We started out December with our friends from Bolivia coming for a visit. We were still working in the temple daily but when we had time we took them to a few close places. President took the whole day Monday and we took them to Antigua to the Iglesia Y Convento de la Recoleccion ruins and shopping. It was a fun day.
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| Oscar and Carmen visiting from Cochabamba. |
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| Earthquake damage to the huge Recoleccion complex |
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| This man was selling hats at the market. |
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| Packing up his wares. |
That evening we went to look at Christmas lights in the city and to check out the huge party going on in the Central Plaza. There was an ice rink and tubing slide and hundreds of vendors of course.
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| People on stilts posing for pictures. |
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| Entrance to the Central Plaza |
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| Palace in the central plaza |
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| Tubing hill. Kids were having a ball. |
On the 8th we took Oscar and Carmen to Atitlan to visit the ceramics factories there. They were enjoying dodging in and out of tiendas and checking out everything.
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| Typical dress in San Antonio |
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| Ceramics store and lot more. Textiles factory is up there as well. |
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| Old Guatemala city aqueduct on our way back from the airport. |
On December 12th for home evening we were honored with a group of kids who wanted to sing in front of the temple at the manger scene. Since that was not permitted we had them sing to us. They had guitars and violins and we thoroughly enjoyed the entertainment. After they left Hermanos May gave us their good bye lesson. They will leave a large hole.
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| Group that sang to us for Home Evening |
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| The Mays |
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| Dad and I with Marilyn and Leonard May |
On the 17th President invited us to go on a trip with them to a conference at Santa Catarina La Tinta. We left at 6:15 am and went to the adult session of conference. The Priesthood had a session that night so Christine drove us to Senahu to check into our hotel. The office was 2 blocks away from the rooms. We had two twin beds and a giant spider in the shower. I later found the other 5 members of his family. Since I forgot my water purifier and they offered not drinking water, I walked the two blocks to the tienda and bought some water for us.
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| A brother leaving conference |
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| Beautiful scenery everywhere. |
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| Local transportation. It is surprising how many can fit in that truck. |
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| More lovely views of mountains and trees. |
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| The children are so darling. |
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| President had his shoes shined by a young man outside our hotel in the morning. |
We headed out in the morning to two full conferences. The building will not hold the entire stake so it is done twice. Each speaker was translated into Kekchi or Spanish depending on what the speaker's language. Some speakers translated their own talks. The people fed us chicken, rice and a potato for lunch before we headed for Salama, back over rutted, pothole filled dirt roads. We checked into the Tz'Alamha' hotel and it was lovely. However we wanted to go see some new missionaries to see how they were doing so we climbed up and over winding narrow roads and then down over winding narrow roads to Rabinal.
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| This hotel was very nice |
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| Beautiful gardens |
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| Our room on the left of the fountain. |
We made it back to Salama after visiting with the Calls. They are enthusiastic. We left the next morning at 6:45 with the promise of breakfast down the road but President was on a mission and did not stop until we pulled into our place at 9:30.
December 20-23rd we were busy at the temple. Not many people came during the day but the last hour was full. We did not have many workers.
On the 24th we had dinner with everyone at Presidents house and talked to Brandi and Tami on Skype. Then we went to Hermanos Rodriquez penthouse to watch the fireworks. It was impressive to say the least. I felt like I was in an air raid in the middle of a war.
We had a quiet Christmas day. Lisa Skyped us and the rest wished us a Merry Christmas on texts mostly. It would have been nice to Skype with one of the kids while they were opening presents.
The temple grounds were decorated with 600 poinsettia plants.
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| Poinsettias galore |
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| Sisters Hurst, Fillmore and Frampton |
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| Brothers Hurst, Fillmore and Frampton |
The 26th we had our teeth cleaned and the 27th-30th was relatively quiet at the temple. Still no workers coming and sporadic participants.
The 31st we stayed home but could not have gone to bed early if we wanted to. The explosions of fireworks were like cannons going off. And so ends 2016.
