A Sweet Afternoon with More Sakura!

We had a nice afternoon with Sister Hirayama.  We drove her to Sakata to visit her aunt, Sister Konno- also a member of the church- in a nursing home.  She is 85 years old.  Sister Konno was the sweetest lady and was grateful for our visit.  Sister Konno was baptized 39 years ago, one year after Sister Hirayama.  We sang "I Need Thee Every Hour" to her in Japanese.  She sang along as best she could. 

Here she is holding a picture of Jesus that we gave her.

Sister Hirayama has a beautiful voice.  She sang some Japanese folk songs for her aunt.  They were all so "Japanese," based on the pentatonic scale. I loved it!

Her aunt loved the songs and sang along when she could. 

We thought the sakura was through blooming for the year.

But Sister Hirayama knew of a park with a different variety of sakura that was just in full bloom.  She directed us there and we had a delightful walk in the beautiful sakura. 

Thank you, Sister Hirayama.  We would have never found this on our own, and I think I liked this pinker variety even more than the more popular one.