Christmas Canoe Ride

December 23, 2011

One of my favorite activities this year was spending some time at the Polynesian Culture Center. 

Surfing Santa

 When we visit the PCC, we usually watch the little shows, but this time we just tried different games and such...

 Elise HATED the ride on the Fijian raft - look at that grip!

Ever since her kayak tip, she's been a little skittish on the water.

Around 5:30 we left the PCC and drove up the road to eat at the highly recommended Kahuku Grill.  It didn't disappoint... the macadamia coconut shrimp were fabulous!  We came back to ride the Polynesian Christmas Canoe.  This was my favorite part of the day.  (As you can see, it was not Elise's favorite... not a surprise, but at least this time she didn't bawl - just had a scared-to-death look on her face.)  The first half of the canoe ride told the story of "Kamakana and the Five Fir trees" - showing 5 different scenes of the story of the birth of the Savior and how the wood of five trees were involved.  The music was wonderful (our bishop is the wiseman with red headress.  He sang "O Holy Night" 50 times every night they ran the canoes :).  He is really talented and that is one of my favorite Christmas carols.  It was beautiful.  They had live animals throughout -  mule, sheep, ram, ducks, horse, etc.  It just started to rain when we got to the part where the baby Jesus was born.  The whole thing was fantastic and it felt so right doing something like that just before Christmas.  The second half of the canoe ride was more of the "santa" section... singing and dancing by different musical groups.  They also blew out soap which looked a LOT like real snow.  The girls loved that part!

The Ward Party

December 17, 2011

 Our church ward Christmas party is always something we look forward to!  We love our ward family!

Dinner:  Steak, garlic shrimp, fish, fruit and corn... YUM!

 The original plan for dinner was for the Elders Quorum/Young Men to catch the fish.  They set aside two Fridays to do it.  Chris caught one of the three fish that night... and if they counted this one, you know it was pretty bad.  :)  (The other two were a baby hammerhead shark and a big 'ol three pounder awa'awa).  They had better luck the following Friday, but still not enough to feed the ward.

 This is what Austin ate.  

And he ran to fill up his cup with punch literally 20 times.

 Primary kids sang "Silent Night" in English and Hawaiian

 George ended up being on the program 4 times.  Ha!  This number "Silver Bells" by the bishopric was the only one he was planning to be a part of.  It was pretty funny.

 Geo was the winner of the "get the gingerbread cookie off your forehead and eat it" contest.

One of the ladies actually got the cookie into her mouth first... but George was a quicker chewer.  :)

"On the second day of Christmas, my tutu gave to me two dads with babies..."

 Christmas wishes:

Lucy:  Hello Kitty Sewing Machine

Elise:  Gum (Bubble Tape) and a camera - in that order!  :)

Austin:  Candy

I helped with the decorations.  For the tables, I put together lots of different nativity pictures in black frames and displayed them next to a mini Christmas tree.  The primary kids also drew nativity pictures. It was kind of a cool experience for me to gather/frame all those pictures.  There is a lot of beautiful nativity art.  And afterwards I took down some of my decor at home and displayed those instead.  It was a good reminder.  (It also showed me I never need to buy another black picture frame again.)  Anyway, the decorations were simple but I thought they turned out nice.  I must say I am always amazed at how talented people put together those big flower arrangements.... like the fancy arrangements on the stage and the manger scene.  A lot of the flowers/greenery they just get from their yards and then just make it into something fantastic.  

Gingerbread House Making

Lucy made a nativity set for us at school as her Christmas gift.  Cool, huh?

December 15, 2011

 For Lucy's class Christmas party, we had a gingerbread house creation extravaganza.  It was 2 hours of craziness so the kids loved it!  I had arranged to have the toddlers tended by a friend, but a couple days before, the teacher told me siblings were invited.  I asked the kids what they wanted to do and right away Elise threw her arms in the air and said, "Build houses!!!"  and Austin did the same thing but said, "Play!!!"  So, my friend took the two boys and the girls and I had a ball!

We had been working for a few minutes when the teacher mentioned to the class that we COULD have a special visitor (Lucy whispered "Santa."  :) and if we did, she didn't want the class to run and charge him at the same time.  So when he appeared, all of them waved and yelled, "Hi Santa!" and kept right on working.  I thought it was so funny!  (See him in the doorway?)

After they got the "go ahead"...

Busy classroom!
(You can see Lucy's flat kid hanging up.  She's been visiting Elina in San Antonio.)

Elise always knows what she wants to do.  Towards the end, I helped her build a fence and she'd also give me some direction with the icing, "Draw a line" or "Draw a window" and then she'd put the candy on.  Notice the little "shimmy" in this video. When she's proud of herself, that's usually the move we get.  :)

Lucy likes to do her own thing too.  She finished the house pretty quickly and then moved on to the yard area.  That's where she really got going... she made a garden, mailbox, pool, a front door and a back door (which meant she needed two paths), a playground for the gingerbread people, and pumpkins.  

 This is what they look like two weeks later:

And that is due to one person:

Busted!

Well... maybe the roaches helped too.  ha!

Christmas Card

 Merry Christmas!!!

We love you!

Out of 100 pics, these are the 3 that were good.  And that's only because Geo flopped in the sand like a seal to get them to smile.  Here's what really happened - Elise bawled pretty much the whole time because she was worried the water was going to get her.

Ukulele Christmas party

December 14, 2011

beginner Uke class - Lina Girl is in the red.  She's our very patient teacher.  

 We always look forward to this fun party!  There are always lots of great prizes and lots of opportunities to win.  We came away with t-shirts, gift cards, water bottles, bags, stuffed bears... all sorts of goodies.  Lina and Sam are always so generous.

Lu won a prize for the "top sticker card".  We get stickers for attendance, performing, etc.
She was one of Lina's first students so she had good odds.  :)

Austin trying to follow along with the hula to Mele Kalikimaka

We decorated covers for our ukulele Christmas song books (Lu won a keiki prize for that and Geo won a prize for "making the judges laugh"  ha!).  We had a hard time dragging Elise away from coloring to eat something for dinner.  For Austin it was the exact opposite - couldn't drag him away from eating to color.  :)

My favorite part:  ukulele jam session

And I love how no one is sitting down at the tables during the dancing!

"A Christmas Wonder"

Lucy's school Christmas concert

December 11, 2011

 "Do you like my poses, mom?"  ha, ha!

Lucy's speaking part:  "We begin our program in the name of the Father who sent his Son as the most important Christmas gift, in the name of Jesus who gave us His life to win us the gift of eternal life, and in the name of the Holy Spirit who gifts us with saving faith."


If you peek behind the lady in black trying to watch her daughter, you can see Lucy here and there performing "Away in a Manger" hula.  (wish I could have traded the lady places :)  The kids sang in English and Hawaiian.

Lucy and friends

(She's on the top row in the group pic - one of the taller 1st graders and pretty happy about it)

After the program, we had to say goodbye to Chris and Taisha.  Come back soon!!!