Christmas and Birthday Again

 What a great week! It was exciting to start the week with the Jupiter-Saturn Convergence. It was too cloudy to see it here so I posted a picture from the newscast just to remember it by. Lisa had a great picture from Utah. I like how she described it as "gleaming". 

We had a snowstorm with 8 inches of snow last week. That makes 32 inches so far this winter and it is piling up. I was glad it didn't snow on Christmas Day though so the snow plow drivers could be home instead of having to work. You can see how big the snow mounds are getting. When we have a warm day in the 30's it starts to melt and makes big icicles and large puddles in the parking lot. 

Also this week was fun in the mission office seeing the excitement of the missionaries when they would come in to pick up packages. One day we received over 100 packages plus letters to sort. The missionaries really enjoyed helping to sort everything. They would get excited to see who received a package. A few missionaries did not receive anything for Christmas and members donated to provide gifts for those missionaries. It was such a nice spirit of giving and being excited to share with each other. More than what they received it was knowing that someone remembered and cared about them.

This was a great week too with 3 mission devotionals. We had one on Dec 23rd for Joseph Smith's birthday, one on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas Day. President and Sister King work so hard to provide good experiences for the missionaries. We usually have zone conferences (a zone is about 15-30 missionaries) on Fridays and the missionaries still wanted to have their zone conference as scheduled on Christmas Day and New Years Day. I think they enjoy being able to spend time together. So they also had a zone conference between the devotionals. My favorite part of the devotionals is when they break into smaller groups on Zoom and have a question to discuss. One of the questions was about a favorite family Christmas tradition. One of the elders in our group said their tradition is to go to dinner as a family and leave a very large tip. They call it their Christmas Tip Dinner. They go somewhere that is not too expensive and everyone contributes generously to the tip. It is usually 3-4 times what the bill is. They try to park where they can look through a window and see when the waiter receives the tip. But even if they don't see, they know the tip is appreciated, especially at Christmas time and especially for this year.

As a full-time missionary we can go online to the church website and the missionary portal has devotional talks twice a month from general authorities. The Christmas devotional this week was from Elder and Sister Anderson. They prepared a video of their family performing musical numbers and telling the Christmas story. It was like a Family Christmas Eve program. (I miss our family programs) We really enjoyed it. The devotionals are focused on missionaries and are very uplifting. It makes you feel glad to be a missionary.

The best part of Christmas for us was hearing from friends and family. We were so happy to get to talk with so many family members. I was especially happy that Kate and LeAnn were able to go to Utah. All 8 of our children were in Utah on Dec 26. Thank you for the pictures! Jed and Kevin were able to get the Covid vaccine and all of Kate's family were tested (negative) with traveling. We are grateful that no one in our family has had Covid. They have all been pretty restricted in their activities, much like everyone else. I think everyone thinks a little more about who and how you will spend your time with others. I'm glad they found a way to spend some time together as safely as possible.

We loved your gifts, especially pictures! Dad and I gave each other one set of salt and pepper grinders and a Mexican train game. Facetime if you want us to help you learn to play. We enjoy playing with other senior couples on our P-day. We also received a lot of yummy treats (which we really enjoyed) so I am grateful for Lindsey's help with setting goals for the new year to help get in shape. Thank you for your thoughtfulness in remembering us. 

I am sad to see the Christmas season come to a close. It has been a time of joy in remembering the birth of Jesus. I liked the comment I heard that referred to Christmas Eve as a "serene moment of peace". I hope you have had moments of joy, peace, hope and goodwill. It is a good way to end the year. We are grateful to be here in Alaska, sharing this experience together. Thank you so much for your love and thoughtful remembrances of us. We feel truly blessed. 

Love,

Elder and Sister Robinson

Happy Birthday to Russell Christensen on Dec. 27 (today!) and Zack Robinson on Jan. 1. I used to give singing birthday cards but they are getting very hard to find. So instead I have started sending solar dancing figures for your birthday. Aunt Jane clued me in to these. They dance/wobble in the sunlight. I have one and it makes me smile whenever I see it moving. Think of it as a little birthday dance that you can enjoy all year. Also remember light is energy, so happy dance when the sun shines.

This last picture was a beautiful sunrise walking in to Target at 10:30 a.m. As Elder Robinson was taking the picture, 2 shoppers stopped to look at the sunrise too and comment how beautiful it was. People are so friendly here! It was nice to share the sunrise over Cabelas with nice people.