Last year in December we said our Goodbyes in Fiji and came home to Orem. It was the first time we were to live in our home with only the two of us in 5 1/2 years. We had quite an adjustment but after being home for a year, we really do feel at home and have had a wonderful year. Here's a grundle of pictures to show the adventures we've had, the love and joy we have felt and hold deep in our hearts.
In January, my sisters, Cheri & Kim, along with our husbands, took my mom on a cruise to Cozumel, Grand Cayman and Costa Maya to celebrate her 90th birthday last November. I'm grateful they waited until January so Kim and I could go with. In Cozumel we rented Volkswagen bugs and drove around the island. In Grand Cayman, we went to a turtle reserve and bird sanctuary. In Costa Maya we went boating in a glass bottom boat and saw lots of sea life. We played lots of card games, ate tons of good food and of course had lots of laughs and fun.
We've enjoyed having Katie so close. She and Brandon bought a home in Spanish Fork so Friday Nights are often Pizza movie nights at Grandma & Grandpa's house and often a sleepover with donuts or pancakes for breakfast follows. In January, because we were on our cruise when Indy turned 5, we got to take just her to Wendy's, her favorite place for lunch.
February was another busy month. We started the month by giving our return missionary talk in our ward. It was so fun to have Brent Blackburn and Bill and Jane Hoopes come to hear us. They had served in Fiji with us when we were there in 2019. Brent's wife wasn't able to join him. Robert and Julie Briggs, who served with us in China, also came to hear our report. Unable to come to our home after were Roger & Janet Denney, from missionaries in Fiji, Kim's brother Paul & Linda and their daughter Liz. Later in the month, we got a visit from Ladd and Lorie Stewart from Arizona. We met them while in Fiji in 2019. They were serving an ITEP mission (the same type of mission as ours) in Kirabati. Fiji is their assigned temple and they had worked with a family to get them to the temple so they were able to fly to Fiji to accompany them. We also had dinner with our mission president's wife, Suzie, who was home for a medical procedure. We also met with Brian and Kathy Jorgensen and Roger and Janet Denney who had served with us in Fiji in 2022. We spent a week in St. George...unpacking the house after returning from Fiji. We got to spend some time with Millie, Cameo and Aayla in St. George. On Valentine's night, it snowed and stuck. Aayla made a little snowman to celebrate. After St. George, we headed to California and spent a week with Abbie, James, Macie, Maverick and Luka. We are thrilled to have Brinley living only 30 minutes away. She came up Saturday morning with her boyfriend Nic and hiked with us and spent most of the day with us. We also go to see Maverick learning how to drive his new "motorcycle". Macie and Maverick also enjoyed the bike park and learning to ride the curves, hills and other trails. After church on Sunday, we drove to the poppy fields. They had so much rain earlier that the poppy fields were all ablaze. So beautiful and fun to run through. After we left, California had their own snow storm and Abbie's kids were thrilled to get to build a California Snowman.
March was one of my favorite months this year and not just because it's my birthday month. But we had 4 young women who had lived in the Fiji Church College Dorms come to the MTC in Provo before serving their missions. We were able to pick them up at the SLC airport and deliver them to the MTC. Jill was suppose to arrive on a Saturday night and spend the night with us, but because of plane problems, she was late getting to LA and missed her flight. She ended up spending the night at LAX. She may or may not have cried. She definitely cried when we picked her up Sunday night, she was so glad to finally be here. Paruru and Maikep flew in a couple of hours behind her. They all three got to experience some snow in our backyard. They removed their shoes so they could have a true feel of what snow is like. And then it was off to the MTC for them to start their missions. The following week, I was blessed to escort them to the temple for their first time. On my birthday, Katie with her kids, Esme, Kyson, Indy and Navy accompanied Kim and I to Soldier Hollow for some fun snow tubing. To top off the month, we went to lunch with Mark and Kathy Poulsen who were our neighbors when we lived in China.
