No white Christmas, but can't beat the beach views!!!

December 15, 2025

While it definitely isn't going to be a white Christmas
in Vanuatu, the near white beaches aren't a bad
substitute -- we are in a beautiful part of the earth

As Darleen mentioned last week, we are soaking in the December atmosphere here, though it's quite different from the snowy Christmases we've known in Wisconsin. Instead of cold and snow, we're adjusting to a hot Christmas—definitely a new experience for us! While Christmas reminders pop up in stores, there’s something missing here: the outdoor lights on houses and buildings. It makes it a little harder to see our traditional Christmas reminders, however, we still are enjoying a simpler Christmas celebration.

Seeing a little Christmas wonder
from the resort up the road from 
our apartment 

This week, we spent most of our mornings doing missionary apartment checks across the island. There are 15 different apartments housing elders and sisters, and we visited 10 of them. We really enjoy interacting with these incredible young men and women. Their energy and dedication to their calls are inspiring, and it's always fun hearing about where they come from—many are from nearby islands like Fiji, Samoa, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu, with a few from the U.S. as well.

For our visits, Darleen baked a batch of coconut banana pineapple bread to share—she did let them know that for our next visit she will do it again, if they keep it clean when we come.  Most of the apartments were in good shape, but I did end up doing some handyman work on a few of them. I replaced broken fans, fixed a cracked shower heads (cheap products tend to break), unclogged toilets (that wasn’t fun), repaired broken closet door hinges, replaced missing locks on back door, patched up leaking sinks, and got a plumber to come out to help fix a washing machine (which had a sock stuck down in the pump causing it not to drain – no idea how it could get to the point it was at). It’s been a nice change of pace from the Seminary & Institute work. We do these inspections every 6-7 weeks, so it’s not a huge time commitment.

Darleen mostly focused on checking the cleanliness of the apartments, while I focused on the repairs and water filter replacements. We make a great team! She also checked the 72-hour emergency food kits that were distributed to each apartment a year ago. Given that the island experienced a 7.8 magnitude earthquake last year, the mission president thought it was a good idea to be better prepared for a future emergency. However, we've found that missionaries have used food in the kits and not replenishing the supplies, not to mention many of the food items are nearing expiration dates. We’re planning to discuss this with the Mission President to see what the best option moving forward is for these kits.

The YSA Convention is still causing me a bit of anxiety—especially since we’re now less than three weeks out and still working to get ferries and flights booked for about 200 of the 500 attendees. Today, I confirmed we can accommodate 80 individuals on flights from one of the islands, and now we’re working with ferry companies to arrange transport for the remaining 120.  Darleen and I had a productive meeting with our logistics sub-committee this Thursday, where we laid out what still needs to be done and delegated tasks for the coming week. I feel like I am able to bring some organization skill to our committee, but I keep hearing my girlfriend remind me to not try and jump into everything (wise counsel). I trust that the Lord will help us as we do our part, but I’ll admit I’m still feeling a little stressed. 😊  

Two of our YSA leads taking 
lead in our Sunday YSA 
Devotional... nice job
Tania & Gideon!!

On a brighter note, we had a fantastic devotional Sunday night. The YSA leaders held a cross-island meeting with participation from islands like the Solomon Islands, Malekula, Santo, Port Vila, Tanna, and New Caledonia. They did a great job explaining the event details and answering questions. We’re continually impressed by the amazing YSAs we get to work with.

This past week also marked the end of our Missionary Institute class for this semester, and we’ll be starting a new one in January. Our last lesson was a powerful one on embracing God’s justice, mercy, and love. It was an uplifting message, and I left the class feeling more grateful for the love Heavenly Father shows us through His Son, Jesus Christ.

On Friday, we hosted a fun activity for the Etas Ward YSAs. We’d planned to play volleyball earlier, but no one showed up at the scheduled time. When they did arrive, we squeezed in a quick 30-minute game. Afterward, Darleen had set up some "Minute to Win It" Christmas games, which were a hit! The YSAs had never played them before and really enjoyed the friendly competition between the boys and girls.  

