FIRST FULL WEEK IN GRENADA

Merry Christmas to all of you!  Our Utah children had our annual Smith Family Christmas party last night without us.  We were feeling a little blue until we talked with all of them and then received this cute photo of each person holding the Christmas gift we made them before we left for the West Indies.  This is the first in a series of books on our ancestors.  Hopefully the family will learn about the great heritage that is theirs as they read from the pages of this book.  Making this book was a labor of love.  It took hours and hours of research and digging, but worth every minute.

Tonight was also the annual First Presidency Christmas Devotional from Temple Square.  We love the beautiful messages of peace that the Savior can bring into the lives of those who seek Him.  President Monson asked us to make Him the focus of the season and not miss the simple joy of His birth.  He lived and died for us.  What can we, in return, give Him?  Drop the last syllable in Christmas and it becomes the spirit of Christ.  Peace can come into our lives as we build faith in the Prince of Peace.  We love Him!!!

OUR WEEK

We have made a few trips to Grenada over the last four months, but this is the first time we have been here for a week!  This is actually our 9th day here and we are finally feeling settled.  We have spent a fair amount of time unpacking, organizing and buying supplies for our home office.  The rest of our week has been spent going to Government Offices trying to get missionary permits and also figuring out how to take care of the day to day rigamarole in the mission here in Grenada.  Computer geniuses that we are, it's a piece of cake....NOT!  We have also gone to a fair amount of mission meetings, including District meeting and inspecting apartments (some of which were disgusting), Family Home Evening in Gouyave and Friday Fun Night at the Branch with the Single Adults.  We went into St. Georges, the capital city, to buy a new phone and ended up going on a little excursion to Fort George.  This fort has been occupied over the years (1674-1983) by the English, French, eventually the Grenadian government and even the United States.  Needless to say, the fort has a long history.  

Sisters Kime (from Bountiful) and Cragun (from Ephriam) helping us learn how to do Petty Cash for the mission in Grenada.

Standing outside of our very unique church grounds.  How many churches have LDS cut into their landscape?

The Grenada church building.  It used to be a home and was converted into a church.  It has an extremely steep parking lot which is a bit awkward for parking.

This, my friends, is a wall of painted tires along the roadside on the way out of St. Georges going toward Gouyave.

We think this lone palm tree on the top of a cliff is rather interesting.

Elders Sherren (from Texas) and Strong (from Park City) walking down their street in Gouyave.

Ajaria

Tuesday night FHE with the Gouyave Elders and local church members Abigail, Rachel, Sister George and Sister Jean.

We have noticed that people in the Caribbean love to wear uniforms.  There must be some sort of status to a uniform.

Santa is here, although it doesn't look too Christmasy.

Have to go through a tunnel in St. Georges to get to the other side of town.  Cars and pedestrians both use this very narrow tunnel.  Yikes!

View from the top of a hill in St. Georges.

We went on a hike up to Fort George.

Loved this little pathway that passed by this beautiful Flamboyant tree. (which isn't blooming, so it's not so "flamboyant" at the moment.

Couldn't resist the colorful garbage can!  It's so Caribbean!!!

Part of Fort George.

A very old, and really cool looking, library.

There is parking at the dock for "DINGHIES ONLY".  I'm dingy.  Maybe I should park.

A line of Mailman Motorbikes.  Cute!

First time to pick up our mail from Box 3804 in St. Georges

I love where we live!!!!!!!!

We had Friday Fun Night at the Grenada chapel with single members of the Branch.  This room doubles as a multi-purpose room/chapel.  Elder Smith taught a lesson on Christ's birth and showed a short Christmas video from the Mormon Channel.  We then played games with cups and ping pong balls.  The games had a "Minute to Win it" feel to them.  We had lots of fun.

Rimble, Joshua and Kent

Sister Kime (from Bountiful) is very competitive!!!!

Elder Dall (from SLC) goes home before Christmas.  Helping the "Pro", Ryan (who was just baptized)

Roger is the life of the party!

Elder Hazelett (from Moab) is multi-talented.  Seems like he can fix anything, is musical AND he can juggle.

Elder Dall and Roger trying to flip the ping pong ball into the cups with a piece of cardboard.

Sister Kime is cozying up to a hermit crab.

Winding up for the night.

Elder Hazelett, Elder Smith, Joshua, Sister Smith, Sister Cragun, Ryan, Sister Kime, Elder Dall, Roger, Rimble

Of course, no week would be complete without posting pictures of a home or two.

Have a beautiful Christmas season.  We love and miss you all!!!