Youth New Year's Eve Dance-- the Last Hurrah of 2019! (And Christmas Cards...)

Katelyn went to the New Year's Eve dance tonight while the rest of us went to Grandma's house to play cards... first though, we had the missionaries (Elders) over for dinner.  (Elder Anderson from Colorado and Elder Price from Georgia.)  We had such a yummy stir fry and fresh tuna poke that Todd and Bill made!  Luckily both elders love Asian food.  Megan made sugar free chocolate chip cookies for dessert and the elders had them hot and melty with ice cream.  We had a really nice visit with them afterward, as they didn't have to be in such a hurry to leave tonight.  They encouraged us to invite the Bonnafassi's to church and we had a good visit about missionary work!  It was a fun evening and we played Rook at Mom's tonight while we counted down to 2020!

Below is a picture of all the cards we got this year...I love to receive these in the mail, but we didn't get as many as usual this year... Still lots of fun!

Sister Maloney's Homecoming Talk!

I drove out to Mesa EARLY this morning to hear Brooke's companion that just came home, speak in Sacrament Mtg.  She is from Mesa.  Low and behold Ron and Debbie Van Dusen are in the same ward!  Debbie had been Haley's primary teacher and activity day leader when she was little!  It is SUCH a small world and so interesting how our lives cross paths-- many times without our even knowing it!  So cool!  It was fun to see her a catch up really quickly!  It was AMAZING to meet Haley and give her the biggest hug!  I felt like I was hugging Brooke and somehow I felt close to Brooke as I hugged Haley!  It was fun to hear her speak about things and people that Brooke mentions in her letters too!  Haley bore her testimony in Karen at the end of her talk and it almost made me tear up knowing that that is the language Brooke is striving and sacrificing to learn so that she can be a servant of the Lord in teaching the Karen people!   Haley is a cute girl and it was fun to meet and chat with her!  She is wearing the traditional dress of the Karen women and I often see Brooke and her companions wearing these clothes when she sends home pictures.  It was a fun morning!  I'm glad I went even though I would've loved to have had a travel companion out to Mesa this morning!  (Katelyn!!!!  She was too tired from all the partying we've been doing!) 

OHIO STATE V. CLEMSON!!!!!!!!!!!

We got tickets to the Fiesta Bowl just down the street in our Cardinal's Stadium... Robin was so excited to be able to go, and it was doubly fun with all of us going together... except Ohio State lost!  They had a great first 1/2 but really choked on the second 1/2 and between the penalties, bad calls and inability to make anything happen... they lost.  In fact, on the very last play they had an opportunity to score a touch down to win the game, but our receiver didn't get the memo from the previous time out and ran the wrong way and Clemson caught the ball in our end zone to win it.  One mistake after another cost them the game!  I bet that guy is in big trouble right now!  It was fun though, we all just wish Ohio could've gotten it together and won it!  Their band was sure fun to watch though... especially script Ohio at the beginning of the game...that was awesome!

Thurman's Come for a Visit!

We had a fun evening with the Thurman's!  They came through overnight on their way to Kyle's family Christmas party.  It was fun to see all of them... especially Emma!  She and I had a really good visit together and she helped me chop the veggies for our Turkey soup dinner, which was soooo yummy and soothing and good and a cold winter's night!  We had a great visit... woke up the next morning and visited some more (bottom picture), and then they were off!  Short but sweet! 

MERRY CHRISTMAS HAPPY CHRISTMAS! (Brooke's Letter)

Wow Merry Christmas everyone! It has been quite the week with some Christmas miracles! :)

Miracle #1 

We found some of the CUTEST people this week through some really unexpected ways! Long story but basically it was a miracle and they came to volleyball AND church! :) 

Miracle #2 

We worked SO hard this week to invite people to the Christmas Program for church on Sunday and the hard work PAID OFF! 11 of our friends came and it was such a good day! 

MIRACLE #3 

Christmas is the time we get to celebrate Jesus Christ! He is our Savior and Redeemer and what a miracle it is that He came to earth and fulfilled all that He had to do! I am so grateful for Him and for this time of year that we get to celebrate Him! :) 

Thinking about the Christmas story with Christ and Mary and Joseph and the Wise Men and the Shepherds has brought me to wonder what gifts I would want to give to Christ. I've also been thinking about what gifts that Christ gives to people as the perfect gift giver. Christ gives gifts of love and service and those are the most valuable gifts that anyone can give! That is the gift that I want to give to Christ every day! "When [we] are in the service of [our] fellow beings [we] are only in the service of [our] God." We can give the gift of love and service to Christ as we serve and love our fellow men! 

I love you all and I wish you all the Merriest of Christmases and the Happiest of New Years! 

