it first and we had to come back around to look for it because I wouldn't believe him that is was posted in a front yard. It is down the street and across the street from some members. We have a lot of missionary tracting in this area from different churches. The Jehovah's Witness tract on Wed. and Sat. They dress up just like we do and go around neighborhoods. I had a nice chat with a gentleman the other day. Wally said I did a good job explaining what I believed. I never thought I would be able to do that and make sense. It made me feel really good.

Bro. C's and Hale's

Today we talked about hale's with Bro. C. Hale's are original Hawaiian homes. They are made using pili grass that is dried, bound and then layered on a frame. The roofs and walls are all made of the same material. The doorways are small so you would have to bend over to enter your house. This was for defense. If an enemy was entering your home they would have to bend over to do so and you would have time to hit them over the head before they had time to stand up straight! Handy huh? Kukui nuts were used as lighting for the house. They are a nut that is very oily. 2 or 3 were hooked to a coconut frond and were lit kind of like a torch. They would last a long time and provided enough light for the house. Cooking, weaving, and general meeting hale's had roofs but were open sided. The village fishing house was on stilts so the nets of the fishermen could be hung from them to dry.

The Bumper Sticker!

We have been seeing lots of interesting signs and bumper stickers lately. I thought I would post a few. Some give pause to ponder and others just crack us up! After I saw this one I knew exactly where I hoped I would be....

Dinner and Lesson with Lois.

This morning we had a great District Meeting! These young elder's are so on the ball. They teach from the heart and are so prepared. We were told we had to have a 5 minute talk prepared for next week's Zone Conf. with President and Sister Dalton. The topic is "How do my actions reflect the Gospel of Jesus Christ?" Hmmmm, I'll have to think about that. Wally, of course, has his outlined in his head already. After our meeting we need to go and do some shopping and then I am going to make some chocolate chip cookie bars for dessert tonight's lesson with Vince and Lois. Vince said he is making Saimin salad for dinner. I know it will be yummy. It is so much fun to share the cooking every other week with them. We have really developed a great friendship and enjoy our meetings so much. Lois mentioned on Sunday that she has ordered her own set of leather bound scriptures. She can hardly wait for them to get here. She wants to underline her own important scriptures. Does that bring JOY to our hearts.

School and Lesson!

What a great Monday. Yes, it was P-day. In the morning we have started reading again to the 4th grade at Kekaha Elementary. (I really need a school t-shirt. Old habits die hard) Our class has 23 students and the ratio is 1 girl to 5 boys. Wow. Denise the teacher is shocked by the numbers. So many boys she says. They are so cute though. We love reading with them. After reading we stopped by the beach to have a look at the waves. We are obscessed with the ocean. Not too rough today. This afternoon we had a lesson with K & K and kids. Brother Young went with us for member support because Bro. Karratti is off island on business. We love having members with us to bear testimony of what we are teaching. It is wonderful. We challenged reading the Book of Mormon and Prayer . It was so good. This would be a happy celestial family!

Service for Sister Kua.

Sister Kua has gone to spend a few months on Oahu with her daughter. While she has been gone her daughter and son here decided to clean up her yard and paint her house for her. As they were putting new "legs" around the house a support beam underneath fell down. It was eaten right through by termites! Yikes.

The ward got together today and put a new support beam underneath. Here is Brother Young under the house working to make sure they get it placed correctly. Brother Young and his son the younger Young are contractors and so they knew exactly what to do. Wally wasn't much good with a hammer and nails so they made him the official photographer of the project. We had a good turn out. And, of course, there was a nice lunch served when the project was done. It is so wonderful how the members of the ward get together here to help one another. They are a bunch of talented people! What one can't do another can.

Our Neighbor Kawehi..

