Where does the time go??

WOW! I can't believe it has been so long since I have written! Time has been flying by! I haven't even told you about part 2 of Rick and Deena's visit. I will. I promise. It's too great not to tell you! But first I want to get you caught up on what's been going on.

I have been going into Jenna's classroom helping the kids make Christmas decorations. Each child made an ornament out of clay with their picture on it and decorated it with glitter. They turned out really cute. I actually stole the idea from Jenna's babysitter! Thanks Jeanette! We also made an "ojo de Dios," or "eye of God." The kids wrapped different colors of yard around popsicle sticks. This project was a little harder for the kids, but they turned out OK. Lastly, we made angels out of pinecones. It's kind of hard to find pinecones in Hawaii! As you can imagine, there just aren't very many pine trees around! One of the teachers had some from a different project that we used. The kids decorated the wings and drew faces on macademia nuts. This project ended up being mostly MY project because I had to use a hot glue gun to glue the wings and macademia nut heads on. Oh well, the kids enjoyed it and that's what matters most. I was in the classroom 3 days last week and twice this week (so far). Some of the projects took longer than expected, but the Christmas decorations will make nice gifts for the kid's parents.

We had our Christmas concert at our church on Sunday night. Jenna and the kids put on a really cute play. Jenna was a camel and an angel. She had 2 lines and did great! I was in the adult choir and we performed our songs too. It went pretty good. I think I could have done better, but I'm just not that good of a singer. Sometimes I have a hard time hitting the right note, especially when I want to join the sopranos! It was fun though and I would probably do it again.

Jenna's school Christmas program was Tuesday night. Each class sang songs and the girls that do hula performed too (which includes Jenna.) I was asked to make outfits for Jenna and 2 other girls. I borrowed a sewing machine from someone at school, but didn't get it until last Wednesday. I bought fabric, but then was told that I should use white sheets instead, so I didn't get started until Saturday. We both had rehearsal for our church Christmas program on Saturday and there was a Christmas parade that evening that we went to. I'll tell you more about that in a minute. I made 2 skirts on Saturday, but I didn't know the measurements of the girls I was making them for! I had an idea of how big they were, but I didn't have any numbers. The hula instructor gave me an idea of how much fabric to use, so I hoped that what I was making would fit the kids! Jenna had hula practice on Sunday afternoon and then we had our church program in the evening. I didn't get back to making outfits until about 9:30 Sunday night! I still had one skirt and 3 tops to make! I was up until about 2:45 working on them. When I went to bed I still had Jenna's shirt to make, but I figured I could make that on Monday. I needed to have all of the other ones finished by Monday so the hula instructor could hand them out to the girls. I found out Monday afternoon when I was in Jenna's classroom that all of the outfits fit! I was so relieved!! They weren't that hard, but it just took a while to do. I posted a picture of Jenna in her outfit. Anyway, all the kids did a great job at their school performance and the hula girls did great too!

We went to the Kona Christmas Parade on Saturday night. AJ said it was the first Christmas parade he has ever been where he could wear flip-flops! It was certainly odd. The parade was fun. There were some really cool floats! I posted a picture of a train. Jenna and her friend Enjolique made a haul on candy! Founately, she got a lot of candy canes which I am not crazy about, so I won't be eating too much!! It was strange seeing santa dressed like you would normally see him, while everyone else is wearing shorts and t-shirts! We were telling our friends about the Christmas parade in Darlington a few years ago when it was so bitterly cold. We have met so many people that cannot even fathom what that kind of weather would be like! I just tell them, "You don't want to know!" :)

We are in the process of planning our visit to Wisconsin. We will be there for 8 days and we will be spread between 3 towns. We will be busy, but we are really looking forward to seeing our family and friends. I've been told that the weather has been and is going to be bad! I don't mind having snow, I just don't want to drive from Chicago in it! Please pray that we have safe travels!

We had a huge rain storm go through the islands last week. It was so bad in Honolulu that there were flash flood warnings for the whole week. Many people in several different towns had severe damage to their homes - some lost everything. Fortunately we didn't get near as much rain on the Big Island. One day last week it rained for about 10 hours straight, but that was as bad as it got. It actually thundered for a while too, which is really unusual for Hawaii. The rain was snow on top of the mountain. For several days after the storm people were going up to the top of the mountain to bring snow down to build snowmen! I heard of at least 3 snowmen in the area and saw one myself. It was kind of odd to see, but it helped to make it feel a little more like Christmas! I'm sure they didn't last too long! After we get back from Wisconsin we are going to take Jenna up on the mountain with her boogie board and slide down the hills. It should be fun!

AJ had a very interesting adventure recently. He was on his way home from work one night when he saw a cow running down the highway! He said it was really hard to see the cow and cars were swerving to get out of it's way. He saw another truck chasing it, trying to keep it on the shoulder and not in the road. The driver of the truck was driving from the passenger's seat and had a lasso hanging out the window, trying to lasso the cow!! What was he going to do if he did get the lasso around it!? Did he think he was going to stop it?!? He probably would have gotten into an accident! Anyway, AJ helped chase the cow for a while, trying to get it off of the highway. After about a mile and a half, the cow finally ran down a side road and they lost it. We found out later it ran through our church's lawn before taking off down the road! I wonder where it is now??

There is going to be some big excitement in Hawaii this month. President-elect Barack Obama is coming "home" to Hawaii for a memorial service for his grandmother and a vacation before the inauguration in January. He will be on Oahu, where Honolulu is, so we won't have to deal with all of the traffic and hoopla that his visit will involve.

Well, I think that gets you up to date pretty well. I will tell you about the rest of Rick and Deena's stay before we leave for Wisconsin. I didn't want to make this any longer than I already have!! So, until next time...aloha!