A Little of This and That

It is already December, and I feel like it should still be September.  The months are flying by, and we've had far more to show for them than what the blog suggests.

We are thankful for Christmas celebrations that help us feel like we're in the midst of the holiday season.  The 80 degree weather is AWESOME, but it doesn't feel like Christmas is just around the corner.

Isaac continues to be a ham!  He thought it was hilarious when he colored his lips with orange marker, and we think it will be funny when he looks at it someday and thinks we let him wear makeup.

Phil has had some fun with penguins over the past month.
 Here is a little snippet of him on the news this week. 

  He drove up to Virginia to pick up six penguins, and he's been taking care of them as part of the Christmas Town event at Busch Gardens.

You can see some pictures on the website.  Below is a snapshot from the Busch Garden's Christmas Town webpage...featuring Penguins, Jimmy Osmond, Jars of Clay, AND SnowWorld (with Clare and Phil Hillary).

In other "news"...

 My amazing husband helped me roll, cut, and decorate 72 cookies for a cookie exchange.  What took us way too long would have taken just me even longer.  We had plenty of dough and frosting to keep us hyped up, and they turned out really well.

 This was how a few of the cookies were displayed.

Here's the crew doing what they do best!

We had Jars of Clay over to our house for lunch on Sunday, and that was a really neat experience.  There is something extremely surreal about watching your 4-year-old daughter play hide-and-seek with a Grammy-winning band whose music you grew up listening to.  (I know that I just ended that sentence with a preposition...which kind of makes me skin crawl...by I didn't get enough sleep to creatively think of a way around it.)

We are looking forward to the upcoming visits (from Ninnie, Mema, Papa) for Christmas, and there are sure to be several blog worthy events during that time.