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We were visiting the apartment of some of the missionaries, and I noticed this beautiful table centerpiece:

Elder DeMordaunt explained that guys aren’t really very good at decorating, nor do they want to spend money on it, so picking up a fresh pineapple on sale for $2.49 and plopping it in the center of your table is the way to go. Brilliant.

This evening we went over to our friends’ home to make pizza. Stephen built a pizza oven a few years ago: bricks covered with a layer of concrete. He’d been stoking the coals in it for a while when we arrived.

He has a little temperature “gun” that measures the temperature of a spot you point it at, and he showed us that the back of the oven was just over a thousand degrees. The floor– where the pizzas would bake– was “only” around 850. That means the baking time is less than ninety seconds.

We made our little personal pizzas, and I slid mine into the oven. I kept it in a little longer than usual, because I enjoy slightly browned cheese, and I was not disappointed.

After this delicious meal, I’m thinking about how I might set up a pizza oven back home in Montana…

Serving as a young missionary is hard. It’s a lot of study and work, you don’t ever get a day off, and there are a lot of rules. One of those rules is “thou shalt not go to the beach”. Here in the San Diego Mission, there are a lot of beaches, and there are plenty of missionaries who drive, bike, and walk in those areas. But they don’t go out on the sand or into the water. (To be clear, senior missionaries don’t have any such rules, and we’ve been to several beaches on several occasions.)

Our mission leaders definitely recognize the sacrifice these young men and women make, and when they announced that Christmas Day and New Year’s Day would officially be “beach days”, there was widespread rejoicing. The sheer number of missionaries– almost two hundred– makes it impractical to have everyone together at once, so half went on each day. Our Christmas was spent in the Valley, and our young friends were excited to head out to San Diego a week later to celebrate the new year in the sand today.

There were a few of us with awesome Hawaiian shirts:

We set up sand volleyball nets and spikeball sets. Many of the missionaries just sat around talking and taking selfies with the ocean behind them. I gathered some friends and we played ultimate. Our mission president even joined us (he’s in the center, wearing a grey sweatshirt).

The weather was a bit chilly– maybe in the mid-60s– so it was hardly suitable for jumping in the water. The handful of surfers braving the waves were in full wetsuits. But still, it was New Year’s Day on the beach!

Being the social guy I am, coupled with my love of eating out, I invited a group of the senior missionaries to join us for dinner at a restaurant walking distance from the beach. It’s worth noting Hodad’s was also walking distance, but they aren’t really set up for a large group. We ended up on the rooftop, where we had a fun dinner together. Notice everyone in their sweatshirts and parkas (!) while I’m lounging around in my shorts and Hawaiian shirt…

Just like Christmas a week ago, this was unlike any other New Year I’ve experienced. And it was just as fun.

Back in July, when we’d been serving a mission for just a few weeks, we took a pair of young missionaries out to lunch. We’ve since made that a tradition– every transfer, we enjoy a lunch with every set of missionaries in the Valley. It’s a great way to get to know the new ones as they move into the area, and of course I just enjoy dining out.

Anyway, that particular day, we chose to sample a new restaurant: Brickhouse Deli, a little family-owned sandwich shop in town. We walked inside and stood in line to order, and a woman immediately came up to us and asked if we were missionaries. Yep. She introduced herself as Heather and insisted on buying lunch for us. Now, that’s something that happens to young missionaries in Utah quite often (in fact there’s the story of Zack’s friend Kyer and his “faith lunches”, but that’s for another day). But I’m guessing it’s not that common in other areas, and especially with senior missionaries.

So we gratefully accepted her invitation, and the four of us had lunch. Heather left because she’d just been picking up some sandwiches for her office. Before she went back to work, though, we snapped a picture.

We’ve been back to Brickhouse on many occasions, because it’s quite good. And at least half of the time we go, Heather is there. She loves it as well, and evidently eats there as often as she can. We chat with her each time, and the last time Pepper and I were there, we met her two daughters who were visiting for Christmas.

Today, a few days later, I was at Brickhouse with my friend Woody and– surprise!— Heather walked in. It’s almost comical. Her daughters are still visiting, so I insisted we take a picture together.

At this point, I almost expect to see Heather when I have lunch at Brickhouse. Next time, I should buy her a sandwich.

Christmas week was a little unusual for us; we didn’t have our normal schedule of preparing and teaching classes, and most of the activities with which we fill our time were on hold. Although the young missionaries are still working as usual, we senior missionaries have a lot more flexibility… so we decided to head east to Arizona, where Pepper’s sister Jeanele lives.

Here in the Valley, people talk often of going to Yuma for shopping or just an evening getaway. The drive is less than an hour, and it’s a bigger city than El Centro, so I guess there’s some appeal. We don’t know much about it, as we haven’t been there, but since we’d pass right through it we timed our trip to have lunch in town. We found a little Italian restaurant that was quite good.

Here’s proof we were actually in Yuma:

Continuing east, we drove another three hours or so to the Phoenix area. The weather there was pretty much the same as ours, so it didn’t even feel like much of an adjustment to be in sunny Arizona for the holiday week! It meant Dave and I could go on a desert bike ride, which was a ton of fun.

While we were gone, Pepper “got her hair done” (whatever that means). You can sure tell these two are sisters, can’t you?

