Thankful for the Memories of Barbados & Grenada

 

From Elder Rasband's Facebook post

Church News and Facebook photo of our mission conference with Elder Rasband, Elder Cordon, and Elder & Sister Valenzuela.





These past few weeks have been awesome.  We are soaking up all the Caribbean vibes and making memories, because that is what will last from the time spent here.  So let's catch you up!  The Nobles arrived 10 days ago.  Elder Noble will be replacing Doug as the Financial Secretary, but only for 6 months so hopefully they will get someone else called soon for the spring!  Any takers?  If you want to work in the mission office in the Caribbean, we can hook you up!  Sister Humphrey will be the new Mission Health Advisor (MHA) and will arrive on December 13th.  She is from England.  We actually met last winter, when she and her husband spent 6 months here.  She's going to be great!

Headed for Grenada on Virgin Atlantic


Concord Falls

LOVE the Whiteheads





Barbados, of course, doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving.  Last year, we had all senior couples and mission leaders from the states, so we had Thanksgiving together.  This year, it was not the case, so we traveled to Grenada to visit the Whiteheads, a MLS couple from Burley Idaho for a few days.  It was FABULOUS!  Grenada is a little gem and I might say it is prettier than Barbados (except Barbados beaches are FAB) and the food is definitely better on the Isle of Spice!  

Beautiful Grenada


Look out at that view



We toured a lovely little chocolate factory called Diamond Chocolate where they make Jouvay chocolate.  Of course, we got to tour, sample, and buy some treats!  I didn't realize that Cinnamon was actually a tree and is made from crushing the tree bark.  Cocoa pods grow on trees and are harvested every 9 weeks.  

Separating the beans

We enjoyed seeing the Grenada missionaries immensely and had a traditional Thanksgiving at the Whiteheads' apartment with them.  

The Sisters of Grenada

The Elders of Grenada

It was truly a wonderful time and we got to witness a baptism while we were there.  The Whiteheads service will be up in February, so if any of you would like to be an MLS couple for Grenada or St. Martin in February we do have some of our English islands who will be looking for some member and leadership support!  
Princess, Akiva, and Akila are recent converts

Brighm's baptism




This week is transfer week!  Sister Kowallis is amazing and has figured out immigration and visa stuff pretty quickly and is now the Queen of the Caribbean skies getting all of our missionaries where they need to be every 6 weeks!  We had to say good-bye to a few sisters who we've become very close too.  It's always hard, but in the church we hope it is just see you later and not good-bye.  Thank goodness for social media, because we can connect so quickly.  
Sister Soriano from Philippines

Sister Taulua from Tonga

'Tis the Season for the Reason we all celebrate!  It's the most wonderful time of the year and being a missionary at Christmas is so special.  This is our 2nd Christmas in the islands and we miss our kids and grandkids at the holidays, but we know Heavenly Father is watching over them while we are here and we will be together soon and we will have them forever.  What a wonderful gift!  As we Light this part of the World with the message of Jesus Christ, we hope you are also Lighting the World with your Light wherever you are.  You have truly been a light to us as we have been here and we have felt it in your prayers, your service to our family, and your thoughtfulness and kindness.  PS:  we just found out that our Homecoming is scheduled for January 12th at 9 am at our ward building

Grenada beach




Sis came to visit for a few days prior to Thanksgiving to enjoy some beach time!  Silly me got Thanksgiving dates wrong and double booked myself.  Jerri-Ann came on Sunday and we came back from Grenada Tuesday night.  Fortunately, we spent Wednesday and Thursday on the beach together before we had to take her back to airport.

Sister time!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Christmas.....Lighting the World from Barbados!

Image
  Happy Christmas  !  Barbados was a British island, so we hear lots of greetings this way.  It’s been such a good few weeks, so let’s catch you up.   Here's a photo dump of our December adventures so far: We started our adventures with a new ride....new to us.....for a few weeks.  You aren't Bajan until you've driven a Swift!  Since Elder Noble arrived, it has freed us up to take on a special assignment from our mission leaders.  Barbados has about 12 parishes.  All of our 3 branches are located on the southern part of the island.  Our missionaries are also all centrally living in the southern area of the island.  One set of missionaries living in the southern part and one branch located in the southwest corner of the island takes in 9 parishes that include all the northern parishes.  Members have to travel quite a ways, usually on buses to attend church.  Our assignment was to go find members living in these norther...
Read more

"May" Be Time for Another Barbados update

Image
  Well might as well kiss   May good-bye, because we are already prepping for June.  Our June begins with District Conference focusing on our temple covenants.  Our temple district is in the Dominican Republic.    To get to the Dominican, Bajans typically have to fly through Panama.  It’s actually much easier to get to Panama and they have a temple, but geography….  Anyway, we actually discussed Sister Dennis' talk from Conference on Sunday about Putting on Jesus Christ.  When we make and keep our covenants, we are symbolically putting on Jesus Christ.  When you really ponder that it really opens up a whole new way of thinking about the why and the how of the great plan!  Sister Corbin Sister Braithwaite We were invited to several different members' homes for dinner the past few weeks.  Sister Corbin is Bajan but spent most of her married life in England.    In fact, her husband was the first Black Bishop in Engl...
Read more

Life in Barbados: Refiner's Fire

Image
  Thanks for checking friends, yes we’re alive. We just haven’t taken many pictures as we go through the refiner’s  .  That’s not a bad thing,  but it lets us know that we're alive and there is still more to learn and room to grow.  So, what's new in Barbados? The Globe theatre--Barbados style It's still hot!  We've gratefully been spared from the major storms that have been plaguing the US.  It is a little unnerving to be away from home, living in a 150+ year old apartment, and preparing for whatever is coming off the coast of Africa.  It's a little surreal. It's also calm before the tourist season.  We shall take it! We did find a drive-in movie theatre, so had some fun with the other seniors one night.  We saw the animated Transformers movie.  The movie was ok, but the experience was GREAT! During one of the few days that the Burnhams were back on Barbados, we went out to lunch to celebrate Sister Toma's birthday!  It took u...
Read more