12.31.07
Christmas Pictures
12.29.07
A desperate situation calls for desperate measures.
Little did I know that, last night when I closed my bedroom door, it wouldn’t be so easy to get out of the bedroom this morning. Yes, we had a serious door knob disfunction. I almost got up at 6 this morning, but dad was sleeping so peacefully that I decided to stay in bed. When he got up later the door refused to open. Apparently a piece of the part that keeps it closed had broken away and acted as a very efficient locking device. Dad had to get on shoes, go out the bedroom slider to get to the garage. He went in there to get tools and then came to the bedroom via the hallway. He couldn’t fix it there so had to go back in through the slider. He had to take off some of the trim to have enough room to work. Needless to say we will be going to the hardware store today for a new doorknob assembly. I guess this is what happens when your house gets older.
Speaking of older homes. Those of you who haven’t heard, Leslie and Dixon have a new water heater that actually heats water, or so I am told. Leslie has a great story about running out of hot water after she had sudsed up in the shower. It was a short shower! They also have internet, phones and cable TV. I guess Landon won’t be so eager to come and visit grandma anymore. Just kidding he loves us not our TV and cable.
We packed out the two upstairs bathrooms yesterday, we also took stuff out of the linen closet. Today I will work on practicing my talk. If I feel good about that I will also start packing out our bedroom. We may not have everything ready in a week, but that is okay. We will focus on packing suitcases on Monday and see what we can get done after that.
12.27.07
Our boxing day.
Leslie came over this morning to pick up some of her things. I had been going through each room and putting things away. When I would find things that belong to them I would put them in a box, hence today is also a boxing day. Kurt came over for lunch since he works so close. Before he left Leslie was putting things into her suburban to take them home. We also have been packing up some of our things and putting them downstairs for storage while we are away.
I am not feeling that great today. I have swollen glands in my neck and they make it hard to swallow. Unless it is chocolate I don’t want to bother eating anything. Thank goodness we have chocolate around in abundance.
Brother Moss called and said none of his family would be participating in the singing Sunday, so I guess it is all up to you guys. Hope that is okay with everyone. I need to spend some time on my talk before the weekend starts so I don’t have a panic attack.
Guess I’d better get back to work.
12.26.07
Boxing Day.
It was quiet here this morning. Mark suggested we have omlets for breakfast and they were very good. He left to go on a walk on the Chehalis-Western with Scott and Sukwan. It was nice to talk to them for a minute before they left.
Leslie sent Hayden over to tell us that their water heater pilot light went off, so dad walked over to relight that. He couldn’t do it with what he had so he walked back and then drove over there to light it with our little torch. His toe hurts worse than ever, so we are sure he broke his toe. With all the walking that he is doing it is not getting any better. He even thought of getting one of those motorized carts when he went to Lowe’s today.
Kurt called and was working close by, so he came over here to pick up Jackie’s phone and to have some lunch. Before he left the Oliver’s started coming over. They were here to make phone calls, have some lunch and to pick up a bunch of their stuff. Leslie is determined to have all her things moved over by Friday. Tomorrow she has some running around to do. I am guessing she will be over tonight to pick up some more. Most of their clothes are over here, so Turner didn’t have any clothes this morning and Cooper only had pajamas. It was fun to have Landon come up to the door before anyone else got here.
Now everyone has left and the house is quiet again. I need to get started with some more cleaning and organizing. Leslie is settling in and trying to fit all her kitchen stuff in her new smaller kitchen. I think it will take her some time to figure it all out. She is anxious to make bread, and have a family meal with just the Olivers to feed.
Landon is anxious to find new friends, he is quite lonely for his friends from Arizona. Leslie is going to go over to her new neighbors today, Chanda and Chris Blum and get to know them. They have a little boy that is just older than Regan. At least I think he is. There also might be some friends at the McClellans house for him to play with. We don’t have a lot of young kids in the area, not like in Arizona, but there are a few. She did have the neighbor from across the street bring over treats for the whole family, they have really nice neighbors all around.
Need to get going, I’ll post again later this week.
12.25.07
Up and running!
