An Oliver Christmas

Finally, a few minutes to jot down a bit about Christmas. We had a really nice, quiet Christmas eve. Well, as quiet as you can get with six kids.

Now, before we go on any longer and you start making judgements about the state of Regan's hair on one of the most frequenly photographed days of the year, let me explain. Regan took a shower on Christmas Eve morning. When she got out, I got in and I told her to get dressed and brush her hair. Well, she went the extra mile. By the time I was out of the shower, she had not only brushed her hair, but she put it in ponytails, "all by myself!!!" She was so, so proud of her accomplishment. She even put in one red pony and one green pony. What a cutie. Part of me wanted so badly to take her ponytails out and redo them in the cute hairdo that I was planning on for Christmas. But I knew that it was more important for her to feel independent and competent. So the ponies stayed in. And I'm sure some day she'll look back and wonder why in the world I let her go out in public like that. Until she has her own independent daughter.

Okay, back to Christmas. Here we are having our traditional Christmas Eve food. Some of the same stuff that we used to have when I was a little girl. Namely, cold cuts on toothpicks. Kids love them. And as Fancy Nancy taught us, and Regan reminds us, everything tastes better with frilly toothpicks. Dix made some California rolls which were a huge hit. Port ate like 15 of them and was so full I had to roll him into the family room.

Then we acted out the Nativity story. I have lost a box of Christmas stuff. All of our outdoor lights are gone and our Nativity costumes. So we makeshifted this year. Turner was the Kung Fu Joseph.

Hayden was a shepherd, Landon a sheep, Regan was (duh) Mary, Cooper was (duh) an angel and Porter was the a--I mean donkey and the manger. Who wants to play a manger in the nativity play. Weird kid.

The kids each got to open one gift on Christmas Eve. Regan was so cute and animated. She opened a gift that Porter got her, a set of mini ponies. She was so, so, so, so excited. She started jumping up and down and squealing, "I love it, I love it, I love it!" It was so sweet and made Port feel so great. The face in this picture was her true face at the moment. She was seriously so thrilled.


Cooper got...a broom. Seriously though, what do you get for a fifth boy? We have all of the toys he could possibly ever want, and more. He has tons of clothes. And books. And movies. And games. So he got a broom. And he likes it.

Regan got a little corral for her animals. And Turner got a bunch of Pokemon. So here they are playing animals and Pokemon in a corral. Fun. They have spent countless hours with these toys.

Whoops, this one is out of order. Here she is getting one of the animals that will later frolic with the Pokemon. She was so excited. She was at such a fun age this Christmas. Everything was just so thrilling to her.


This is my new obsession. I found myself rocking on Guitar hero during the day, ignoring my laundry, children, and my personal hygiene. My kids thought it was for them. HA! They are actually freakishly good at it. Dix must have played a lot of air band in his day (yes, that's what we used to do before the days of Guitar Hero), because he is so stinkin' good at the drums that it makes me think he missed his calling. Do you think he's too old to join a rock band? They'd have to start in someone else's garage because ours is definitely too messy.

While we were ignoring Cooper, I mean playing Guitar Hero, Cooper discovered the sub-woofer under the TV. We found a lot of small toys and pencils in it later. He was just tidying up, I guess.

All in all, a fabulous Christmas. Can't wait for next year!

Merry Christmas!

Hayden's new bike!

Hayden worked really hard at saving money this summer doing yard work and babysitting. That, along with some generous donations from friends and family got him to his goal of buying a new bike! Hayden is looking forward to all the snow melting (we've gotten about a foot and a half this week!) so that he can start riding again and get himself ready for the next triathlon! So here are some pictures of his new ride.

What did you do during Christmas Break?

Spent some time with the sweet little puppy.

Hung out in our jammies all day.

Made some really smurfy Christmas cookies.

Got a makeover from Regan.

Helped out in the kitchen.

Dressed up in big boy shoes.

Ate all the chocolate covered cherries when nobody was paying attention.

And played in the snow!

And we still have a week and a half of vacation left! Wahoo!

Snow time!

We got a lot of snow this week, which is really unusual for this area. We busted out the totes of snow clothes. The kids were so excited to get outside that by the time they left, it looked like a winter clothing bomb had exploded in my family room!
Regan was very excited to make a snow angel.

Cooper loved it! He walked around outside, following all of the sled tracks that he could find. He was so mad when I tried to carry him!

He loved our neighbor's nativity set and kept saying, "Doggy, doggy!"

And this is what my landing looked like after the first batch of snowclothes got wet all through. Now imagine six kids coming in and out through three days of cancelled school and you'll have some idea of how much laundry I've been doing this weekend.


