It's Beginning To Look A Tiny Bit Like Christmas

It is so hard for me to remember that Christmas is almost here! Something about the heat and the lack of Christmas parties/decorations/music makes it seem like Christmas doesn't really exist. But Christmas DOES exists and it's not about the weather or Santa or gifts or any of that in the first place.

However.

South Sudan DOES need a liiiiittle bit of Christmas decoration and who doesn't love a good batch of Christmas cookies?!?

Welcome to Christmas, Team Toposa style.

 Our Christmas tree is a thorn branch from a tree limb on our compound. Alyssa's mom had the awesome idea to send us strips of paper, staples and a stapler so that we could make a "thankful chain" for Thanksgiving. On each slip of paper we wrote something we were thankful for. We thought it would make a perfect garland for our tree!

 We hung parts of the chain on our door and along the top of our kitchen area.

 Carrie, Benton, and I made Christmas cookies yesterday. The oven made the inside of their house approximately 1 million degrees.

 Make that 2 million degrees.

 This is Carrie's best friend's baby, Lotikitoi. Lotikitoi is 10 months old and some of his favorite things to do are dance to music, pee on the floor, and eat candy-cane shaped Christmas cookies.

Walker "helped" by cleaning the icing off of the utensils.