Sorry there have been no updates lately. We currently don’t have a home computer. We are planning on fixing this problem for Christmas. Just bare with us and we will get back on track one of these days.

Tonight we were sitting down at the dinner table and I figured while we were all there we would read our scriptures as a family. Well, before we started I was asking the boys some gospel questions. They were really excited that they knew the answers to the questions. As I continued to ask questions Jake yelled out “How many Jesus points do I have?” We all had a good laugh. As we went on the boys continually asked how many Jesus points they received after answering a question. It was really funny.

Holy smokes, it is February 2009 and not a work from the Olsen’s. I guess I better play catch-up.

It has already been a crazy year for us. We had a great time this holiday season. We saw almost all the family from both sides. It was great to see everyone but it was also nice to get back to our regular lives.

Maybe a quick overview on each of the kids will suffice for now.

Jake was excited to go back to school after the holiday break. He loves school and all he wants to do when he gets home is play school. He has had a couple of bouts with the stomach flu which he hates. He’ll constantly talk about how he hates to throw up.

Andrew started Sunbeams this year. He was so excited. He thinks he is so big now that he is in primary. He also can’t wait to be 5 so he can go to school like Jake.

Isaac is still quite the character. Grandma Murphy made all the boys capes. He wears his constantly and says he is Batman. He usually gets in the car to go to church with it on and I have to take it off before we go into the church.

Matt is getting big. He is a tall little guy. He loves to hear himself talk and he is very smiley.

Emily and I are just jugging away like usually. I have been swamped at work trying to juggle things after we had some people laid off. Emily’s life consists of kids and enrichment.

Hopefully we will be better about updating the blog. Life has been crazy.

Well, we did it. We got a dog. We weren’t planning on getting a dog anytime soon but then we saw this news clip. Emily and I saw the dog and decided to call and find out about him. We called the animal shelter and they weren’t open yet but told us it was first come first serve. So, Isaac and I jumped in the car and headed to Salt Lake.

As soon as the shelter opened I called them again and they took my name down to let others know we were on our way. When we go to the shelter there was another lady looking at Otis. When she was done they let Isaac and me look at him. We decided we liked him and went to the front desk and told them we wanted to adopt Otis. Well, just as I started filling out the paper work the other lady walked up to the front desk and said she wanted Otis. They told her that I was adopting him. The other lady went off on them saying how she was told it was first come first serve and that she was “getting screwed by them” and that they better change their policy before they “screw somebody else”.

It turns out that their first come first serve policy says that if someone from out of county calls and says they are on their way then they will be considered first. Since I was out of county I was considered the first.

Otis has now been with us for almost and week and we are getting used to having him around. The boys are excited to have a dog. He does like to run away sometimes which means we need to close off a hole between our fence and the neighbors fence.

Otis is a really mellow dog. Most of the day he lays around. He has only used our house as a bathroom twice and that was in the first couple of days. He is doing better now.

Otis does do one trick. He can stand on his hind legs. The picture above shows it put you can’t tell very well since I was getting him to stand and take the picture at the same time.

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving the boys and I went up to Heber to ride on the Polar Express with some of my aunts and cousins. The boys were so excited to go and ride on the train. They were all wearing their pajamas just like in the book.  The train ride followed the book pretty accurately, they fed us treats, we sang songs and Santa even came to visit and give us bells.  Isaac wanted nothing to do with Santa and the closer Santa got to us the louder he yelled.  But for the most part he enjoyed the ride.

  The best part about the whole trip was how my kids make-believed about the ride the next day.  They carried their bells where ever we went, we sang Christmas carols in the van that was now a train and kept a look out for Santa, the two older boys hoping to see him and Isaac relieved when we never did.  It was a fun was to get ready for the Christmas season.

Today was Isaac’s birthday, and yes, he turned 2. Over the past few days we have been trying to get Isaac excited about his birthday. In all our attempts we failed. However, when my mom showed up yesterday for his party with a present, Isaac quickly realized that he could end up really liking this birthday thing.

This morning Emily texted me and told me that Isaac woke up and went down stairs this morning and saw the presents on the table. When he saw them he said “Wow! Mine!” Isaac is a funny kid. Emily had to keep Isaac busy today so he wouldn’t try to dive into the presents before I got home from work.

The agenda for today included a trip to the pumpkin patch. Jake had gone with his class last week so Emily thought it would be a good day to take Isaac and Andrew to get their pumpkins. As you can see, pumpkins do funny things to Isaac’s face.

