december goings-on

 Ashley made these no-bake Swedish snowball (Chokladbollar) cookies with a recipe she found in the Friend magazine. They were too sweet for me, but that didn't stop me from eating too many of them.

 Cool moon. Too bad this was my blurry cell phone and not my camera. There have been lots of amazing pink sunsets and sunrises and cool clouds, but I never have my camera to catch them at the right time. So I enjoy them and move on :)

 More blurry cell pics. (must remember to bring my camera more often...) Josh also joined a basketball team, and both of the boys have been getting better each week. It has been fun to watch them suddenly be interested when Chris shows them videos of famous players and explains what they are doing to be so good.

We bought this tree about four years ago, then suddenly moved to The Swamp. We left it in storage and took our smaller tree with us. So it was fun to drag this brand new pre-lit Christmas tree out and see how it looks. I really like it!

Josh at a game.

 There's a man at church who has a huge collection of antique Fords. Since Josh is a car lover (he likes to name cars that pass by, and watches both Cars movies whenever he gets the chance -- which isn't often because everyone is sick of it), I asked my friend if we could take a tour of his garages. He was happy to show his collection to us. I forgot my camera, but these were similar to some of the many cars we looked at. He gave each of the kids a collectors catalog and a license plate to start their own collections. (these pictures came from the catalog. I wish I'd been able to take a picture of Josh in front of his favorite.)

 Josh started us out with sicknesses. He came one day with a high fever, fell asleep on the couch, got croup for a day or two, and then Chris got sick. Then me. Then Ashley (whose cough won't go away now). Then Chris again. But so far Ethan's been spared. Maybe that's what he'll get for Christmas!

 One of our favorite nativities in our Christmas collection. Chris's mom gave it to us when Ethan was a baby, and everyone loves staring at it.

 This is how they really feel about going to basketball at least three times a week...

My sister sent us a bunch of oranges to let us know Florida misses us. It made us miss Florida, too. We were supposed to share them with my brother, but between us being sick and busy, it never happened. Sorry Bro.
But just know, they were sweet and juicy and delicious. :)