Well this morning we woke up to snow falling. Beautiful. Cold. Slippery. Yes, it is a beautiful sight, but it comes with a few negatives like it being cold and slippery outside! Welcome to the next 5 months of our lives, right?! We turned some Christmas music on to celebrate the first real snow fall in Vladimir!
Last Friday, Philip had the opportunity to go to the Vladimir Torpedo Soccer game! He was really excited and had been looking forward to going to one of these games. It was pretty cold, so the long underwear was brought out from the closet! He and Brian went while the girls and I stayed with Cara and Sophia! We had fun being WARM, drinking apple cider and talking...sounds better than a soccer game any day! 
There weren't too many people at the game this time, but Philip said it was still fun. He even got a Torpedo scarf as a souvenir!
They are all soccer fans...2 of them just don't know it yet!
Sometimes it is hard to study Russian. Sometimes I don't want to study Russian. Sometimes I need to study Russian. With all that said, I try to find some interesting ways to study. The other day we had to memorize another tongue twister, so I memorized it will I was washing the dishes. Philip is really good at pronouncing the words, so he usually helps me. I washed the dishes, looked at the tongue twister, and Philip just repeated it over and over. Sounds like a romantic evening, doesn't it? We are trying to get into our Russian studies each day/evening. Usually when the girls are tucked in bed (around 7pm), we hit the books. Most evenings we try to do this, but sometimes one of us may be gone, we may be out late, or we just need a night to unwind and not think. at. all.
Have you been praying for me?! 
...because I have been a good sleeper lately...
Thank you for your prayers for Gwen and her lack of sleep. She has been doing well at bedtime lately! She goes to bed at 7pm, and has been staying asleep for those "hard" hours in the early evening. She has been having 1 1/2 to 2 hour naps as well! We are down to 3 naps now, eating rice cereal, carrots, and avocados! When Gwen smiles, she melts our hearts! Oh, what a blessing she is! Now, if she would only sleep THROUGH the night:)!
(Gwen likes the gourd, our neighbor gave us!)
While the Nettletons were here this past weekend, they offered to watch the kids so the parents could go out on a date! We decided to "double date" with Brian and Cara and go to one of their favorite restaurants, ШеШ Беш (Shesh Besh). It was quite good, and a fun experience. We had Shash-leek, which is a big Russian food. They are like kabobs, but maybe better! It usually comes on individual plates, but for some reason they decided to give us all our meal on one big plate. 
Here, Philip is clearly explaining that we are NOT drinking alcohol of any kind. It is in fact pear juice that tastes like juicy fruit (according to Cara!) or ginger ale.
More pear juice...
Dessert! 
Fall is in full bloom (ok, so the leaves are basically off all the trees and it is threatening snow any day, but it is still fall!) in Russia and we are about to enjoy our first pumpkin or тыква (teekva as it is said in Russian)! Our fellow friend and missionary, Kerry, brought us a pumpkin the other day from a lady at church! We were so excited! She even brought us a Christmas CD so we could really ring in the upcoming holidays! I decided to let Adalynn doing a little decorating before we cook it and make some delicious pumpkin recipes! Thanks, Kerry!
This past weekend we had the priviledge of having our Pastors to Missionaries come spend a few days with the GP Russian field! On Friday they joined us for our weekly team meeting and then we enjoyed a team lunch afterwards. On Saturday, they came to our house for lunch and fellowship. It was good to be encouraged and prayed for by this wonderful couple! On Saturday night they babysat for the girls (just 3 of the 5 missionary little girls) while the parents went out on a date! Fun! And guess what? They survived! 
Gwen is getting some love!
They brought Disney stuffed animals and matching t-shirts for all the girls! The adults got chocolate! Yum!