We finished the night by watching the Christmas movie A Boy Called Christmas. Before starting, we set up a candy station where the YSAs filled ziplock bags with all sorts of treats. We brought enough for 15-20 people, but the 8 YSAs present devoured it all! This, of course, was in addition to the 25 bags of popcorn and drinks that seemed to also be finished off. We jokingly warned them they’d get sick from all the sugar, which they just laughed off. Sure enough, one of the young men later mentioned he wasn’t feeling so great. 😊 We’re planning another movie night this Friday and hope to see the numbers grow.

Saturday evening, we had dinner with some of the other senior missionaries at a local restaurant just up the road. While we were there in our p-day clothes, a young man came up to us and recognized us as missionaries. His name was Ye-Ye (pronounced “Yeah-yeah”), and he mentioned he’d attended our church before with a friend. We invited him to come back, but he said he’s currently attending a different church. It was still a lovely conversation, and we appreciated the opportunity to meet him and see the goodness in the people here, many of whom are also followers of Christ.  I still could see him one day coming to church.

The youth of the Eton unit standing
in the water well area.  You can't 
see the actual hand pump that 
provides valuable water for the area

Sunday was a fulfilling but tiring day. We visited the Eton unit that’s aligned with our Ward we are assigned to, but it’s located about 30 minutes away from the ward and about 1 hour from our apartment.  It is a simple dirt-floor building with wood framing, no door, a tin roof, and thin cement siding. The unit has a local priesthood leader who conducts the weekly sacrament meetings, without priesthood/relief society, or Sunday School meetings after sacrament. Despite the simplicity, the members were so kind. After the meeting, we spoke with several of them, and as I stepped outside, a man ran over and handed me a huge bunch of bananas. Soon after, a woman gave me a fresh mango, and when Darleen came out, another woman gave her two pineapples, and a mango tucked in her pocket. Their generosity touched us deeply. They don’t have much, but they were eager to share what they had. We promised to visit again in a few weeks when we're not teaching Sunday School to the YSAs. The views going to this unit are breathtaking as we followed the ocean for about the last 10 miles heading to the location.

The Eton until chapel.  Very simple, but 
by time sacrament started it was full with
over 60 people.

Some of the awesome Missionaries assigned
to our Etas Ward

After the meeting at the Eton unit, we headed home, grabbed a quick bite, and then made our way back to our Ward for a Missionary Devotional. It was put together by our Ward mission leader and the three sets of missionaries assigned to us. They did such a great job talking about how we can all pitch in with missionary work as a ward. They went over some practical things that each of us can do to help out. It was also fun listening to the "seasoned" elders share their experience, and then hearing the newer elder talk about missionary work. One of the elders made everyone laugh when he said that speaking Bislama is like trying to speak Chinese! It made the ward members laugh from the way he said it. We’re lucky to have such great young missionaries in our ward who are really doing amazing work finding and teaching the gospel.

Finally, today we had the special opportunity to watch our granddaughter Darcie's baptism service, as she turned 8 today. Although we missed being there in person, we’re grateful for technology that allowed us to participate from afar. Our son Nicholas and his family were able to drive down from Tampa.  Our granddaughter Ella played the guitar and sang, our grandson Eldon spoke on the Holy Ghost, our granddaughter Alyse gave the opening prayer, our grandson Luke gave the closing prayer, our daughter Stephanie gave the talk on baptism, and our son-in-law did the ordinances of baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost.   It was a family affair. Our Stephanie and Mark have done a great job raising and spoiling our energetic young Darcie.   It’s such a blessing to see one of our grandchildren make this important commitment. We truly love family!

We miss you all and send our love!

Nana & Papa,
aka: Darleen & Mark

Some additional pictures and videos for your entertainment!!!

Video of one of the games from the 

Minute-to-Win-It game night with our Ward YSA's

Some of the unit members from Eton 
after the Sunday services.   Beautiful people!!!

After cyclones many of the trees loose their
tops.  This is a good example of several on our
way out to Eton.   Over time those without tops
will die.

A unique way to warn you 
there is a hole.  They put a 
bolder in it.  Don't hit this 
head on with your truck ... I'm
thinking hole is more forgiving!!!

On opposite side they put sticks in the 
holes to mark where they are.   Fun
obstacles to avoid when driving.

Ending with some more ocean views...
Never get enough of that.  :-)