We enjoyed a bunch of board games, including the classic Skull King.

Potbelly is my second-favorite sandwich chain, and I was excited to learn there’s one right down the street! We all enjoyed lunch there.

Because most of Dave and Jeanele’s kids live within a ten-mile radius, there’s always something to do with our nieces, nephews, and their kids.

One of our grand-nephews (is that a thing?) had a birthday so of course there was a big party. I did the math– based on the size of the family in that ten-mile radius– and there’s a birthday celebration for someone almost every week!

It was great to spend a few days with family, and take a brief break from our “mission life”. But it’ll also be great to return home and prepare for the new year and the new adventures it brings.

Although our kids aren’t with us for Christmas, we find ourselves with fifteen other kids! The missionaries serving here in the Valley are missing their families and their holiday traditions just as much as we are. Naturally we all had to celebrate together.

We started with a sort-of-traditional Christmas dinner of ham, potatoes, and corn. There were paper plates and plastic forks, the potatoes didn’t cook as quickly as we’d planned, the tablecloths were cheap plastic, and we were sitting in a gym. But hey, you work with what you have.

After finishing our meal together, we headed– where else?– to the Dunes. I’m not sure, but it might’ve been almost eighty degrees there. The sun was hot, and we were in shorts. It definitely didn’t feel like the cold Montana, Colorado, or Missouri Christmases I’d known my whole life!

We played an impromptu game of sand ultimate, which is always fun.

Everyone took turns sledding down the sand. It’s the climbing back up that’s tough… the dunes are steep, and the shifting sand makes every step a bit more work. Luckily there’s a helping hand at the top.

We spent several hours together, basking in the sun and chatting. We sure love our fifteen kids here.

Yeah, it was a different sort of Christmas for all of us. But that didn’t make it any less merry.

It’s definitely going to be a different sort of Christmas around here.

It’s seventy degrees outside. The kids are all a thousand miles away. We only have a teeny Christmas tree with two ornaments and a handful of gifts.

But it’s all good.

A few months ago, we coordinated our little group of missionaries to help with a charity event. Not only was it fun to hang out with a bunch of kids, we felt like it was really valuable to serve in our community. Well, the woman who runs that organization was hosting another event today, and she needed a lot of help. We heard about it a week ago, and Pepper called to ask what we could do to support her. She was surprised; she told us she hadn’t contacted us earlier because she’d heard (mistakenly) that our missionaries aren’t “allowed” to do service work at other churches. Although her organization isn’t affiliated with a particular faith, the event itself would be hosted at a local Christian church. Pepper told her that was categorically false, and we’d be happy to help.

So, as with many of our other service projects, we put out the call. The missionaries all volunteered to help! Some of them had been at the October event, and they were eager to do something similar. We arrived a little early to help with setup. There were dozens of bags of donated clothing and other items that needed to be sorted and laid out for people to “shop” during the event.

When it started, parents showed up and left their kids in the church. They were all given wrapped Christmas gifts, and the parents were able to pick any clothes or other items they needed for themselves or their families. The kids, meanwhile, had two hours of activities ahead. Our job was to “chaperone” them– not so much to keep them out of trouble, but just to provide some support and continuity during the event. My new friend is a fourteen-year-old boy named Kat. (That’s his mom with us.)

Kat and I had a grand time. He told me about high school and football and anime. We frosted cookies and made posters and tie-dyed a t-shirt and threw rubber axes. He loved the activities, and I loved chatting with him through the morning.

After everyone had gone home, we cleaned up and then posed for a group photo. Here are all the missionaries who joined us this morning:

And a few of our trusty young adults came out as well.

We’ve loved having these opportunities to serve, and we hope that community leaders– like the woman running this organization, and the people at the food bank, continue to contact us when they need help. After all, isn’t this what the Lord did during His time on earth?

We do a lot of service work in the community, and much of it is with a local food bank. They have an impressive operation and provide food for thousands of families in need all over the Valley. On Monday, we got a call from the volunteer coordinator: with the Christmas holiday approaching, there was a need to prepare and package more food than usual, and she was having a hard time finding people to help. We told her we’d not only help, but round up a few assistants as well.

Our young adult group was excited to volunteer! We all showed up at the food warehouse yesterday morning and went to work filling boxes. Every box contained juice, rice, beans, peas, and nuts. We set up an assembly line and made quick work of the pallets of warehoused food.

Our hard-working crew of seven managed to pack almost four hundred boxes in two hours. Woo hoo!

Today it was time to deliver all of it. At the distribution points, people drive up in cars and we load their trunks or back seats with food. These boxes we’d packed were only a portion of it; there are also mixed vegetables, potatoes, apples, strawberries, milk, frozen meat, canned goods, pasta, and so on. It’s impressive. This time we asked the missionaries to help, and they answered the call.

It’s awesome to volunteer like this, knowing the work we’re doing in the warehouse and on the street is directly benefitting the people who need help.

Today was the last day of seminary for the semester. We’ve really enjoyed spending our mornings with these ten high-school teens. Sure, six o’clock comes painfully early each day, but they show up with a good attitude (mostly) and we have a good time together.

Now it’s time for a nice two-week break before we start the next semester. Ahh, it’ll be nice to turn off my alarm tonight…