A Festive Christmas Season

WOW, this month has gone quickly. We want to apologize to you all for the long delay between posts, but we have been having a wonderful time with family and with friends. This post should give you a glimpse of the many adventures we have enjoyed! Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year to you all!!

Danny works with the children's Sunday school program at our church. Due to the extra time off from teaching this holiday season, he volunteered to do an overview of the Old Testament with the Sunday school. He has been learning so much about God's hand in the history of Israel and the world because he is developing his teaching materials on his own. Our prayer is that the children discover the reality of God's power, not only in history but also in their own lives!

Betsy just finished a great Bible Study focusing on Psalm 46. During this study she was challenged to get her focus off of herself and back on the God she tries to serve. Now, she is doing her own study on all the different Hebrew and Greek names for God used in the Bible. This will be a long study, but has already been quite rewarding! Please pray that God will break through her pride and be glorified in her life!

It is our greatest desire to bring our Lord the glory He so richly deserves. Thanks be to the God and Father of all creation for His amazing love!!

Without further ado, here are some pictures from our many activities from this month:

A surprise birthday party for our pastor's wife.


Fellowship with our church family.



Celebrating Christmas with the ESL program at IBC




Decorating our new tree! Yes, it is fake...try finding a live tree that will last more than 2 days...(ha ha ha!!)

Playing with Papa


Such a big boy in his new bed!




Enjoying the ICS Christmas program (Danny ran one of the spot lights)

Reading books. Aaron has many of the letters in this book memorized:
D: Daddy
A: Aloha
M: Mommy
I: Ipu
R: Rain
B: Baby
It is amazing how fast his vocabulary is growing! He speaks in sentences:
Aaron Apple All Gone
Going Up Stairs
Ni-Night Mommy/Daddy
I Love Daddy/Mommy
Excuse Me
Please
Thank you
Big Bus
Nummy goldfish
Rock truck go under


Opening presents, first with Gigi and Papa before they left.


Eating!!!


Playing with presents


"Going Up Stairs"


Celebrating the Advent


Reading some more:
Aaron has many of his animal sounds figured out:
Cat: "Mou"
Dog: "Woof Woof"
Cow: "Moo"
Duck: "Kack Kack"
Pig: "Oink"
Horse: "Moo"
Bird: "Kack Kack"
OK, so he still needs to work on a couple of those!



Building Walls


Driving Cars


Watching this amazing wedding processional! On the 23rd, soon after returning from church we started to hear excessive engine noises from our parking lot. We looked down and discovered that a huge group of motorcyclists were entering our lot. They sat around and randomly revved their engines for several minutes. We also saw a car decked out with wedding bows idling at the end of the lot. "Ah," we said, "must be a wedding!" However, that was only the beginning. Some time later, we heard drums and xylophone-type clangs. They were getting louder and closer. Another peek out the window showed the parade pictured above. The first figures are men dressed from head to foot in monkey costumes (can we just say....so hot lah!). They were followed by several dancers and the groom and his father. They moved through the parking lot and disappeared. "Quiet at last," we thought. Oh no, about 2 hours later, here they came again, this time with the bride. We could hear the celebration for several more hours. We are not sure what the nationality was of the wedding party, but we think they may have been Indonesian or Indian. Just another one of those, "not ever has happened where we grew up!!"


Christmas unwrapping #2: The three of us opened most of our presents on Christmas Eve. Aaron understood what he was doing a bit better this time.


Solving the Rubik's Cube!
Aaron has seen Daddy playing with his rubik's cube since Aaron was born. Now he has one of his own and loves to twist it. Give him a couple years and he'll be solving it too!

So, that is our month in review! Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas Season and wishing you a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

A Month of Adventures

The past month has been a busy one. Betsy's parents arrived in early November and we have been enjoying the time with them and the ability to have our own photographer! You also get to enjoy the pictures they have taken!

A rainy day, we are in the wet season and receive a shower nearly every day right now with a HEAVY downpour about once a week. Here is an example of the heavy downpour!


Danny working with his chess club students.
Betsy helping to lead worship at the ESL meeting.
Betsy teaching her class.
Aaron & Betsy practicing for the Christmas musical.
Aaron LOVES to read! This is one of his favorites, gotta love Dr. Seuss.
A nice healthy dinner?
Betsy and Danny enjoying fellowship with their Wednesday evening Settlers group.
Aaron enjoying a rare moment on the bed with Mommy.
Dad helped Danny to install the gate at the top of the stairs.
The Whittaker family enjoying a book.
Aaron's first day of school? No, just heading out for church!
Dad and Betsy created a mobile to hang above Aaron's bed.
Building a garage.
And driving cars through it!

The day before Thanksgiving a large construction project was begun on some nearby buildings. They are preparing to install more elevators to give all residents elevator access. Currently most government housing only has lifts that stop on even floors. It is a necessary thing, but it was very loud as they tore the parking lot up to run electrical conduit. We now have a time of quiet before they actually start building the lifts.

Danny and Dad preparing the spuds for Thanksgiving dinner.
We had many friends over to enjoy a traditional Thanksgiving at our house. A total of 16 of us thanked God for the opportunity to spend time with friends and family, and for the opportunity we have to serve him. We were especially grateful to God for providing us with such a wonderful home that we could open up to share with so many.



As we enter this month of December we look forward to the many things God will do. Please pray for us as we continue to raise Aaron up as God would want us to. Also, pray for Danny this week as he is coming up with an overview of the Old Testament to teach to his Sunday School students. He also has the opportunity to speak in chapel this week. Pray that God will give him the words to share.

Thank you very much and have a blessed Christmas season!