Love, Sister Freeman ဖီပြံဝါ

PICTURES 

1. Happy Christmas Eve! 

2. Thanakha! 

3. We became Santa this week handing out gifts! 

4. Volleyball this week with some of my favorite girls! 

5-7. KOM Christmas Party 

8. Picture from Sister Maloney's farewell  

9. Right before we said goodbye to Sister Maloney :( 

10. And then there were two! Man it's so weird not being in a trio anymore but we are working hard and giving it our all and great things are happening! I love this work and I love these people! 

Christmas Day!!!

It's been a wet Christmas... the rain won't stop coming down, and has been pouring since yesterday!  Summer was happy to get her Christmas bone... Paisley too!  We got the traditional pictures of peeking around to see the Christmas tree!  Todd is such a good sport to do all our silly traditions!  We got our stockings all opened and then Brooke got to call, so she joined us for some of our Christmas presents!  It was SO FUN to have her join us on the big screen and be in our family room and part of things as we were doing it!  Todd opened up his trombone while she was on the phone with us!  She got to see several gifts being opened and enjoy that with us!  We talked for quite a while!  Then she had to go...

Christmas was so enjoyable for me this year!  I loved giving the gifts I gave this year!  Megan LOVED her t-shirt quilt, Todd loved his trombone (Dad and I helped Megan get that for him), McKenzie loved her new laptop computer and Katelyn flipped when we got her the camera!  A lot of fun stuff was shared and it was most fun to be all together, enjoying the moment as a family!  We also got wet suits and a wake board for the boat... we got Katelyn her own wet suit, but bought a couple of extra for people to borrow when they come to visit us.  Katelyn and Todd tried them out in the pool and said they worked great!  AND, we finished the first of several puzzles we would complete over our Christmas break!  It was a good day of just relaxing and being together!

The last 3 pictures are some that the Bonnafassi's sent to us of their Christmas!  I'm so glad that we could be a part of their lives and help them out during this time of difficulty... everyone falls upon hard times sometimes and it was neat to be there when that need happened for them!  We hope that they will come to church and experience what we know to be true and more of Heavenly Father and the Savior's love for them!

Christmas Eve on the Mission!

It was so fun to get these pictures and video from Brooke over Google Hangouts today!

Christmas Eve!!!

There's magic in the air tonight!  Everything about Christmas Eve has always felt so magical and wonderful to me!  We had a lovely dinner with lots of family and friends-- especially our new friends we met just last night.  They came late, but they came and we had a wonderful evening together!  We had mom, Robin, Allison and her boys, Beverly Seigel from the ward and Jerome, Mary, Jaxon and Christian Bonnafassi!  The food was yummy and everything just felt right in our little world!  Bill found a small Christmas tree on sale today and took it over to the Bonnafassi's hotel so they could have a tree!  After the Bonnafassi's finished eating, we watched the Nativity.  Even though they couldn't understand it because everything was in Aramaic-- those little boys were just glued to it!  They loved it and kept very quiet and reverent during it!  After we had a ball singing Christmas carols and harmonizing!  (The original plan was to go caroling, but we felt it was better to include the Bonnafassi's and by the time they got here and ate, it was too late to go.)  Bill went outside with Jerome to help him load all the presents into their car.  Some of our other friends heard about them and gave them a bunch of gift cards and some money, as well, so we gave that to them in a Christmas card. Their boys were having so much fun inside... they loved the nativity and loved singing and being together.  They especially loved Katelyn, as she let them play their guitar and sit on her lap!  You could tell all of them didn't want to leave.  We told the boys that if they went home and went to sleep, Santa could come, but if they didn't-- Santa wouldn't be able to come.   It was super late before they left... you could tell they just wanted to stay!  I'm so glad they came!  Both Mary and Jerome have had a lot of exposure to the church, so it gave us plenty of opportunity to talk to them about it.  They asked us pretty early on if we were "LDS"!  She grew up in Snowflake where she could see the temple lit up at night from her bedroom window, and she commented on how she always felt so much peace looking at it.  I got to explain why she felt that peace.  She also has an Aunt in Snowflake who is a member of the church, as well.  Jerome had friends growing up in Scottsdale who were members of the church.  We failed to invite them to church and both felt stupid for forgetting to do that, but we will invite them for sure later!  It was a sweet, spiritual Christmas Eve!

Later, we ALL got to open Christmas Eve presents-- I bought matching PJ's for ALL of us instead of just the kids this year!  It was super fun!  We got lots of pictures so that can be our Christmas card next year.  I also got the same PJ's for Brooke, so she will be matching as well with her companion and be able to be on the Christmas card as well.  We stayed up late watching a cute Christmas movie entitled "Klaus" about how Santa came to be.  It was really cute!  THEN, I stayed up until 3am wrapping stocking stuffers... I was tired by the time my head FINALLY hit the pillow!