That's Merry Christmas...in Hawaiian! This year we celebrated Christmas in Hawaii with the Strack side of the family - the 'half way' point to meet between the East Coast and Shanghai! Eight days in Kona on the Big Island - simply beautiful! Our days were spent sleeping in (jet lag really seemed to hit all of us!), going to the beach in the morning and then the pool in the afternoon while Joseph took his nap. Really roughing it! Here are some highlights:
* Kelly & Megan spent one morning with their cousins Andrew & Daniel scuba diving - it sounded amazing (if you don't mind being 40 ft below the water!). A 'school' of dolphins swam over them, they saw sea turtles, pet an octopus and held a sea cucumber - not bad for their first dive ever! The next day the four of them plus Andy took surfing lessons - a bit harder than scuba diving but they all got up for lots waves.
* The beaches were wonderful and the water just amazing how clear and the shades of blue. Our first beach was actually a lot of lava rock and black sand and really made us question our paradigms of what we thought Hawaii was going to look like. After that we did find some gorgeous white sand beaches - which definitely matched the vision!
* For dinner one night we attended a luau...delicious food, lots of fun hula and flame dancing. Not exactly Joseph's favorite because it was a bit loud but he hung in there as long as we moved farther away from the stage. Zoe however loved the hula dancing and even more getting up to get her own drink of punch like a 'big girl' (thus the reason we think she had about 25 servings and was willing to refill everyone else's cups too!).
* We went to a wonderful outdoor church on the side of Mauna Kea mountain for a Christmas Eve candlelight service. Joseph's favorite part was blowing out the candles & having us relight them!
* The little girls especially just LOVED playing with their grandparents...out in the waves with Grandma, Uno back in the room, swimming at the pool, digging in the sand, staying up 'late' watching a movie. It was definitely, as always, very special time!
* We went to Target shopping - more than just a few times! We also ate at Taco Bell - again more than a few times! Can't get anything like a Burrito Supreme no onions with Raspberry tea easy ice in Shanghai!
We all appreciated the sunny days & blue skies, and mostly loved being with family again. Thanks Mom & Dad for an amazing time together! At the end of the week we actually sent Kelly & Megan on to Sante Fe, New Mexico to meet up with their wonderful friends in the Linn, Morrison & Schwartzman families for a fabulous week of snowboarding. Just got off the phone with them as they await their flight at LAX back to Shanghai - exhausted even before the 24 hours of travel, but definitely renewed by the time with friends. Now landing at 10pm in Shanghai tonight and having school at 7:30am tomorrow morning...not so sure how that is going to work but they agreed in advance to be cheerful (hummm....)!
As for New Year's in Shanghai I would call it woefully uneventful - Lindsey would call it pathetic! There is no ball dropping in times square, although we did watch earlier in the evening the fireworks display at Sydney Harbor Australia. With several of us still recovering from jet lag, the little girls & Joseph went to bed early and Andy & I fell asleep on the couch - we definitely owe Lindsey for being the only one to stay up to sadly celebrate on her own! As we look back over 2011 we are amazed at all the ways God has revealed himself in our lives and all that He has provided. We look forward to following Him in 2012 and wish all of you an abundance of blessings in this new year!
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