I haven’t done a personal post in quite a while so as the year is coming to an end I thought I’d update ya’ll on what the Mariel family has been up to lately.

We’ve had a season of goodbyes the pas couple of months. We said goodbye to Sebastian, Viviana, Timi and Luciana as they finished up their time here at Fuller and headed back to Chile. We were so blessed by our time living and serving with them during our time in Koinonia and we miss the beautiful chaos that would happen every time our families got together.

We also said goodbye our amazing friends Joel and Heather. They welcomed us into Ford Place and my Tuesday nights just aren’t the same now that they aren’t spent at Heather’s drinking wine and enjoying girls night. And Noah misses playing video games with Joel.
Our most recent goodbye was to one of Noah’s best friends. Oh, life in seminary! We make great friends and then they leave us! (Excuse the crappy phone pic, I forgot my camera that night)

Emma, our friend Jennifer, and I went on a little adventure to see the finale of Dancing with the Stars. The three of us would watch together every week so when we saw that they were going to be filming the finale at The Grove, we decided we had to be there. It’s Emma’s favorite show of all time, so being able to see it live was a dream come true for her!

We spent Thanksgiving at my grandmother’s house. We had a smaller gathering this year, but just as much fun as we usually do!The kids had all of Thanksgiving week off, so we had craft and baking days in preparation for Christmas!And we decorated for the holidays. Notice Layla’s decorating outfit: shorts, tank top, and coat. Very festive.Had some Hanukkah celebrations.Noah started playing violin this year at school. He had his first concert a couple weeks ago and looked quite dapper for the occasion.SOCCER! Noah had a blast playing this season and can’t wait for the next season! The girls are still dancing, Emma is in ballet and Layla is in hip hop. And I spend a lot of time in the car chauffeuring them around. My sister came down for job training in Ventura and we were able to surprise my mom when she showed up at our house for a few hours!This weekend we headed out to Newport for the boat parade with some friends. As soon as we had everything set up and the food out ready to eat, it started raining. We found some shelter, ate and then left because we were all drenched. Can’t wait to try again next year!
The boys didn’t let a little rain stop them. I, on the other hand, was in many layers of clothing and under the overhang. Oh to be a kid again!