Well, we’ve been up to a lot of fun things, but since I’ve been pregnant I’ve blogged about very little of it. Here is my attempt to get somewhat caught up.
Thanks to my amazing husband and older children we were able to do most of our fun, traditional Christmas activities this year.
We had our ladies tea. (It was just the ladies in our immediate family, but was still fun.)
We had scones, egg salad sandwiches, vanilla pudding, assorted cheeses with olives and lots and lots of tea. I posted about having a regular tea time with our girls, it doesn’t have to be fancy in order to create wonderful memories, lively discussions and stronger relationships.
We decorated our ginger bread village. Well, it’s actually a graham cracker village. When you have several children one large gingerbread house just won’t do. Each child in our family makes and decorates their own graham cracker house.
It takes precision, concentration and a helpful older sister to create a sturdy graham cracker house.
I think we had more cave-ins this year than ever before, but the great thing about working in candy is that you get to eat your mistakes and no one ever need know, unless of course your mom takes a picture and posts it on her blog. 
I’m not sure who ate more candy, Savannah (notice how empty her house is?)
or Nicholas (who made no house at all). 
And just in case you were wondering, we don’t allow anyone to eat any candy off of someone else’s house and we don’t offer it to guests either!!!
We decorated Christmas cookies, finished most of the Christmas shopping, played games, snuggled in front of Christmas specials and mostly kept up with the laundry.
Then the Sunday before Christmas, one of children threw up right in the middle of church. (A huge apology goes out to our whole church family, that was unexpected and unfortunately contagious.)
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I hope you start feeling better soon! But so happy you are expecting again. You are BLESSED! Your Christmas celebration looks marvelous!!!!
XoxoGapGirl
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:11 am
Thank you. God has indeed blessed us.
Hope your family has a blessed 2010!
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Sounded really good until the throwing up in church part! Hmmm, not so good. Hope everyone is well now and you are starting to feel better.
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:14 am
We are all better now, thanks!
I need to go back and read your posts about your visit in this area. You did some really fun things that I’d like to incorporate into our year.
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They are so beautiful and happy!
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I love the tea set up! I love “tea food”!!! How are you feeling?
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:15 am
I’m getting into my groove of only feeling well for part of the day. Once I come to terms with accomplishing less things get a lot easier. Praying that I will feel better by the half way point – only 7 1/2 more weeks.
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Oh that looks like so much fun. Sorry about the throw up in church. That is just miserable when you are pregnant oh….. Glad you had a great Christmas!
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:16 am
I’m just happy that I didn’t join her.
What was funny (or not) was that when I got it, it was hard for me to tell if I had an illness or was just having a particularly bad morning sickness day. We are all feeling better now!
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I love having tea parties with my two girls and seeing your posts about yours keeps it at the top of my mind. Sometimes the busy-ness of life can cause me to forget to stop and play!!!! And with so many boys I also tend to stay boy minded in activities and forget that my girls really do enjoy doing those real girly things!!! And so do I!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks for sharing about all your fun times!!
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:18 am
We love tea parties. It’s especially nice now that the girls do most of the preparation.
How are you feeling?
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love the gingerbread houses! Bummer about the getting sick part,…life with kids is seldom dull, no?
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:19 am
I love the excitement that having kids brings….most of the time. Honestly by Christmas night (when we had the most mess) I was laughing through it. It’s honestly hysterical if you can step back out of the grossness.
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LOVE the pictures and I LOVE that you had a tea party! It’s truly a dying tradition- I wish I did more of those types of things! Happy New Year to your wonderful family!!
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:20 am
Happy New Year to your family as well. Hope you enjoyed your snow sports. (I’m not jealous, I’m not jealous, I’m not jealous.)
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Sorry, but I completely laughed out loud at the throw-up in church part! Been there, done that! My husband just looked at our son, like, “Who’s kid is that?!” It was horrible.
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:22 am
That’s great that you laughed at that part. My husband and I both were laughing at the back of the church as we worked to get her, the floor and me (yes she got it all over my dress) cleaned up.
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What is it with you guys and getting sick during worship? This is not a “first” for your family.
Thanks for sharing what makes Christmas special at your house.
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Kimberly @ Raising Olives Reply:
December 31st, 2009 at 9:23 am
No it’s not a first for our family, but we’re getting better at how to handle it. Also, this time was a lot more discreet than last and Mark was there to help rather than it being just me and a bunch of LITTLE kids.
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What a great post. The kids look like they had a blast, even with the cave in.
I love the idea of a formal tea! It is something I have always wanted to do.
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I loved reading about your Christmas and enjoyed the fun pictures! Sorry to hear about the throwing up at church — been there, done that!
No fun, but part of having a large family, I think!
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