A White Christmas...

Ok, so we know that a traditional white Christmas involves cold, snowy days. Since there is no chance of getting that here in the tropics - no matter how much we dream of it - we figured to go for a different kind of white Christmas - on a white sand beach!

We are going light on Christmas presents for each other this year; instead, our main gift to each other was a family vacation at the beach for a few days. Unfortunately, it poured rain the first couple of days there, and Ben was terribly sick with the stomach flu; but he started feeling better just as the sun came out - and we still had almost 2 days to enjoy the beach together.

We hired a boat to take us "island hopping" to see some of the beaches on the outlying islands. It was the highlight of our time. Check out these beautiful places, and you will see why!On the way back, we ran into someone from our resort who had rented some kayaks but needed a faster way back - so we traded with them. Worked out great for us since we got to take the boat to the further islands but then still got to try out the kayak the rest of the way back.

Megan (the volunteer who has been on our team since May) came with us, and the kids had a great time showing "Aunt Megan" some of the spectacular places in the Philippines.
Since it was just a few days before Christmas, we had to do some things to keep us in the holiday spirit - so we had a sand ball fight ("it was totally wicked!" declared Ben)...
...did sand angels...

...and even made a festive sand man!

Admittedly, our version of a "white Christmas" was a little different, but we sure had fun!

We decided that making and eating "sand cream" wouldn't be the same as snow cream so we skipped that one. :)

Mikayla wanted all 5 of us to climb up on this rock to get a family picture before we left. Our trip home was quite the adventure in an over-loaded boat through the rain. When we arrived at the "port", we discovered that we had to jump down INTO the chest-deep water to walk the rest of the way to shore. Thankfully, we had traveled in our swimming suits so getting wet was not a problem. Then we loaded into this little motorcycle with a side car to travel the last mile to our vehicle. We made quite the spectacle going through town! We arrived home earlier today and will celebrate Christmas in the village tomorrow morning then with some American and Australian friends tomorrow afternoon. Christmas day will be a quiet day with just Megan and our family here at the house.

So which do you dream of - a snowy white Christmas or a white sand Christmas?