Princess GiGi Came to Visit

A couple days after the New Year, Mike's mom, Ema (aka Princess GiGi) came to visit along with Mike's brother, Titus, who is staying here with us while he gets his associates degree. His mom stayed here just for a couple of weeks before she went to visit other family in Shreveport all before she left for Nigeria at the very end of January for a graduate school practicum. She has been working on her Master's degree in conflict analysis/peace building. She is working mostly with kids; helping them to understand how to work together, etc. We had so much fun with her while she was here. She joined my Spin class for a week and loved it.  She showed me how to curl Shalom's hair in rags.  She looked so cute with them in, needless to say I use sponge rollers now.  We ended up being a half hour late to church trying to take all of them out, and her hair was super, super curly!  Both of the girls (and Roxy) looked super cute in their rag curlers though!  Also, while she was here, the Mission leader was in charge of the ward activity for the month and since Mike is the ward mission leader he was in charge of it. He came up with the idea of doing an adult dance and his mom had the idea of doing a luau and she just went to town helping to get ready for it. She made a flier to send to different wards to invite and to give to the different auxiliaries in our ward. We went crazy (well she did) trying to make Hawaiian foods, everything. By the time we set up the gym and everything we were too tired to join in and dance, but, of course, we couldn't not dance. Everyone was talking around the sidelines and eating, and I got to the middle of the dance floor and said, "This is a dance party, people! Let's dance!!" I think that got everyone at least moving toward the dance floor. Half way through, Ema stopped the music and taught everyone the meaning of Aloha and how to hula dance. Everyone instantly fell in love with her and enjoyed the night even more! The whole thing was a blast. We were complaining about it being a lot of work, but we had so much fun in the end! We got super spoiled the whole time she was here with her cooking for us every day. She is really good at just throwing things together, making meals up, and it tasting really good. I tried to get some good tips from her.  We were definitely sad to see her go!