Mele Kalikimaka!

Christmas morning was low key; Kai slept while I went to walk and visit Dad. I'm not sure how much later Kai stayed up after we watched the 1st episode of Dark, a German-language series he likes. During my drive up I could see it was very gusty; I saw no one walking. I did see a lit up Christmas decoration that I had not seen before. During my sunrise walk I saw Loy at the bus shelter; later I saw Wendy with Bella & Mickie as they were finishing up their walk. I saw no one else; there was a steady breeze with frequent strong gusts. There were hardly any birds flying by or calling.

All the Christmas lights were on, I think the kids were opening presents.

Twenty-four minutes before sunrise on Waiʻalae.

Fourteen minutes before sunrise on Maunalani.

Two minutes after sunrise on Sierra.

The gusts were so strong they blew the sleigh and reindeer over again. And they were sitting on the lawn when it happened! The gusts combined with high surf made for some big waves rolling in.

It is not usually an unbroken line of surf all across this area.

I wore my reindeer antlers while at Maunalani; they were a big hit with residents, staff, and other visitors. They light up and flash! I got them last year when we went to the Honolulu City Lights event; this year the high winds shut things down shortly after the opening ceremony.

Dad was in the Orchid Dining Room having breakfast; he was sharing a table with Mrs. Pang. He ate all his fried egg sandwich, papaya, and banana. He drank 120 ml cranberry juice but no water.


It looked a little ominous when I looked out the window as I got ready to prepare for my mid-morning walk; a darkening gray threatening to rain. When I got out it was just very windy; so windy in fact the headwinds made some parts of my walk a little tougher like when I was going uphill against the winds! The FEMA Alert site issued a Wind Advisory saying south winds 15 to 30 mph with gusts up to 50 mph were expected until 6 this evening.

Compare trees by poles with photo just after sunrise.

During my walk I saw Rob and Lilly drive by, it turns out they were on their way to the park where I caught up with them. Just above the park I saw Kira wearing a helmet and being pushed on a swing by dad Art; Bailey was nearby watching the action. Betty drove by and waved while I was chatting with Art & Kira. Later I saw Peter on his way down Lurline and hanging on to his hat like I was! Further up on Lurline I saw that Art & Kira were back from their play time; Bailey was lounging in the yard.


Lunch today was Prime rib, Garlic mashed potatoes, Dilled baby carrots, Garden salad, Raspberry cheesecake, and Broccoli cheese soup; once again I opted to skip lunch so I could better control my carb intake since I knew we were going to Curtis & Lori's house for Christmas dinner. Dad ate all his 1/2 peanut butter & banana sandwich and all the cheesecake plus a madeleine. He drank 120 ml apple juice and 30 ml water. During lunch the rain storm that was sitting offshore finally made landfall.

Check out the fancy cheesecake!

Rain.

I left about an hour after lunch; it looked really wet out there. In fact, Marissa suggested I wait until it slowed down; but I had things to do and had no guarantee that it would slow down anytime soon so just kept walking. It turned out the atmoshperic perspective we were seeing was not from rain, we were in a fogbank!

Fog.

I got home and prepared the pie for baking. It is a frozen pie from Hawaiian Pie Company. It is the Strawberry Guava Pie that Kai picked out for the Nawele Neighbors Christmas Dinner that we did not bake since there were so many other desserts.


I also wrapped the present for The Roommates and Kai. I tend to use the comic section as wrapping paper; I try to wrap the present so that the strip can still be read easily.

The gift for The Roommates.

The gift for Kai.

When we got to Curtis and Lori's house we found out the roast did not appear to be done, the meat thermometer said it was still at 130 degrees F. Curtis said it had now been in for 6 hours! He took it out anyway and let it rest for 15 minutes before slicing it. The instructions that came with the roast  said to cook it at 200 degrees F; I Googled and found multiple sources saying20 minutes per pound at 375 degrees F. But it turned out fine; if you like your meat medium rare, which I do. If you like it cooked more you could either microwave it or pan fry it.

As usual there was a lot of food so we could have started without the roast. There were also a lot of desserts; once again the pie was not needed.

My dinner choices.

My dessert choices.

Hauʻoli lā Hānau to Lorna, Alvin, & Doug!