Happy 2014! We rang in the new year by working at the PCC and then came home to a semi-quiet evening. At least Dennis was quiet. People outside were all having big parties with yummy smelling barbeque and loud music and illegal fireworks. It went on all evening and into the new year. Everything was very quiet in the morning. I thought I should take some pots and pans and go bang on them under their bedroom windows! Here is a picture of Dennis beating the drums to announce the opening of the Island Buffet.

The rest of the week was quiet. We are ready to get back to work. Although the break was nice, it was a little long when you don't have anything to do. We went on a picnic on New Year's Day over to the state park on the beach. Sister Stephens went to sit down and she missed the bench and fell backward, striking her head on the edge of the table. She and her husband left and he took her to the university clinic and she received four stitches. I felt bad for her. She is a nice lady and seems to be fine now. We have a new senior couple in our building. They replaced the Cochrans who went home in December. They are the Frogleys from Draper, Utah. They have been assigned to our little branch at Sunset Beach.

This is a picture of Sister Natalie Prawitt who is from the Hobble Creek 6th Ward and whose dad is our home ward Bishop. What a small world it turns out to be. I am constantly amazed. She is serving in Kaneohe and Dennis and I had to go down there the other day. We were walking through the mall there and all of a sudden, this cute girl was hugging me! It was fun to see her. She is happy and doing well. I wish I could run into Kayla like that!

 On Friday Dennis and I went over to Pupekea to help our Branch President and his family move. The owner of their house is going to try and sell it and they decided to be pro-active and were able to find another place. When we finished there, we took a short drive down to Waialua to see what was there. There is a ward building and people who live in Haleiwa drive there to go to church. There isn't that much of a town, but there is an old sugar mill with a few shops. One of the shops there belonged to Kirk, our branch member who passed away. They built custom surfboards and designed T-shirts. This is a picture of their shop. If you look carefully, you can see that it says "Aloha Kirk" above the door. The other partner had it put there. It made me feel sad to see that and be reminded of his loss.

Today we started teaching our temple prep class again and four of my favorite girls are in the class. They are: (from left to right) Hana Akina, who recently graduated with her Master's from UH in LIBRARY SCIENCE! We talk the same language! Standing next to her is Taylor Moyes, who is from Arizona and just returned today from Christmas vacation. She was Kirk's girlfriend and is just starting her last year at the university majoring in education. The little short cutie is Marissa Santeco who will be leaving on her mission to Bolivia in February. I hope we can go through the temple with her by the end of this month. On the end is Kuulei Akina (Hana's sister). She runs her own photography business and took our branch picture a few weeks ago. These are the nicest girls. I feel blessed to have met them and hang out with them!

This week we will start back to school and we are glad!