We haven't seen Kawehi (Ka-vey-hi) or Willy for about a week. We were wondering about them too. Then, today as I was cutting Wally's hair outside, she came over for a visit. I guess the whole family has had a bad cold and they haven't been out at all. She asked if we had heard them coughing over there. They are feeling better so she came over and brought her grandbaby for a visit while Willy had a nap. We talked for about an hour. She asked some things about us being missionaries; what days we had off, how we paid for our mission, wards, what we are called (elder and sister) and a few things like that. We talked so long that the baby fell asleep in her stroller and Veyhi said " I leave her here. I have something for you." Off she went and back she came with this basket full of delicious ripe mangos with a big avocado right on top. She knows how much we love them and she is so kind to bring them over when ever she thinks about it. She also said how much she loved the mango-banana bread I took over to them. We are so blessed here. Sometimes I feel bad that we can't be out doing lessons all day long but I realize that sharing with our neighbors and being friends and doing service is also what our mission is all about.

Thursdays With Bro. C.-Birds and Tattoos!

Today we talked about birds and tattoos with Bro. C. After I asked him about Egrets we went on to talk about Sheerwater (night flyer's), Mina Birds(so noisy and everywhere), Cardinals (very red and beautiful), Owls (I saw one flying up at Kokee) and lots and lots of Doves. All the streets in Kekaha have bird names. Ho'omau Street means long and ever lasting Phoenix. Ele ele is Black Bird. Elapiao is Yellow Black Bird. We live on Iwipolena and I have forgotten what that means. Oh well, I will ask him next week. There are lots and lots of birds here and they are always singing. Brother C. says the "tree hugger's" here have made such a fuss about Sheerwater's flying at night and hitting the lights in the football stadiums they can no longer hold games at night just in the afternoon or early evening. Poor birds you'd think they would learn their lesson. Now for tattoos. Tattoos were used to identify a person and link them to a tribe or family. Anciently a piece of bone tied to a stick or a sharpened stick was used as a tattoo "needle." The design was pounded into the skin using a mallet. The ink or dye was made using the ground kukui nut or sugar cane juice. Tattoo's were used as a protection by ancient warriors. The designs were made so they would look savage, fierce and frighten their opponents during battle. Tattoos were also used as a sign of social class. For example, slaves were tattooed across the bridge of their nose. Wow! We can't believe all the interesting things we are learning about these beautiful islands and their beautiful people.

No Seagulls in Hawaii!

We were on our way to District Meeting this morning and noticed that they are plowing the fields getting ready for another corn planting. That field was covered with Egrets. Egrets are the seagulls of Hawaii. They eat as farmers turn up fields and after you water or after it rains and there are lots of insects and worms. It never occurred to me that there were no seagulls here with the sea surrounding us. I asked Bro. C about it and he said "yep, we have Egrets here!" Funny all this sea and no gulls.

Yea, Suncrest Stake Y. W.

We had the most wonderful P-day today. We did the regular cleaning and laundry and then we went for our regular Lappert's cone and sitting watching the waves at Salt Pond Beach. It was yummy and beautiful at the same time! A family had their 2 year old and baby there and were playing with them in the water. Let me tell you they were water babies! So cute to watch. On the way home we stopped at the post office and there in our box was a wonderful surprise from the Suncrest Stake Young Women. They had a service project at camp and wrote their testimonies in Books of Mormon and made "My Testimony" hand gloves to teach about bearing your testimony. They sent these to missionaries in the field to use. We were the lucky recipients of one of the packages and we were so thrilled. We can use both of the projects. We are teaching a large extended family and will share the books with them. We also teach bearing testimonies to families for FHE and we will use the gloves for those lessons. Later in the evening we went to Lois's to teach the 1st half of The Gospel of Jesus Christ. She shared with us that she has sent for her own leather bound set of scriptures. We were so happy! What a blessing of joy we are feeling. We think she is finally accepting the idea that the spirit is whispering to her and she is recognizing it and is being touched by it. We have promised her we won't push or put a time limit on teaching her. She has come to know she can trust us and is becoming more apart of what we are teaching and sharing with her. I mentioned before that they feed us every week and so I have started cooking for them every other week so it won't be such a hardship for her to come home and worry about preparing food right after work. This week we had salad, macaroni bake and chocolate chip bars for dessert. It was yum! We share mainland food and they share Hawaiian. It is so much fun. We are loving this......

