Christmas!

Happy birthday Jesus. I'm so glad its Christmas. All the tinsel and lights, and the presents are nice, But the real gift is You!

It's hard to keep the focus on Christ in the mist of buy, buy, buy, I want, I want and all of the great deals, but we tried really hard to focus this year on Him!

The Bishop kiddos saved up $88 in change for our Samaritans Purse shoeboxes, and this year we made 12!!! It was neat to see the kids get excited about giving. We also adopted a family and had fun buying for other kids too.

It's weird how we are way busier this year than the last few, but we squeezed in more activities. We went to movies, baked cookies, ejoyed 3-D @ home(thanks Aunt Jolynn and Uncle Kevin!), painted ornaments, enjoyed Christmas lights, visiting reindeers, playing in the snow, and drank lots of hot cocoa!

Looking forward to 2010!!!

Farewell beach...we will miss you dearly!

So Judah has been asking to go home for a couple of days (it's hard to be 4 and off routine) but the rest could have stayed a month! At least it was rainy today as we packed up so it wasn't as hard to drive away. It has been our tradition to get one of the "grow" animals and grow it during our vacation and then set if free into the sea. John-John is the official "free-er." This year we grew "Growie the Turtle" and stopped by the beach on our way out of town. I took a picture of the kids in the van as we were headin out and told them it was so that someday when we didn't have the big green van anymore we could remember all of our adventures in it...John-John got teary and said "What do ya mean we won't have the van forever?!" For anyone who has seen the movie RV, it is a family favorite and we have affectionately named our van the "Big Green Rolling Turd." Slightly innapropriate I know, but we love that van and all of the places it "rolls" us to!!!

Fort Stevens

We went and had a look around Fort Stevens.

It is actually very interesting and we went on the underground tour which was cool...literally. It was the old bunker/battery and was dark and damp. The kids did good and like to learn about history...the older gentleman leading the tour was a bit longwinded....There was a fun little museum too. There were several buildings to explore aside from the tour too and pleanty for the kids to climb on and get worn out!

Adventures in Seaside

Today was rainy and cold and Mike wasn't feeling well, so I loaded up the troops and headed off to Seaside. After another ride on the Carousel, we found the hat shop and had a lot of fun. They suprisingly weren't that expensive and a few of the boys got one. We shopped for a bit, collecting some treasures (and B-day suprises for Grandma). We hit the arcade-they have player cards like at a casino. What is the world coming to?! On our way back to the ice cream store we spotted the tilt-o-whirl and had to try it out. Judah was the most excited and Will took some convincing. They all loved it! We then continued down the block to the ice cream store...I looked back at Judah and he looked a little green...yea, well, I'll spare you the details, but just know that after the vomit comet, he asked "Can we go on it again?" I love that kid!

To Haystack Rock- and beyond!

The younger 4 and I went out and dodged waves the other night. We went down with the intention of climbing on Haystack rock as we have done in the past, but it was all marked off this year- so we took to the waves! Once your legs go completely numb, the water is not too bad :) It started out with the toes, then the ankles, knees, and so on until Judah and John were each attached to one of my arms and Em to my back and the waves were taller than Judah. So much fun! One of the marine guys keeping people off of Haystack told us that at 6:30 the next AM, would be the lowest tide and we could see cool stuff in the tidepools-so the alarm went off the next morning and so did we. Once we got down there we had a blast and the early morning grumbling stopped-Will was even skipping on the beach after being my biggest nay-sayer! Lol! And to make the trip totally worth it, we stopped by the bakery and got fresh goodies. Aaah! I love vacation!

A day at Seaside

We love heading up to Seaside for the day....it is a little too touristy to stay in, so we just visit. We worked in all of our favorites-got our new sweatshirts, ate chinese food, rode the carousel, walked the beach, checked out the seal tank and got Tillamook ice cream!

A fun day!

On our way to the Beach.....

We made a few stops on our way down...a museum and the hatchery-fun! We told the kids they got three suprises that day...those were two and the third was a hotel to swim. We have good kids, pretty easy to please...as long as you bring candy for John, ignore Will's teenage sighs and block the sounds of Em and Mo bouncing off the walls, it is A-OK!

GOTCHA!

Happy 6yrs home Michael Odelin!

"Oh who could have guessed? Who could have seen! Who could have possibly known?