This is really extreme weather for the Pacific Northwest. We normally get a couple of inches of snow each winter, but mostly rain. Our temperatures are usually in the 40s, although we do freeze occasionally. This week has been really cold and with lots of moisture, so we've had lots of snow. And tonight we're supposed to have a pretty severe storm that could leave many people without power, and could make driving pretty near impossible. So we're all settled in for a quiet (?), cold week. We have plenty of firewood, candles and food. I'm getting all the laundry done today so I don't have to do it the Laura Ingalls way. It is such a threat that both stakes in our city have cancelled all meetings tomorrow. Kind of a bummer since it's the Sunday before Christmas and many people have spent a lot of time preparing special musical numbers. Hopefully they will do the Christmas program next weekend. If we still have power we'll probably re-watch the Christmas devotional or a session of conference. I'm sure we'll have a nice Christmasy day even though we won't be going to church.

So if you don't hear from me for awhile, you'll know that I'm sitting in front of the fireplace without any power, playing uno with the kids!

The Biggest Snowman in the 'Hood

They say it takes a village to raise a child. Well, in this instance, it takes a village to raise a snowman. We didn't think we could get the "tummy" section up, but thankfully all the college boys are home for the break. They provided some muscle. So happy birthday, Frosty!

The Great Christmas Tree Hunt

It's hard getting the perfect Christmas tree when "perfect" is such a subjective word! We all had different ideas of what we wanted. Dix liked the first one he found. Hayden liked this big fat one that would have completely filled the family room (Think Griswold family). Turner and Cooper liked this one. It felt like it was just the right size! And Landon and Regan liked this one the best. Awwww, so cute! Porter brought a friend with him, and the two of them ran around the whole time. They didn't offer many suggestions for trees. Hayden did a great job keeping up with Cooper. Most of the time. Here we are. Well, all except me. And with Chance joining our family. Aren't we cute? And now to cut it down. Everyone took a turn with the saw. No Daddy, not that one! Everyone spent a few minutes with the saw, and Dix finished it off.






The best part was yelling "TIMBER!!"


Then to carry it to the car. (Thanks for all your help, Hayden!)


And now to decorate it...

Knusper-Häuschen

Tonight for Family Home Evening, we put together the gingerbread house that Grandma and Grandpa sent us from Germany. We had fun trying to get the kids to say the words on the front of the box: Knusper-Häuschen. Regan has the best German accent of all the kids, that's for sure! Or else she's been saying it fifty times a day every day since we received the package in the mail! This is our finished product:

Read to me: A journey with Cooper

Cooper, feeling a sudden thirst for knowledge, decides that he wants to have a book read to him. He knocks many books off the shelf in his quest to find a book that will quench his appetite.
After deciding on Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel, Cooper searches for a big person to read the book to him. He's not picky. Pretty much anyone bigger than him will do. Although he does have a slight preference for daddy.

Daddy, here I am....

I love reading!

Terrific Turner

Turner is *obsessed* with the letter T. He makes it everywhere, finds it everywhere. Every time he sees a sign or book or anything that has the letter T on it (including on every stop sign or exit sign) he says, "Hey! That says Turner Weldon Oliver!" So this is how he plays Battleship:


Earlier he made a big T out of the pegs, and a little T out of the ships. He's a genius, no doubt.

Old Granny Gives a Talk

Regan was assigned to give a talk in Primary today. She was SO excited. She wanted to look extra special, so we decided that we would put curlers in her hair on Saturday night. When I got all the curlers in, she saw herself in the mirror and started laughing. She said, "I look like an old Granny!"
I had to laugh at her. She was so funny. She put her satin sleeping cap on over it and went to bed. She woke up twice in the night asking if it was morning yet. I guess the curlers weren't as comfortable as the packaging claimed! She was also very excited to give her talk, so that probably added to her night waking.

So when morning finally came, we took out the curlers and here is what we found!

After a little brushing and some hair gel and a head band, it looked a little better. I didn't get a picture until after church. Keep in mind that this has been through three hours of church and a little roughhousing before and after.


She was very excited about her talk. We talked about the topic last night, "I can show respect and kindness to all of God's creatures." So we talked about what that meant, and then she dictated to me what she wanted to say in her talk. I typed it out for her, she picked out some pictures, and I helped her give her talk today. She was so cute. Here is her talk:

"I can show respect and kindness to all of God's creatures. I can be nice to everybody. And love others. I can share with my friends. I can be kind to animals. I can take care of them by putting out bird feeders. And taking care of my pets, like my dog and my fish and like my brother's lizard. Being mean to animals is not okay. Heavenly Father and Jesus created all the people and animals and they love each one. He created my family. He created Sister Brown's family. He created everybody. So I can be kind to everybody."

She was very proud of herself and since I was conducting Primary today, when she was done, as soon as she said "amen" said, "Now can I have my sticker?" Funny girl.