Christmas with our Family

The fun continues. . .
We have been to California, Oregon, and home in Washington.  This coming week, we will be in Minnesota.  We love our family so much.  What a precious gift we were given to have this season with our family.

Home for the Holidays!

since it is school break (and the country is still shut down from the measles) we have taken a sabbatical to get medical exams and see our family.  We cannot describe the strong feelings of love we have as we see our family again. We can’t wait to see them all and give hugs!

Grandma Unicorn with Kailyn and Layla

One last trip to the market for some gifts before we take off for home.

Layla’s picture of baby Jesus.

Government Shut Down

This has been an interesting week.  The Measles epidemic is starting to slow down but not without some great effort on the part of the government of Samoa.  They shut down the nation on Friday and Saturday so vaccines could be administered more efficiently.

We walked over to the mission home on Friday and looked up and down the street and it was mostly empty.

When things opened up again on Saturday, we took an excursion over to the west side of the Island with some other senior missionaries and a nice young Danish couple who are working in the dental clinic and spent a very relaxing day.  Everyone was ready to get out of the house after being locked up for a couple of days.

The LeVasa Group (Sophie, Daniel, Nova, Sister Bennett, Elder & Sister Wright, The Lloyds

Sunset at LeVasa

View of the pier at The Edge

We have tried to keep the tradition of "Taco Tuesday" alive while we were here but we just can't find a decent taco.  We have modified it to Nacho Tuesday because a restaurant on the warf downtown sells a pretty decent plate of nachos for 10 tala (about $4 US).  It has a wonderful view of the pier and Apia harbor.  We have become good friends with Barbara at the Edge.

Christmas at The Edge Restaurant

Nacho Tuesdays

Measles

They shut down our make up classes and closed the buildings at Pesega so there would be no chance of spreading the measles.  That means we have a couple of weeks to get ready for our trip the the USA.  We will fill it with lesson preparations for our next class and pick up on these make up classes in January when we return.  As of yesterday, there have been 44 deaths and over 3000 cases of the measles.  There are still about 60,000 people that have not been vaccinated although there has been progress in vaccinating the younger children.  We held just sacrament meeting today with no one under 19 attending.  The government has banned anyone younger than 19 from attending any public gatherings to try to deter the spread of the disease.

We held the traditional American Thanksgiving dinner on Friday (Thanksgiving in America) in the Seminary building behind our house.  We had about 30 people there including senior missionary couples from both the mission and the temple, some junior missionaries from the office, and a young Danish couple who are volunteering at the dental clinic for a month.  It was so good to taste these traditional tastes again.  We consumed two turkeys, about 15 pounds of mashed potatoes and gravy and a couple of gallons of dressing along with all of the trimmings and of course pies!  It was glorious.  We were so exhausted from the preparations that we took most of the next day staying off of our feet.

Small recreational fale under construction on the beach

With some of our new time opportunities before our trip, we are going to do some stenciling in preparation for out graduating ITEP Teacher certificate students.  We just finished up two teacher's program and should have 9 more teachers finish before we leave in July.  We are hoping to have an assembly with both schools (over 1000 students) and honor them.  We are preparing to give them a stenciled shopping bag and lavalava with the ITEP logo on it with a Samoan design along with a few teaching supplies that you just cannot get here.  Janice has been busy negotiating with her stencil artists (see below) to get just what she needs to do the work.

Janice negotiating with her stencil boys!

Stencils made from Used Xray film