This December was very eventful. I've been teaching art classes at our women rehab center. It's been great to get to know these women and hear their stories. They tell me they look forward to my classes because they can relax and forget about why they are there for a while. It's been therapeutic for me too! Here the women are learning some water color techniques and we also did a "self-portrait doll".  I had each one talk a bit about the doll (themselves) and what was going on in their lives right now. It was very good. 

The finished dolls 

For Christmas Mario's family came to be with us. The cousins had a great time together and we had a delicious Christmas dinner in our "garage"/porch

 A few days before Christmas the kids (and our neighbor Bia) had fun making "cold porcelain ornaments" and decorating them for our tree. In our region of Brazil people rarely decorate their homes for Christmas and it's actually very hard to find real pine trees to buy, luckily, there are several green houses that sell trees and plants and every year the kids and I go buy a pine tree for Christmas (after Christmas we just plant the tree somewhere).

We also went to "Opa" and "Oma's" house to help her bake and decorate cookies. One of the women who volunteer at the women's rehab had never made cookies before and enjoyed helping as well. 

This was Evelyn's first Christmas! On January 20th she will be turning 1!

My parents took the kids to see Santa at the mall. Everyone took a letter they wrote and gave it to him

 while they were distracted, my parents gave santa a small present to give to each kid. They had a blast!

 My mother-in-law had her DTS graduation in Sao Paulo, so now she is officially a YWAMer!  Mario drove there to honor her and then brought her back. She spent her two month outreach in Colombia and brought the boys each a soccer uniform and cleats.

and then there were all the other gifts...more than usual this year!

 There were even more gifts the next day at Opa and Oma's house!

 Evelyn got a special one this year for her first Christmas, a rag doll made by mommy!

On Christmas day we went to church for a special musical celebration. Our boys also sang. It was so cute!

We were so grateful to have our family with us...during this last Christmas here in Brazil. Next year we will be celebration in South Africa where we will be moving to indefinitely in June.
 Here is a picture we took on the 26th going out for a treat to celebrate getting our passports!
Cheers!!!

God bless you!
 Merry Christmas and Happy 2017!