I’ve got my new computer up and running now! Rose has been very clingy and needy tonight, but somehow she was asleep in bed long enough for me to get this computer all set up and running. I’m even on Firefox already. I’ve added several new programs, started my Microsoft Office trial, got an anti-virus program and a couple of anti-spyware programs as well. The only big bummer is that my printer is not compatible with Vista. Darn. My printer isn’t that grate anyway, so it’ll be an excuse to buy a new one.
I’d like to know what everyone got for Christmas. The opening of the presents was kind of a blur and I missed a bunch of stuff. I’m too tired to list everything right now and I’m sure I’ll miss a bunch of stuff since Lacy was in warp gift opening mode, so I’ll just go back tomorrow and respond with everything we got! We love all our gifts, and thank you all so much for the thought you put into them and the joy we will all get from them. Dave read a couple of Beatrix Potter books to Lacy tonight, and she really enjoyed them. And I’ve been eating chocolate all night from my new chocolate stash. And obviously checking out my new computer, which I LOVE! It is so FAST!
We had so much fun with all of you today! Thanks for the yummy foods, festive singing, and good times! We’re really going to miss having everyone home for Christmas next year. It was so fun this year, and it will be weird without everyone.
12.23.07
We are not homeless!
We are no longer homeless. We had our meeting this morning, right after Sacrament meeting with the owner of the house on 41st Ave. It went really well, and not only did he agree to rent the house to us, but he is only charging us $1200. It is actually a very fair price because the house isn’t in perfect shape and is a little outdated. But it’s a roof over our heads, and for that we are grateful. The utilities aren’t on yet, but Dix and the kids slept there tonight anyway. They took some firewood over and I expect they’re all sleeping in front of the fireplace. I stayed here with Turner and Cooper. I will call City of Lacey and Puget Power or whatever it’s called first thing in the morning and see how soon we can get hooked up. Frank and Barbara Johnston, Ray Shoop, and Kim Redding all came over to help unload along with Hayden, Dixon, Kurt, Mark and Dale. They made very fast work of it. Then they brought the empty U-haul truck back to my parents house, loaded it up with the stuff that we unloaded yesterday, and unloaded that at the new house. Now we just have our clothes and a few other things laying around here.
I have most of the presents wrapped. It’s not hard when they’re not getting a ton! They are each getting one present from Santa and two from us. All of the kids are giving a present to the sibling just younger than themselves. We have a few more things to buy tomorrow. I will do a little shopping in the morning, along with the rest of the world, and then come home, wrap (not to be confused with rapping), and begin the eating fest which will conclude sometime before next year begins. Not getting any thinner.
Tonight we went Christmas Caroling. We had a lot of fun. We went to my parent’s next door neighbors and sang to them first. When we walked off, Regan grabbed my hand and said enthusiastically, “I LOVE this!” We walked down to our new house and caroled to the Browns (right across the street) and the McClellans (two doors down). Everyone especially loved our perfectly harmonious “Joy to the World, My Teacher’s Dead.” We got lots of laughs and the kids had a ball. Regan wanted to sing a solo at every house and was bawling on the walk back because she didn’t get to sing one. Luckily Grandpa had chocolate in his pocket and that cheered up Regan from her sadness and Landon from his when he fell in a puddle.
Well, it’s off to bed and to read. I only have another week left of this month, and it’s Mark Twain month! I’ve only read Tom Sawyer. I will start A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court tonight. Next month might be Jules Verne month…
12.22.07
Hopeful, still
It has been a rollercoaster of a week with high hopes of getting a home and then the lows of being denied…again. We had to get our belongings out of the 22nd Ave house today, so Dix and Grandpa went early to get two U-hauls and then met Dale, Dave and a friend and Kurt over there. I took Hayden over too. It took less than two hours to load everything up. Thank you so much for all of you that helped. You guys are the best. We took the U-hauls back home and waited for a call from the guy at the 37th Ave house…no call…then we finally got hold of him and he hadn’t made a decision yet. We had no where to put our stuff, so we finally started emptying it into mom and dad’s house. We emptied one u-haul, then started on the 2nd. We had several leads throughout the day, made and received lots of phone calls, all to no avail. Later in the afternoon dad got a tip on an empty house in Wedgewood, on 41st Ave, directly across the street from Bishop Brown. It turns out that dad knows (and fired!) the guy from his military years. He got the phone number, made a call and we have an appointment to see it tomorrow morning. It has been vacant for two years, and we’re not sure if the guy is interested in selling or renting. We’re hoping for renting for now, with the possibility of buying it in the future. Anyway, our hopes are now hanging on that house. We didn’t empty the other U-haul with the hope that we may be able to empty it directly into the home tomorrow. So hopefully this one will work out. I don’t know how much more of this rollercoaster ride we can handle!