May brought more adventures. Again I got to attend the temple with Jamuna as she went to the temple for the first time. Next, I flew to Kansas City and picked up my mom from my sister Cheri's house which is just north of KC. Cheri had brought my mom down from her place which is 2 hours north. I flew my mom back to St. George where she stayed with us for two weeks. Abbie and the kids came out from California to visit. My mom really enjoyed getting to see them. She also got to spend some time with Millie and her two kids, Cameo and Aayla, who just live three houses up the street. While there, Gunlock falls was overflowing with all the spring run off. The Schramms and Webbs and us hiked up to it. The ground isn't level enough for my mom to make the trek, but she did get to see it from a distance.
June might have been my favorite month this year. We took a 14 day Princess Cruise to Hawaii. We left out of LA and had 5 days on the sea, 4 days visiting the islands and 5 days back to California. I must admit the 5 sea days got a little long but the distance has shortened it in my memory. We rented E-bikes to explore the Kilauea Volcano. We were worried that morning that wouldn't get to go when we heard it had erupted that morning for the first time in 3 months. BUT gratefully we are at such a distance it didn't cause a problem. It really made it all that more memorable and exciting. At Kawaii we took a small plane ride over the island. WOW! It is spectacular. We need to go back and spend a week there exploring. Unfortunately, Kim got really air sick and didn't get to enjoy it as much as he would have liked. On the island of Oahu, we rented a car and drove up to the north end to Laie and visited some dear dear friends who are attending BYUH. We met Pauline and Soko when we were in Fiji in 2019-2020. Soko grew up in Fiji and has become like another grandson to us. Pauline is from Papua New Guinea and came to live in the school dorms in 2020. Pauline often came in to our office during lunch time in 2022 and shared her lunch with me. We loved being able to spend the afternoon with them and see Soko perform at the Polynesian Culture Center. David Ness, who is also attending BYUH, is another young Fijian that we got to know while serving in Fiji. When we went to Maui we docked at Lahaina. Who knew that only a short time later the whole town would burn down. Sadly we didn't take very many pictures there but gladly we did take one of the Banyan Tree. While on the cruise we met a couple, Bill and Debbie, who are from Arizona. We enjoyed their company while cruising and played a few hands of cards with them. When we went to Ensenada, they had been to the Holdman Stain Glass Factory while on another cruise so they took us there. WOW! I would love to share some of the pictures from there but they asked us not to. They make stain glass windows for many of the temples for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They sell samples from each of the temples. They didn't have any for any of our local temples so we bought a stain glass of the tree of life! So beautiful. Each afternoon on the ship, they had afternoon tea so we got real use to having little sandwiches and cookies with a delicious herbal tea. We celebrated our 45th anniversary and the serving crew sang to us at dinner that night.
OH JULY! What an eventful month. It's always busy with the 4th of July and four birthdays, James, Millie, Annie and Brandon. We celebrated with 2 out of the 4. We spent the 4th of July this year with Abbie, which was lots of fun. We invited Soko Ukuvakaloa to come visit for 2 weeks. He came on the first and spent the first 3 days in Southern California. Then we went to St. George and spent another 3 days and then on to Orem. He's very close with Bill and Jane Hoopes who also served in Fiji in 2019. They live in Manatua. They came to our place and took him up to spend his last 3 days with them before flying back to Hawaii. In California, we went to a Dodgers Game, the LA Zoo, saw the Endeavor Space Shuttle at the Science Museum and then spent the 4th at James's parents for a barbecue and fun in the pool before going to the city's firework show. Driving from California to Utah really opened his eyes up to how big the US is. And that's just a very small part of it. Soko loved riding the e-bikes all over the city, hiking through Pioneer Park, and then biking through Zion's as well as taking a few hikes. He's not afraid to climb to the top of the big rocks or get close to the edge! Kim let him drive our car through the tunnel which I think was a highlight for him. While in Orem, we e-biked to BYU and saw the campus, the MTC and the Provo Temple. We were able to take him to the Saratoga Springs Temple Open House. We took him on the front runner to Salt Lake City and toured temple square, the tabernacle, the conference center and see the temple in it's renovation. Millie and her kids came to Orem for her birthday. Soko enjoyed getting to know all the grandkids. Then it was time to hand him off to the Hoopes. Abbie and James came to Orem at the end of the month. Ginger, Abbie's dog, turned 16 this year and is mostly deaf and has poor vision. She has a baseball sized tumor on her shoulder and we thought it might be her last trip to Utah....fast forward. She made it back in Thanksgiving and is still doing fairly well. Dale found a dead rattler close to their house. Took it home and he and Meggie skinned it and pickled the skin and then dried it.
