Olive's Identity Crisis

Every member in our family has a lot of nicknames. So much so that Olive doesn't really know her actual name. She claims Ollie-pop or Goose-Monger the most—before Olive.

Baby-O

Ollie

Ollie-pop

Goose

Goosie

Goose-Monger

Loosy Goosy McWoosy

Her newest addition is "Goose Mon Wong Shin Tsau Li."

O's Idea of Potty Training

With little success her and there, lets just say she is interested but not committed.

Copy Cat

I thought that this outfit looked very "Jana". Nothing says Jana more than a patterned skirt paired with sandals and a solid colored shirt.

Family Transportation

Olive cycling with Talmage.

Since we moved to the Dallas area we have been biking and busing a lot less. Plano isn't really a bike-friendly town (despite recently being ranked the most biker-friendly city in Texas)—there are no shoulders on the road . Although on the weekends we see herds of cyclists taking up the right lane. But we were pretty content with our one car and cycling and busing when needed, that is until we realized that after the baby comes we wouldn't all fit in it. We considered buying one of these and putting it in our Volvo so we could fit all of our kids. 

Fit four kids in one row! Only a European company would think of that!

We also considered having Talmage cycle while I drove the car to where ever we needed to go, like church. One of the kids could ride in the front seat because there is no air bag on the passenger side and it complies with Texas state law.

I miss cycling as much as we did in Virginia. But I realize that being pregnant while pulling kids and groceries wasn't going to work.

Our last option was to break down and buy a van. But we are picky. We wanted a reliable van that would last long with low mileage (our last van only lasted for about two years) AND that we would have zero debt when buying it. We'll we ended up with with all of our first criteria and only half of our second criteria.

Olive & Dolly Riding Safely

After lowering our expectations on price, we finally found a van that would work for us. We put a non-refundable down payment on it. But that night before we go to pick it up and buy it, we prayed about it together and both got the strong impression not to buy it. I was discouraged and we went back to plan A, not buying a van at all.

Our Loved Volvo

But then two weeks later, the same dealership lowered the cost of another minivan that they had by $1000. Putting it in our price range AND it had 20k less miles on it than the first one that we were going to buy! And that non-refundable deposit could work towards it. We jumped on it. I really believe that the Lord was looking out for us and wanted to help us get something that would be right for our family.

Our New Minivan

What I like about our new minivan:

• It seems reliable! Very important when you have a car full of little ones.
• Low mileage. Has 55k miles on it, which is amazingly low for the price range we were looking in.
• Fits all our kids in it and future little one. 
• Has Stow-In-Go back seats
• I love how Heber calls it a Mini-Ban

Heber's Tigger

Heber loves his "tigger" blanket. It recently got a hole in it which got bigger and bigger. Now it's become his tigger sleeping bag.

Texas Wildflowers

Overheard: One for Each Kid

The other night I taught the 12 year old Boy Scouts about Personal Fitness for the second week in a row. They are good kids, but it's such an eye opening experience working with them. It's hard to believe that a rather short time ago I was one of these rowdy, immature and sometimes weird young men.
Afterward, I was talking with Rachel about it and came to the conclusion that if our kids were weird and immature it would be because of their weird dad and certainly not their mother. Shortly after I caught myself once again being my weirdo self (I think I was referring to Olive by her new nickname, Goos Mung Wong Shin Tsao Li) and exclaimed: "No! My kids are going to be weird!"
A few minutes later, a teary-eyed Hannah was walking toward our room.

Me: What's wrong Hannah?
Hannah (in the verge of a breakdown): I don't wanna be weird.

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Olive, running naked after a bath: I coldie! I coldie!

Happens almost every bath.

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I took Heber with me to play basketball Saturday morning at the church. We got there a little early so I started teaching him how to play defense. Later, I started playing ball and Heber kept calling for me from the sidelines to tell me something. I kept telling him to wait until we were done, thinking he was just being a needy little kid. Finally it got to be too much and I asked the guys if they could stop while I addressed Heber's concern. He quietly reprimanded my defense:

Heber: Dad you're not blocking them.

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