Nov. 22 & Dec. 5 (lol)

Hm. Okay, that was weird, but I guess it worked. Here are pictures from Thanksgiving Day. First of all, Sierra Vista is only an hour southeast of Tucson, but it's a completely different climate, as I've mentioned previously. In Sierra Vista, they get 'fall'!! After seeing no change in the flora all through September, October, and November, it was shocking to see these colors!



This picture, in addition to two other of the Prices' guests, shows Nicky on the left in orange, Cecil working in the kitchen, in gray/green & looking at Jeremy, and then Jeremy being a goon on the right.

In the afternoon at Cecil and Nicky's house we were able to use a projector to play a game Jeremy recently found online. Actually he found a bunch of different Bible games. This one was set up like Family Feud. Justus and Natasha both played on the team with Cecil and me. In the picture below it was Justus's turn at the 'face-off' - to see if he could ding his bell first and our team could get the 'play'. The player has to stand there with hands behind the back; I thought he looked so precious standing there!!

There has been a strange thing going on with Justus's stomach. I mean, actually it's not strange, just that we hadn't noticed the problem until recently. It seems to be a blood sugar problem ... just that his is more sensitive than some others'. Jeremy says that especially when he was young he had the same problem. It's most noticeable when Justus is really hungry, and/or then if he eats something sugary on an empty stomach. He just gets 'sick'! His stomach hurts really badly and he just wants to sit/lie down. It's really pitiful. Well, here was a conversation a few days ago:

Justus: "Even though I like eggnog and Dad doesn't, I think Dad and I have the same DNA."

Natasha: "You have different DNA than Dad does."

Justus: "But I have a 'digestible' system like Dad's because when I eat sugar on an empty stomach I get sick, just like he did whe he was a kid."

Last week during the "Stray Dog Incident" I have yet to detail for you, some neighbor children were hanging out with Natasha by the dog, keeping it company. Michael is 7 and Hannah is 6; they live across the street and some of their older siblings are homeschooled. There are nine children in the family! Wow! Great! Well, yesterday during our walk, Michael and Hannah joined us. I had only ever spoken to one other person in their family, an older brother Jackson, who just turned 13. I don't know where they are all the time, but for eleven people living in that home, there is remarkably little evidence of that out here in front. At any rate, Michael and Hannah seem verrrrrrrry sweet, and they rang the doorbell today wanting to come in and play with N & J. I told them no! I said, "I have got to meet your mother before I let you come in and play. I need to at least give her our phone number." So this evening before we left for Bible class, we took a plate of cookies from the freezer across the street along with our phone #. The dom wasn't home, and the dad was sleeping. I spoke only to the 15yo daughter, the oldest, Marissa, who is 'bored' staying at home (???!!!!??) and is going 'back to high school' here pretty soon. I'm fascinated at how a 15yo oldest-child of nine is 'bored'. One thing I know is that there could be more cleaning going on! That could keep someone from being bored. lol ...Stepping off my soap box now. I'm just really frustrated that I haven't been able to meet the mom yet. However, I am happy that there seem to be two sweet children in close proximity that could be 'neighbor-friends' to N & J!