Christmas!

We had our first Christmas in a tropical climate! It was definately quiet in our little casita but not so outside! Fireworks had been going off since the week before Christmas. There is one area where booths are set up selling fireworks and this is a serious business! Christmas Eve is big day here to celebrate the holiday with fireworks, presents, church for some and then dinner around midnight or after. We had fireworks going until after midnight. Serious bomb things than shook the windows!
We attended a potluck dinner at an American's home. There were 4 families. They have between them 7 kids under age 13. So it was really fun. We had a great ham from Costco in the states! One of the guys had brought it home in a carry-0n from his last business trip!
On Christmas day Jim and I drove to the beach. It's about 30 miles from here. We didn't get "on" the beach. We were more or less sight-seeing. We weren't sure where to go or where to park sooooo next time. Besides, by noon the whole country was coming to the beach-so we went home!

We have some veggies coming up in some boxes of dirt in the yard. We are so excited to have nice weather all the time! It's endless summer down here to us! Even though we are North of the equator they call this summer right now and it's their "cool" season. Winter starts in May.

We've had several missionary activites keeping us busy and several ward activities for the holidays. We had a Christmas dinner at church. For la cena we had turkey, tamalies, rice (always), potatoe salad (always), rolls and cake. It started at 6:30 but didn't get going until around 8:00 and we didn't eat until around 9 pm. This is dinner time. Jim and I are ready for bed by 9:00 so we're going to have to change our schedule!
Last weekend Jim and I made cookies for the Christmas goodie bags for the missionaries. We made about 900. 14 batches. We made them over two days and put them in the freezer. It was fun! We made Grandma Fenn's Ranger cookies. They are Jim's specialty.
On the 23rd we had a Christmas dinner with all the missionaries in the El Salvador West Mission. There are about 154. There's 20 more in Belize.
It was amazing to have that many young people in one group. They are so great. We just love them!

There is progress on the temple project! Yeah! They've been moving dirt and trees for a week now. There's a gate and new security guards (with uniforms) and several pieces of very large equipment, surveyors and lots of activity. It's exciting to see something finally happening. Jim attended 3 meetings last week (all in Spanish) at the architect's office. I have been working on photos of the site.
And so it begins!!

Other than that, we've been making trips around the city to learn the roads and how to get places. It's crazy to drive here. The roads are crazy. There seems to be no order. At least there's none to me now. Maybe in a few months.....