While Kurt, Jackie, Marilyn, Dale, Mom and Dad went out to dinner, Dix, the kids and I went to the Shoops for dinner. A good time was had by all of us Olivers. I can’t speak for the other group, but mom certainly seemed a bit more relaxed this evening. Dix and I got the kids bathed and everyone in bed by 9! Wahoo! We have our traditional Lacey 2nd ward orchestra playing prelude and postlude tomorrow. Hayden has to be there at 8:30, so we will be getting up early. We won’t go to the whole block tomorrow in order to try to figure out this house predicament. I may leave a few kids and see if Donna can bring them home to me, or I may even go back to get them. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.
We’re not ready for Christmas gift-wise, but bring it on. I’m ready to celebrate! I’m excited to get together and sing a lot of Christmas songs! Hope nobody has laryngitis (although you are all wishing I had it, aren’t you!).
12.20.07
Tutoring is over for the year.
When the phone rang today for our tutoring session we answered it by singing the First verse of “O du Froehliche”. It was fun, our tutor enjoyed it and it made 2 minutes of my session go by painlessly. When my session was over, but before dad’s began, he got to talking to the tutor about what he is studying in school, and spent the first 20 minutes of his session just talking about that in English, I couldn’t believe it. Finally dad said the closing prayer for mine and the opening for his and got started in a lesson.
The kids had just made it through breakfast and downstairs before the session started, it was at 10 today. Our tutor had gotten up at 4 after going to bed at midnight, he wanted to study before his test. Things didn’t go well, but I haven’t been studying much this week due to other things going on at home.
Leslie and I went to the cookie exchange tonight and had fun. I brought home 6 dozen of 12 different kinds of cookies that we plan on eating on Christmas eve and Christmas day. I guess I will hide them until then. We played some games and had a few refreshments and got our cookies and left. On our way home we stopped and got some milk cause we are out again. We are now figuring out how we are getting Leslie’s stuff and move it out of the garage of the house they are not going to buy. We will call and get that taken care of tonight. We plan on moving the stuff on Saturday. We don’t know where we will be putting it, but have another day to make the decision on where we will put their stuff. We will let you know when that will be. If anyone can help we would appreciate your service because the more hands we get the quicker the work will go.
I am going to spend the next couple of days trying to get ready for Christmas and resting up for the next big adventure. I feel like we are entering a new era in our lives.
12.19.07
Rainy and Windy, bad combination.
We got over a half inch of rain yesterday, and woke up to more rain today, and wind. Right after we started hearing sounds of waking children from the basement the power went out. There was much weeping and wailing after that. Fortunately we could still make oatmeal for breakfast on our gas stove. Not everyone was happy about this. Leslie made a huge batch of oatmeal and then the power came back on. It was out for less than an hour. The house had started to get cool, so dad had started a fire and we had the Lego table upstairs so the kids could play. We also got the pyramid out, installed candles and lit them and had other candles lit, which always makes me nervous with kids around. We were also able to locate the flashlights and used those to get around downstairs to find clothes and children. After the power came on again there was more weeping and wailing because a couple of the children didn’t want to eat oatmeal. We said “Tough, eat it anyway”, and they did. Leslie was trying to hurry things along because she planned on having everyone go to the library today during our tutoring session. Things were very choatic as she was trying to get everyone fed, dressed and ready to go out for the rest of the morning and early afternoon.
Our tutoring session was supposed to begin at 11 today, but the phone rang at 10. Yes, it was the tutor and he got the time wrong. Because of his mistake we will only have an hour and a half session. I had mine already, which didn’t go well, and dad is now blowing through his. I need to study more tonight and plan on doing that later.