Lots of Churches.

This picture is of the Buddhist Temple in Hanapepe. We decided we are going to take pictures of all the beautiful churches here on the island. There are so many different ones. Today was a wonder Sunday. We had a family of 7 come in off the street and ask for the lessons. They stayed for all 3 meetings and actively participated. We told them we would be glad to teach them and gave them an overview of the gospel and what we would be teaching them. They will come to church and we will give the lessons to them during Sunday School. We hope and pray that this gospel is what they are searching for. We know these are the miracles we are seeing because of our ward's 40 day fast for missionary work. So many members have been blessed with opportunities to share the gospel. It has been a great blessing to us all.

Red Dirt Shirts.

This is the Red Dirt Shirt Factory. These shirts are very popular and I know I have seen them at home in Utah and other places. They are dyed using the actual red dirt from Kauai.

This is Kauai's famous red dirt. It is so red and it clings to everything! It even seeps into the water and tints your white clothes when they are washed in the water. We have noticed that when we hold up Wally's new white shirts next to the ones he has been wearing the old ones are kind of cream colored. You don't really notice it until you compare but it is interesting. We saw an article that says they use about one gallon of the red soil in the water as dye for a batch of red dirt shirts and you can see from the picture that it really does a good job. Thought you might find this little piece of information interesting.

No More Duck Tape!!!

We had the most wonderful surprise today when we got home from District Meeting. We had a new floor! It is a wood laminate and it is beautiful. It has a little grain in it and it looks and feels so good. We were worried because we have used up all the leopard duck tape and only had one camo tape left(Wally is saving it as a memento). We have used up all we could find of both kinds on the island. We were going to have to go with red flames next and that was a little out of our comfort zone. LOL. We hope it won't long until the bathroom floor is finished. It is so nice not to have to worry about changing the tape because the glue is seeping out and we don't have to use paint thinner on our feet anymore. Yea!!

District Meeting With New Missionaries.

We got 3 new elders and 1 sister this week. Starting from left to right here's who they are and where they are from. Elder Tenney is from Arizona and 3 days out, Elder Tiakia (see uh key a) is from New Zealand, actually Nuie an island 60 miles from Tonga. He has been out 9 months. Elder Cox likes to tell people he is from Hawaii but he is a military "brat" and just happened to be living here when he got his call. His is 3 days out. Sister Parkin is from Utah and has been out about a year. Elder Tiakia is with the zone leaders so they have a tri-panionship for the next 6 weeks. That means they will do splits with ward members and they will end up teaching about 50 or so lessons a week. We have a great zone and all the missionaries work so hard to be exactly obedient so we can expect miracles just like Elder Russell M. Nelson promised us.

The Plan of Salvation.

We had a wonderful lesson with Kisha and family tonight. Our ward mission leader came with us and it just made it even better. We gave the Plan of Salvation and we felt the spirit so strongly. Kisha has lots of really good questions to ask and it really helped that Bro. K. has been a bishop and could help us out by answering questions that needed to be answered by priesthood authority. We pray always that she will listen and hear the spirit whisper to her that what we are telling her is true. We love her and her family and want to share the greatest gift we can ever have with her.

Apt. Checks and Donkey Beach.

Today was missionary apartment inspection day. We got to see everyone that was transferring and tell them goodbye. We were right. Elders Bowlby, Miller and Sister DeArton will be going. We will miss this group because they have been here almost as long as we have. We will get 3 new elders and 1 sister. We found out that the zone leaders will have a new elder with them. I guess there will be a threesome for 6 weeks. The 2 elders are greenies. It will be fun to meet them on Friday at District Meeting. One comes from New Zealand. We start our rounds down here in Kalaheo and check that apartment first and end up in Anahola at the top of the island. We met the Cox's and had lunch and then they wanted to take us for a walk down to Donkey Beach. It was beautiful. The water was turquoise blue and just rough enough to be interesting. I think we will use this picture for our Christmas card this year. Do you think it will look like we are showing off and having too much fun on our mission? We will be participating in 2 ward service projects this evening.

