Malta- Week 29
Zone Conference in Rome, the Branch Christmas Party, the Christmas Sacrament Meeting and more!
I made my famous white chocolate lemon bars for him!
Monday night's English Class!
Zone Conference
Attending this Zone Conference presented numerous challenges. Initially scheduled for last Thursday, it had to be postponed twice due to a holiday in Rome and a then a transportation strike. On both occasions, we booked nonrefundable airfare and had to cancel. It was rescheduled for Wednesday this week, and while booking my airfare for the third time, I accidentally booked the wrong flight. In the USA, cancellations are allowed in the first 24 hours, but Ryanair does not permit cancellations even within five minutes of booking, so we had to absorb the cost of that as well. Fortunately, Ryanair is inexpensive, and for two of us one way, was only 60 euros. Thus, forfeiting the ticket was not excessively costly particularly compared to all the flights for all ten missionaries that had been canceled twice last week. Finally, on Tuesday night, we departed for Zone Conference.
The Morrises did a great job of making this a very nice Christmas Zone Conference. They gave beautiful messages about the Savior and how it applied to our lives. We had an amazing musical number by our own Elder McPhie, who is an accomplished pianist
After all the lessons we had fun with a White Elephant Exchange.
We found these warm booties to give for our gifts.
They divided us into smaller groups so the exchange wouldn't take too long. This was my group.
Here's a picture with all our fun gifts! You can't see it very well in the picture, but mine was a cute little blow fish!
Steve's group with all their fun gifts!
An anonymous donor donated dresses for all of the young sisters. They called Cindy and told her they wanted to buy a dress for all the young sisters. Cindy scrambled around to find the dress sizes for all of them. It was so fun watching each of these cute sisters joyfully open their gifts and see the beautiful dress each had received. They didn't leave the Elders out. They gave them each 20 Euros to buy a tie! What a loving gesture that was!
Elder and Sister Morris gave each of the senior couples this cute little ornament which I hung at the top of my tree.
A few Christmas photos in the Visitor Center
The Senior Missionaries were in charge of putting together a Christmas Dinner for all the missionaries. The local senior couples did most of the work of planning, organizing and preparing the food. We were required to bring 4 dozen homemade cookies. I brought several dozen snickerdoodles on the plane in my backpack. We went to the church early to help get things prepared and set up. But when we went to Zone Conference, the others took care of the rest.
They did a beautiful job. They served a nice ham dinner with baked potatoes, salad, fruit, veggies and a variety of homemade cookies for dessert. It was very enjoyable!
These are some pictures I took in the Visitor's Center.
This room makes you feel like you are eating on a patio out in the countryside of Italy.
After all the meetings, we had a couple of hours to spare before our hosting senior couple got off their shift at the VC. We decided to go to the mall and IKEA. It's about a 15-minute walk to the mall from the temple. But that's only the beginning. After you get to the mall, it's another 10-minute walk through the mall and then outside again to IKEA. We were hoofing it! After walking upstairs and then across the mall to find the exit that would take us to IKEA, we walked outside and saw this amazing Christmas Market! I could not wait to shop there, but I had only a brief few minutes to look at all the beautiful things they had in the outdoor booths, because Steve was grabbing me by the arm to get me to go straight to IKEA! How I wished I could have spent more time there!
But then I got to IKEA and this shopping deprived girl went crazy! We don't have stores like IKEA in Malta. It was really fun to shop there! We couldn't buy much because we had to fit everything in the one small suitcase that we brought with us. My goal was to purchase a clear glass bowl to make my Death by Chocolate Christmas Trifle Dessert. There are NO trifle bowls in Malta, but I found a clear glass salad bowl at IKEA that would show off the beautiful layers for the dessert I was going to make on Christmas day. I raced through the store finding kitchen gadgets and small items that our kitchen was in dire need of. I felt like I'd died and gone to heaven. Steve couldn't tolerate shopping very long, so I sent him to the snack bar to read his book and give me some freedom!
By the time I was finished, we were running late and sadly, Steve whisked me past all of the shops in the Christmas Market, where I was hoping to purchase a piece of jewelry I'd seen earlier. So sad!
As we were walking briskly back to the temple it started to get dark. The temple was lit up, glowing against the night sky! What a beautiful site it was!
That evening, Tim and Cindy invited us out to dinner with them. It was such a treat for us to spend the evening with them. They are always so busy, they don't have a lot of spare time, so we felt grateful to have the time to enjoy visiting with them. We love them so much!
I ordered this fish and didn't expect it to come out quite this fishy looking. But once I managed to remove the bones, it tasted great!
The Spallinos were our Host Couple. They were delightful to stay with. We enjoy them a lot. And they were gracious enough to get up and take us to the airport at 6:30 AM.
It was surprising to look down as we were flying back into Malta and see how green it is! It was so brown during the heat of the summer but our Maltese friend, Gloria told us it would green up in the winter and it surely did!
Look at that green countryside!
Torch and Gloria Morris invited the Sister Missionaries and us to dinner on Thursday night. They always set a very elegant table and they have pre-dinner appetizers and drinks. The meal is equally as good. Torch likes talking and telling us all kinds of stories about the exciting life he's lived! It's always a treat to have dinner in their beautiful home.
Valletta
On Friday, we needed to go shopping in Valletta to get some Christmas presents for the missionaries. We decided to make it a lunch date at the Caffe Cordina which was beautifully decorated for Christmas.
The whole city of Valletta is beautifully decorated for Christmas and we love going there.
Upper Barrakka Gardens
My goal to ride this beautiful Ferris wheel had to be postponed again because it suddenly became windy!
These girls were giving out free Panettone. It's a famous and popular cake they have here and in Italy. We aren't sure we are fans, but everyone else loves it!
Saturday night was our Branch Christmas Social
Dinner and Talent Show
Each organization was asked to provide a number for the Variety Show
The Primary sang "Picture a Christmas"
The missionaries were adorable as they performed a hula to Mele Kalikimaka. Even the Elders joined in the background. Excellent job missionaries!
YSA Drama Production!
The Elder's Quorum impressed everyone with their rendition of "Far, Far Away on Judea's Plains" in English, Spanish, Italian, and Maltese. They all really sang out and this was a highlight of the evening.
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Santa brought gifts for all the boys and girls!
Next up, Karaoke and Dancing!
An enjoyable time was had by all!
CHRISTMAS SUNDAY
For the last couple of weeks, Steve and I worked on putting together a Sacrament Meeting program for the Sunday before Christmas. We planned several musical numbers and five speakers, all giving a 5-minute talk about the different members of the Nativity, Wisemen, Shepherds, Mary, Joseph and Jesus Christ. Elder McPhie is an accomplished pianist and was able to play for the entire program. He did a beautiful job! The only problem we had was the Dancing Santas that decided to perform rather loudly right under our window right when we were starting!
When Sacrament meeting started, they were so loud, it was difficult to hear Steve conducting at the pulpit. Fortunately, by the time the Sacrament was blessed, the Santa's disappeared!
I was deeply moved by all of talks and musical numbers. They were extraordinary! The spirit was profoundly felt in the chapel that day and I felt immensely blessed to be present and for my testimony of our Savior, Jesus Christ. This was undoubtedly the highlight the Christmas Season for me.
Your Branch Christmas party looked way more fun than our ward party!
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