First Ward Temple Trip and a Visit to Laie

We were lucky enough to go on a temple trip with our ward over to Oahu to go to the Laie Temple.  We decided to go a day or two early so that we could visit with our friends the McGills and maybe just relax for a day.  The craziest thing is that I have been so healthy the entire time I have been here on Maui, not even a sniffle, but a few days before this trip I started to get a head cold, that quickly turned into something else.  I was really sick but it felt like I had gallbladder pains, but I  was also very tired and felt terrible.  In the morning when I tried to get up and Jeff wasn't here I fainted and found myself on the floor when I woke up.  After a couple of days of crazy symptoms and because we were planning to leave the following day I decided to go to the urgent care and get checked out.  After doing blood work and checking me out the doctor could not find anything wrong.  He told me to go on my trip and just go to an ER if the symptoms returned.  That at least made us feel better about things and so we decided to continue as planned.  

Our first day we spent in Honolulu and went to dinner with our good friends who work in the mission office, the Llengrens.  We had met in the MTC and we wanted to get to know each other and talk about our stories of getting here and how things were going on our missions. We decided to go to the Yard House by Wakiki.  Yummy food!   It was so fun.  I didn't feel 100% but I was much better.  We were lucky enough to run into one of our favorite Elders, who we had known on Maui, Elder Kofe.  We had a soft spot for him because we had flown over to Maui together during the start of both of our missions.  It was so fun to see him and how much he has grown into being a great missionary!

After dinner we drove out to Laie and to our friends house Jennifer and Shay McGill.  They are friends from our ward back in Provo.  They are both here teaching at BYU Hawaii for a few years.  It was so great to see them and to stay in a big house for a change and sit on a comfy couch!  It was just the best!!!  They are a lot of fun too!  Their son Trey,  just got called on a mission to the Ivory Coast!  Speaking french! Sounds like a dream!

We had a great day on Friday, they both had to work but we spent time at the beach and drove around the North Shore and of course got shaved ice at Masamoto's!  We went to dinner that night at Pounder's, it's the restaurant by the Polynesian Cultural Center.  Really fun to visit and have a good catch up!

Next day was temple day and we had a full day planned at the temple.  The ward was there too and it was fun to see all our friends.  They did a special session just for our ward.  Prior to the session Jeff and I both did initiatories and after the session we did sealings.  It's quite a regimented process they have going for sealings, they really use their time wisely.  We had to leave a few of our names there but they said they would get them done.  

After temple we headed for a bite to eat and met up with several ward members, including one of our dear friends who was just baptized.  She had done baptisms and was able to do it for her mom and her sister, that was very sweet. It seems like she had a great experience.   

We packed up and headed back to the mission home and met up with our dear friends the Navarros.  They are in charge of all the cars in the mission and they had arranged for us to drive one of the mission cars while we were there.  It was so kind of them.  They volunteered to drive us to the airport.  When we got there Sister Navarro had made the cutest candy lei and a flower for my hair for a Happy Mother's Day!  She is so sweet.  We had a nice time visiting with them on the way back to the airport.  They told us they are hoping to go on another mission to Western Samoa, which is where Sister Navarro is from.  

We got home again safely and Beth Jefferies came to pick us up at the airport.  We are so grateful for such kind friends to help us out!  It was a great weekend!

 When I went to write this post I realized that I did not get one picture from our temple trip!  Except this cute picture of our dear Elder Kofe!!  It was really so fun to see him!!!