December!

Whew! December just FLEW by! With lots of fun and exciting activities happening I am so grateful for pictures to capture the fun (my memory is not dependable these days).  Below Si is showing a couple of Pull-Up trends happening among the toddlers today...

The library near our home brought in reindeer one night! We couldn't miss out on that! And to make it even cooler, one of the reindeer was named Sven! The girls couldn't believe it!

Another fun library outing was a gingerbread craft after Story Time. I had to bring in our faithful babysitter, Britany, to help with the kids. 

Speaking of the library, we have become friends with a lovely family whom we met at Toddler Time.  We invited them over for dinner one evening to hang out.

They have three children who are all within months of Lydia, Carrie and Silas. Below Carrie and Adele are reading together- so cute!

This month we had several doctor appointments (9, to be exact) in our family. They seem to come in clumps. Below Joy is all ready for her well-child check-up. We are so grateful that we have been mostly healthy in our home this month. A few colds and runny noses, but nothing serious.

Another fun outing was visiting the Childrens Museum- always a hit! Fire Fighters Carrie and Lydia to the rescue!

 Lydia attends a preschool class one morning a week at a homeschool Co-op called, Koinonea. It has been a great blessing to her, and us, this year. She had her first Christmas school performance this month. Below she and her friend, Lily, are all ready to go! (Lydia was a bit nervous but she did an awesome job.)

Just a cute pic of Joy

Another fun activity was making and decorating Christmas cookies. The kids had a blast playing with the dough. Unfortunately I didn't get any pics of the cookies decorated.



It has been a mild winter so far so we have been getting outside as often as we can. We are at the stage of life where it sometimes takes longer to get ready than we actually spend outside playing. Below Silas is ready to go!


"Do You Wanna Build A Snowman?"

We decorated three gingerbread houses over the course of the month. Below we are ready for the final one. As you can see, Silas has already taste-tested some of the materials.

Joy watching the fun...

We also made it to an open gym which was a blast!

We started out official Christmas celebrations with our Mallekoote adult dinner. It was such a treat to enjoy great conversation and delicious food together. And only 1 out of 14 grandchildren attended. ;-)

The next celebration was the Mallekoote kid party! Below the kids are all ready for church that morning.

Below some of the kids and adults are fueling up for the fun...


Lydia is super pumped about her new sleeping bag! (She and Carrie have slept in them every night since.)

A few days later we enjoyed dinner and celebrations with Grandma O!

Si liked his robe...

And Care and Si had to try out their new game before bed. (Side note- the new Hungry Hippo is awesome! It is much quieter than when I was a kid and the game stores in itself- no box needed!)

Christmas Eve we had a beautiful service filled with members or our church family sharing testimonies of God's faithfulness in their lives as well as lots of beautiful singing!

And here are the kids Christmas morning!

Joy in her special Christmas outfit. Carrie wore the same one 3 years ago. :-)

 After a lovely church service, we headed to Zach's folks for more celebrating!

A quick Christmas day picture with my bud.

 JoyAnna was absent for many of these celebrations due to her napping schedule. But she was very pumped about all the excitement...

 Although she was not as pumped when we told her that her siblings opened all of her presents for her....

After a fun and very busy month, we were pooped....

My favorite Christmas memory this year was reading the Advent stories and singing Christmas songs with the kids and Zach each night. It is such a joy to watch them discover more about the precious gift of a Savior who came from Heaven over 2,000 years ago in the form of a tiny baby. He is perfect love made known to us...Emmanuel- God with Us! Merry Christmas!

November!

The months keep flying by! Here is a bunch of pics that give a taste of life with the Olsons this past month. The girls built a tower out of our Costco groceries. The boxes are as much fun as the items inside!

One night we found Lyddi at the top of the stairs in her own little self-made sleeping cocoon.

Joy sleeping in her own cozy spot. 

 Lydia holding her little sister while standing!! She was pretty proud of this- but only allowed to do it with Mommy or Daddy VERY near by.

 With the beautiful November weather, we headed to Robinettes Orchard for a morning. My dad came along to help with the kids. It was awesome and so fun to be outside in the fresh air.

Enjoying some delicious donuts with Gramps. 

Just a cute pic of Joy hanging out. 

 Si being Si. Man boys are messy. If you're wondering what is keeping the plate on his head...it's syrup.

 The kids rarely give Joy personal space when she's in her seat at their level.

 Me and the girls visiting my grandma.

 All ready for church- on time!

 Si held his "babeee!" in her chair for about ten minutes. It was super sweet.

 Daddy and Lyddi all ready for church.

 Si and some friends hanging out after our church service.

 Daddy and Joy-Joy.

 A big event of this month was Silas' first hair cut! We took him to this cute, kid-friendly salon. I thought he would do okay because he would be so distracted but as you can see, it did not go so well. Even with a sucker in his mouth he made his opinion of the occasion very clear.

 Poor buddy. We made it through the event.... and will not be heading back for a hair cut again for a while. I think I'm going to watch some tutorials and attempt it myself next time.

 Joy getting a sink-bath.

Our girls do the sweetest thing of running and waving to our guests when they leave. They even rev up while they wait for the car.

The day after Thanksgiving we put up Christmas decorations! We set up a train around the tree which had the kids giddy with excitement.

And the train is now back in its case as we were quickly reminded that we have 4 kids 4 and under who love to touch and play with everything! In addition to the train being gone all of the tree ornaments are now out of Si's reach. :-)

Speaking of Si, being the younger brother of two sisters, he gets to do a lot of dressing up. Below he is sporting his Elsa look. (Future wedding video photo?)

The three Elsas!

Si even sings the Elsa song...

 Si's first time playing in snow

This month we did this activity where we wrote something we are thankful for every morning on a pumpkin. My sister gave us the idea- thanks Mare! It was neat to read all the blessings God provides   after a month of writing them down.

We are so very thankful for the abundant blessings we enjoy from our good, good Father. 

Praise God from whom ALL blessings flow!