Stake Primary Activity.

We had a Stake Primary Activity today. It had to do with all aspects of missionary work. It lasted from 9:00 a.m 'til 1:00 p.m. The children started out in the cultural hall on an "airplane" going to their missions. They were divided into groups and an attended all the different stations by the time they were through. They had p-day, studying the scriptures, tie tying, learning languages, learning about different countries, and learning to cook. When we finished all the rotations we all did a service project and cleaned the church. Of course, we had to have ice cream when we were all finished!

This picture shows Dad teaching a group of boys how to make turkey sandwiches. LOL! I am taking his picture but also in the kitchen cooking saimin (ramen). It was fun. It brought back memories of teaching 6th grade and trying to keep every one's attention. Boy, did we eat a lot of bread, turkey, cheese, lettuce and noodles. They were hungry kids that early in the morning. We told them to make sure they appreciated their moms now because when they went on their missions she wouldn't be there to wait on them. They would have to take care of themselves. Of course we bragged about our boys and their cooking, washing, and cleaning skills! Those were the good old days - right boys?

Lois

Finally, a picture of Lois. We had a lesson tonight. We taught the Plan of Salvation. It was a wonderful. I think we all had our testimonies strengthened tonight. Lois is learning more and more and we are having a great experience teaching her. We always have a wonderful dinner and nice visit before hand. We have become so close to some people here and we always look forward to teaching them. We learn as much when we prepare as they do when we teach, I think. What a blessing it is to share something we love so much. It has taught us not to take it for granted.

Shaka

The shaka goes clear back to the 1930's. It is a form of greeting meaning don't worry be happy, hang loose or aloha. You can see in almost all of the group pictures of missionaries they are "shakaing", is that a word. Bro. C. told us there is a story of a man who had his first three fingers taken off in an accident and so he would wave with his thumb and pinky up and that was how the shaka got started. Anyway, I just thought I would give you a little insight into the shaka.

Last District Meeting Before Transfers.

Well, here is the final picture of this group before 3 of them are transferred for sure. Sister DeArton is dying (going home). She is the red head. Elder Bowlby kneeling to her left and Miller kneeling to her right are leaving too. We know for sure because they have been here for 6 months. They came as greenies and they are ready to get on with their missions some place else.They are anxious to see other islands. They are all so wonderful and lots of fun. We will miss them for sure. We'll get to see them one more time because we do apartment checks next Tues. before they leave and we will get to say goodbye and write in their signing journals. I'm glad we already had them write in ours. I wonder if Elder Smith will go(in front of Dad)? He is our Zone Leader. What a great elder and fine young man he is. If he goes that will be half of our Zone. Guess we will have to wait until next week to find out. The only sure thing is we will remain here in Kekaha. As Dad would tell you 7 more transfers to go.!

Yumm.. a Beautiful Papaya

We walk every morning at about 6:15. We head down our street and down around the elementary school to the track around the baseball fields. We walk around the track about 5 times (1 round is 1/4 mile) then head out to the beach to walk along the road until we get to our street and head for home. Our route takes us about 55 minutes. We have lots of walking "friends" we meet along the way. Most are elderly. We wave and say "hi" " have a good day" etc. They always look for us and wonder where we are if we are not there. Even the Kekaha to Lihue bus driver honks and waves to us. This morning "the man in the gold suv" waited 'til we got around to where his car was parked and called for us to come over. "Miss" he said,"Do you like papaya?" "I sure do." He then went over to his car and brought out the biggest papaya I have ever seen. He said it was sweet and ready to eat and hoped we would like it. Wally tucked it under his arm and away we went to finish our walk. We still had about 30 minutes to go. Let me tell you it was worth bringing home. It was sweet, yummy and perfect for breakfast!