White Christmas!

After an early morning Christmas with the Cornelisons, we hopped on a plane and returned to Seattle to be with the Jacobs. All the sisters with their families were here to open presents and enjoy each other's company. And to mark the occasion, Seattle had a rare snowfall! Gorgeous white flakes gently fell across the undisturbed landscape as Jessica and I rushed out barefoot to catch them all on our tongues! The perfect picture of winter serenity besides those two crazy kids spinning circles out there.

So after we got our bare toes good and tingly, we got all bundled up to take advantage of the photo-op. That's what you get when you marry a photographer.

But it made for some fun photos, and Jess was even able to convince the whole crew to step out for a few quick shots.

Cornelison's Christmas Eve!

Thanks to a very generous gift from the Beck family, Jessica and I were able to catch a standby flight home to be with the Cornelison family for christmas eve and EARLY christmas morning!

We had a fabulous visit. Together we saw a community performance of Beauty and the Beast, we ate delicious food, we walked the local christmas light lane and sang carols and drank hot cocoa (not all at the same time), and most importantly we celebrated my bithday!

We also had the opportunity to join Grandma and Grandpa with all the fam for the traditional Christmas Eve party.

The dinner table had all the "must haves" of the holiday from spicy jalapeno stuffed green olives to Grandpa's famous punch. Grandma's candies were as scrumptious as ever, and combined with the sugar flowing from the pinata and the candy bar game, we'll all be soaring on a sucrose high for quite a while.



It was a special treat to have Great-grandma with us. The Christmas Party really encapsulates all of what is so memorable about the season when we all get together and make extra effort to show our families that we love them! And we'll treasure those moments together until we can all get together and do it again!

Call family Portraits

After attending Brad's graduation we spent the afternoon with the Calls. We all enjoyed a delicious lunch at the famous Uncle Bobo's BBQ, and Jessica shot a Call family portrait session on Sunset beach.

Check out their pictures here.

Also made available for download by the Call family members by clicking the file folder:

Elder Ballard - BYU Hawaii Commencement

We are currently attending BYU-Hawaii's December commencement ceremony, and Elder Ballard has just addressed us. With the help of our tablet pc and WWAN internet, I'm following up on the prompting and invitation he extended to us to "join the conversation."

Specifically, he opened my eyes to my personal online "sphere of influence" and asked us to use the new media to spread the message of the Restored gospel. He spoke of the marvel of the invention of the printing press and its associated bust of revolutionary knowledge & growth. He affirmed that in our day we can participate in a modern day revolution and use its power to spread the message for good.

His invitation is one that would have us generate, contribute to, and correct content that will help answer questions and influence others for good. I feel like there is more that I can do to spread the gospel message that has so blessed our lives, and would invite you to also lend your voice to enlist in the forces for good. We live in a marvelously connected time, and I think that if we'll enlist in the cause championed by Elder Ballard, the voices of many can be heard by those who might be seeking. And being so blessed by what we know - we need to find ever better ways to share.

Katie's Birthday!

Happy Birthday to our Sis-star!

Jessica made a cute - and incredibly delicious cake to celebrate with the sis.

So we filled up on dessert, crammed into an aready filled car, and went out to dinner on our way to the airport! Both Katie and Thomas returned home for the holiday break, and sis reunited with the fam to further celebrate her 19th year on this sphere.

We heart our sister.

Crazy Dayz

Yesterday was a crazy day.

So I woke up and said to Jessica - "Let's go hike stairway to heaven!"

She said - "OK," so we went!

Here we are hiking up to the stairs and getting kinda lost back in the lush vegetation. But we found the stairs, and made it part of the way up, before a security guard showed up. He had other plans - and a bright shiny shrill whistle - so we decided to comply and come back down. He was real nice, and showed us a better way back through the dense bamboo. He was even nice enough to tell us the hours he worked, and when might be a better time to endevor upon the hike.

But being busted, we returned home with only slightly sore muscles and were somewhat grateful to be spared the further beating of that rather tiring trail.

So we took an amazing nap, woke up and deep cleaned the house, and I took off with Chris for some last moments of day-light surfing.

The last couple of sessions out at Crouching Lion have been awesome. The winds have been down, and in the evening its been getting down right glassy out there. And with the head-high swell we've been getting its made for the prettiest little break I've ever surfed. I snagged a classic ride - one for the scrapbooks. And at the end of the evening took the last one in over the reef. But it was kinda shallow (as in only lots of exposed coral heads) and my back fin snagged the reef and I got gently tossed into the water and scored a few spines from our black spiny urchin friends in the foot. (See picture)

But, I braved on, and paddled in to shower and join Jessica as we went to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner round two - sponsered in part by Ted's Bakery and their $5 pie sale! We went to Brad and Kerri's and they had just pulled a beautifully cooked turkey out of the oven - seasoned with Jamaican Jerk! So we had our Jamaican Jerky Turkey, giant costco baked potatoes with cheese and bacon-bits (the real kind), stuffing, white corn, and pumkin haupia pie! Oh my.

Happy Electricity-less Day!

So, our power went out Wednesday - from midnight to 9:00 pm!

We had a night of pretty wicked storming which left a fine mess all over the road as Jessica and I drove to teach Seminary at 5:30 that morning. Only to find that the power was out not only in Ka'a'awa, but at the chapel as well - and pretty much the rest of the island. Which left both Jessica and I jobless and rather free to spend our holiday in traditional electricity-less fashion.

So we called up Brad and Kerri - cooked up baked beans and smokies on our propane hiker's stove, surfed, and had an evening barbeque. At which barbeque Brad managed to down 4 burgers - 1 full pound pre-cooked weight. Well done!

We had so much fun we figured we should knock down some trees more often.


Surfing out at Bunker's with the Call's

Kaneohe Christmas Parade

We woke up early to make our way down to celebrate with the rest of the windward side of the island at the "Peace on Earth" Kaneohe Christmas Parade. It was fun. They had the floats, marching bands, no-name government officials and city counselmembers, and Jessica's favorite - lots of horses. She would have naturally fit in well with the "angels" on horseback dressed in long flowy white dresses.

We watched while sipping a shared Egg Nog milkshake from Jack in the Box. Nothing but the finest. We cheered for the kids who played, marched, sang, and did tae kwan do. And Jessica was even able to snag some goodies from one of Santa's Elves.

All together it made for a fine kick off of our December month.