After Jake got home from school, Emily took the boys to McDonald’s for Isaac’s birthday lunch. I am pretty jealous of all the fun they had without me. I’m busy saving up my days of for when the baby comes.

All-in-all, Emily and I decided that Isaac had a good birthday. He was very pleased with all his presents. Isaac was lucky enough to have two parties. Well, all our boys usually get two parties. Last night we had a party with my family and then tonight we had a party with Jeff, Patti and Rose Marie. We had a lot of fun on both nights.

Just to make some of you jealous. I’ll make a list of the gifts Isaac received so you can imagine how much fun he must be having..

• Diego Toys and Movie
• A large Winnie the Pooh that talks
• A bobble head train
• Building stix
• Batman
• Winnie the Pooh backpack
• A reindeer Christmas decoration

See, I knew you would all be jealous!

Well, Jake has just got on the bus and is now off to school, wearing his favorite color, yellow.  Grandma Murphy sent him this back to school shirt. He was wearing his Lightning McQueen shoes from his aunt Patti. He was so excited, I was so nervous.  I was up before six doing the dishes and fretting about his first day of school meanwhile Jake decided to sleep in till after seven, something he never, ever does.  He chose his breakfast of french toast, sausage, eggs and orange juice but he barely ate a bite, I guess it was just nerves or the fact that he wasn’t awake quite yet. Last night he did his first homework assignment which was coloring an apple by following the instructions.  Then he wanted to pack his backpack with the markers that Grandma Olsen gave him with two caps and the computer paper that Grandma Murphy gave him. He wanted to do everything all by himself, I guess he is growing up.

He was so excited to get to school we were out waiting for the bus about a half hour before the bus came, and I thought we were running behind this morning.  Andrew and Isaac were waiting with him all decked out in their backpacks so that they could be like their big brother.  Jake also brought out his Dog and Buzz so that they could watch him get on the bus.  I gave Jake the whole lecture on listen to your teacher and don’t push in line and then he told me that I needed to be gentle to his dog and bunny while he was gone and that I needed to make sure to pet them.  But he doesn’t need to worry because Isaac loves his animals and is thrilled to take care of them while Jake is away.

We have an eight year old neighbor boy named Peter who offered to help Jake get to school and get to his class on his first day so Peter arrived to take Jake off to school.  Jake was so excited he thinks Peter is the greatest thing ever.  Peter’s mom told me that Peter had it all planned out, he was going to teach Jake the rules on the bus like waiting in line and being quiet at the railroad crossings.  He also told his mom that he would take Jake all year if he had to.  I am so glad that Jake has him to help  him out at school. Jake couldn’t wait to get going, as soon as Peter arrived Jake was ready to get in line, and any one who knows Jake knows that went Jake is excited he can hardly control his body.  He was jumping up and down and talking up a storm.

They got in line and for Jake the bus couldn’t get their fast enough.  When the bus did get there Jake got on with out hesitation.  I was a little worried that when the bus finally got there Jake would be too scared to get on but he climbed right in and found a seat in the back (our bus stop is the last one so there aren’t many seats left.  So Jake is a school boy now and the only tears I shed were at 5:50 this morning.  All in all, so far anyway the day has gone really well.

Today we had a back to school party to get Jake excited for school.  The boys all had a lot of fun.  We started the day by playing the classic games of duck, duck, goose and red light green light.  The kids had a lot of fun doing this and they followed the rules pretty well.  Then we had a back pack relay where the kids raced to fill their backpacks with school supplies.  They wanted to play that game twice.  After that we had a scavenger hunt and that is where it really got wild.  The kids all raced to be the first to find the clues.  After that we did some quieter art projects and then we made ice cream.  Making ice cream is a lot more difficult then the instructions made it sound, especially with 10 eager little kindergartners.  We made it in bags that the kids were supposed to shake until ice cream formed but the kids expected it to form like magic.  It is funny because they were all frustrated during the making part but both my boys said that it was their favorite part of the party.  All in all it went well and we are looking forward to starting school tomorrow.

Emily is off to California for the weekend and I’m left home alone to finish my final thesis revision and paint our bedroom. Emily and the boys are off to the beach enjoying their time in California. From the sound of it, California is pretty hot (above 65 degrees). So, here is a message of loneliness.

Today Jake and Andrew had their first Christmas party with some boys in the ward. From the sounds of it they had a lot of fun. I am trying to get Emily to write more about the party since she was in attendance. Hopefully that will happen soon.

It is nice because there are a handful of boys Jake’s age in the ward. There is a little boy named Maddox that he really likes. It’s fun to watch the kids make friends.