In September we drove to Colorado and visited Annie for a couple of days. Then drove on to Coin, Iowa and visited my mom for a couple of days. She is doing well although her eyesight isn't good enough to drive outside of Coin. With a population of 150 give or take, she can drive down to the library where she enjoys volunteering and to the post office. Sorry I didn't take any pictures but one of my mom in the car. Kim and I biked the Wabansi Trail that follows along one of the roads on the outskirts of town. The last week of September took us on a Disney Cruise with the O'Neil family. The three youngest kids had never been on a cruise so it was especially exciting. One night we dressed up and trick or treated. The next night was Pirate's Night with a pirate show on deck followed by fireworks. But the best part was spending two days on their private island. All the swimming, water slides, ice cream and food waiting for us to enjoy. The three themed restaurants distinguishes them from other cruises lines.
December means Christmas time and my favorite time of the year. We have spent the whole month celebrating not no other. We started by going to California so we could participate in a few of Abbie's family's traditions. It started with Brinley spending the night with us at Abbies since she just had her wisdom teeth out and needed a little extra tender care. Castaic Lake, just down the hill from Abbie, had a float parade on the lake with hot chocolate, Christmas lights and even a little snow. The next night, Santa made a personal visit to their neighborhood and all the kids got to sit on Santa's lap. We were treated with hot chocolates from one of the neighbors. One night we went with all of James's family that live in the area to a neighborhood where everyone goes all out with Christmas lights and decor. It was beautiful. Then to McDonald's afterwards for hot fudge sundaes. We celebrated Brinley's 22nd birthday while she was there and had advent on Sunday evening. Celebrating Christmas the four Sundays before Christmas is one of my favorite parts of the holiday. We have treats and listen to the Christmas story. Kim has put together of video of the Christmas story with members of the family each reading a different part from the Bible. We love it! After returning to Orem, each family made a batch of cookies and sent some to each of the other families. The following Sunday, during our advent, we sampled and everyone's cookies and of course the competition was on to see who had the best cookie. For Kim's birthday this year, I gave him tickets to Luminaria at Thanksgiving Point. We were a little worried we would freeze to death, but we bundled up and absolutely LOVED walking through the gardens. My favorite was the life size nativity and statues of Jesus during his ministry on earth. They had lanterns strung all along the way and throughout that area. The day before Christmas Eve, Li Wang came to visit. He was a student of Kim's in Xi'an in 2017-18. He now lives in Ohio. We loved having him come visit for Christmas. On Christmas Eve, we were able to attend church with the choir performing several numbers and have a speaker. It was a beautiful meeting. Millie, Cameo and Aayla drove up from St. George. That evening we went to the cemetery, as we do each year, and put ice candles, luminarias and lighted wreaths on our daughter, Meggie's grave as well as Kim's brother and parents and nephew. And then off to Chinese for dinner and home to Katie and Brandon's for the Christmas story from our family video readings and then a story read by Grandpa. Last Christmas Annie gave him a book just like his childhood's of "Twas the Night Before Christmas." I'm not sure that any of our grandchildren had ever heard that story before. Bedtime and everyone was ready for dreaming of sugar plums and Santa to come.
As we finish the year and contemplate the blessings we have received, we are grateful for family and friends. Without them our lives would be empty. We are grateful for our Savior Jesus Christ and celebrating his birth at this time of year. Everything we do is because of Him. He shapes our lives and gives us purpose, hope, peace and mostly love.
Merry Christmas to you all! May you feel of Jesus Christ's love, peace and hope throughout the coming year. We love you all.
The Ropers: Kim and Rhonda
Annie & Dale Krupinski, Ben and Rem Krupinski, Brinley (and Nic), Meggie and Robi Guillena
Katie & Brandon O'Neil, Esme, Kyson, Indy and Navy
Millie Webb, Cameo and Aayla
Abbie & James Schramm, Macie, Maverick and Luka
2024 Challenge: Look for the Love
Record every day something you saw that shows or demonstrates love. It may be the love you showed or the love you saw from someone else. Love is all around us. Look for the Love. It will make a difference in your life. Spread the Love.