All of these roads we have traveled, the places we've been-

Would have finally taken us home?

So it's here's to you and three cheers to you!

Let's shout it 'Hip Hip Hooray!'

For out of this world so tattered and torn,

you came to our house on that wonderful morn,

And all of a sudden a family was born.

Oh happy adoption day!"

(by John McCutcheon)

Each of the kids get woken up to our obnoxious singing of this song on their adoption day! This year, Michael chose to go ice-skating for his day-what an adventure! Will and Michael are our roller-bladers and they picked up on it right away. The other kids and Mike soon followed....after a few rounds, the little boys came over and asked when I was going to get out and try-my response "When I'm done being scared!" So John went over and brought me a cone and said "We'll help you." And off we went!!!

Fourth of July Fun! Yay! We had a fun BBQ with family and then fireworks at night(sans mom, she was putting out fireworks on the Adult Unit). John-John was fearless this year with the "fire-pops" and didn't even hesitate when he burned his finger. Everyone had a blast :)

So we finished up 2weeks of swimming lessons....apparently I am raising fish! Judah is just amazing, fully swimming underwater. Emily is getting really good at her strokes! Michael is doing well, but needs to learn to not panic!!!! John-John's hilarious because he is absolutely fearless and wants to swim underwater, but always floats to the top-lol! They will definitely be waterlogged by August!

Memorial Weekend with Fam

We have had a lot of fun this weekend-in spite of allergies! My Aunt Dian, Uncle Hosea, and cousins Anita and Scotty drove up from Oregon to visit. They were fun when I was little and they are still fun now! My kids love to see them. Aunt Dian always brings fun things when she comes and this time it was costumes. We all were laughing so hard...and who knew that Will could be the funniest of them all. I'll post his 'purple' outfit, but you have to imagine the Jay-Z songs "If you're feeling like a pimp" playing in the background(it's not a bad song :)) We had BBQ courtesy of Mike of hours of visiting.

young love :)

Judah went to Chuck-E-Cheese with John and Dad a couple of days ago before John had to go to school. After counting up his tickets he went to browse the goodie counter and spotted 'Best Friend' necklaces that he had enough for....here is what he told Mike "Ooh I can get those and share with Baliegh(flash back to b-day party post). I'll get the blue because there is no purple which is her favorite color." When they got to John's class he got out and gave Baliegh her half...so sweet!

Fishing Day!

This year for Tri-Cities annual Kids' Fishing Day all of my kiddos got to go! It is really cool too because they each get a fishing pole, t-shirt and can catch 3 fishies and someone in the church pays the $5 fee for all of the kids who want to go each year. Well this year they caught the 15 between them...then we all went again the next day as a family and caught a bunch more...then Mike took the little boys the next day...and then the next day Michael got to skip school and go...pretty much a whole week of fishing! They loved it! John appears to be the most dedicated-even staying out in the rain and Michael has the casting down to an art.

Michael Odelin's 9th Birthday!

So Grandma and I scrounged up our best Chuck-E-Cheese coupons and Mo got to have his B-day party there :) He had fun with the family and a few friends. I love boy parties...they are so low maintenance-food, fun, and no frills! They had a blast! Still can't believe he's 9......

Easter Sunday

Easter was fun. We went to church and had a wonderful time of worship-thanks Pastor Tony! Then we came home and had way too much food and hunted eggs-in the house since it was raining outside by the time lunch was done. Thirty eggs apeice for the kids!!! A great day of food, fellowship, and being thankful that we have a risen savior-Jesus Christ!!!

Grillz!

So here's the vote we are putting out: Does Emily need dental work or should she stick with the GRILLZ? Easter Grillz that is...I guess when the sucker on the backside is gone the silly teeth will be too :)

John & Judah's Birthday Bash

Well, the whole bounce house plan that we had fizzled out with the rain! Good thing we had a back up plan-and good thing a lot of the boys' friends had already left for spring break and couldn't come(we invited the whole kindergarten class!) They had a great time with party games like pin the tail, baloon pop, mummy wrap, and more. John was a little sad that he couldn't win every game, but Judah didn't notice cause he was busy getting his mac on with Baleigh-his best friend in John's class! So now I have no more babies just big boys, boo-hoo-hoo. John is already planning next years party where he wants his family to put on a play...hmmm we'll see:)