Surrounded by family!

I must say that our family is so lucky to have such a wonderful extended family. My Aunt Susan and Uncle Mike drove out to Oregon from Arizona this weekend and were staying with my Uncle Dave and Aunt Linda that live close by. My parents came up from Winchester, OR, and my brother stayed as well, since he is flying back to California on Monday. We all got togerher for a few hours of visiting Sunday evening at our home! It was so nice to see everyone together again!


From left; Jim and Barb Hamlin, Dave and Linda Curtis, Susan and Mike Patterson, Tina (me!), Mike Hamlin and the Tishendorf children -- Ryan, Ryley, Tyler (front) Tori, Sarah and Brandon!

Caution to those who receive scratch lottery tickets

Be sure to turn up the volume, so you can hear this video!

Tishendorf and company rock band!

The Christmas gift that has gotten the most use so far is the game simply known as "Rock Band" for the Xbox 360. It was a gift to the kids from their Great Grandma Hamlin! "Thank you Great Grandma!!!!!!!" The game comes with a microphone, drums and guitar and as you watch the TV screen each "rocker" has to attempt to karaoke the chosen song, keep the rhythm on the drums and hit all the notes on the guitar. After playing just one song we have a new sense of respect for the musically gifted!

Tori singing, Brandon on drums and Ryan (GO DUCKS!!) on guitar!
Tina's Dad on drums and Brandon on guitar!

(Note the audience on the couch!) Brandon on drums and Tina's brother Mike on guitar!

Merry Christmas to all!

To all of our family and friends that keep up to date with our family through our blog, "We hope you had a fabulous Christmas!" Be sure to leave us comments so we know you visited!

On Christmas Eve, Tina's parents arrived along with her brother Mike who flew in from Aurora Hills California! We took this photo prior to the kids first Christmas tradition of opening one present from under the tree!
Our second Christmas Eve tradition is to go out and feed Santa's reindeer prior to going to bed. The kids have bags of reindeer food (oats and glitter). Santa's reindeer will be sure to find us because the glitter will shine under the moonlight and the reindeer love to eat the oats and can smell them from miles away!

Then it was off to the upstairs where all of the kids had their slumber party! Ryan, Tyler and Ryley pictured above!

Tori and Sarah!

Brandon all snug in his bed!

Our tree prior to Santa's arrival!

Santa filled all of our stockings!

Loaded presents under the tree and moved one of our couches!

It is a lot of work for Santa and his elves to deliver gifts to all 6 kids!

The kids awoke Christmas morning with smiles on their faces!

Tina's brother Mike and her mom opening their stockings!

"Thank you Uncle Mike and Aunt Susan for the Mexican Train Game!" We are looking forward to playing it!

Santa brought Sarah the baby doll she asked him for!

"Thank you Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Jack for the wonderful train set!" That was a fabulous surprise and we can't wait to set it all up!!!!

Around 9am it started snowing on Christmas morning. It was a magical Christmas snow! The Oregonian (Portland newspaper) stated that statistically there is a less than 1% chance of getting snow in the area on Christmas! We loved to see the huge white flakes coming down that morning! Sarah was the first to run out to play!

A visit to Santa's House!

The holiday season seems to be flying by this year for us. Everyone in our family has favorite traditions. The kids were busy cutting out snowflakes this weekend and attaching them to the windows and filling our oranges with cloves (they smell SO good)! With Christmas only 8 days away we finally made the trip to Santa's house to visit!

Ryley, Tori, Tyler, Sarah, Ryan and Brandon with Santa.
Sarah is telling Santa she would like a "baby doll" for Christmas.

Brandon requested "Naruto Clash of the Ninja Revolution" for the Wii
(try saying that 3 times fast!)

A Gingerbread House tradition!

Decorating our tree!

Christmas Carol -- 12 days of Christmas

From 1558 until 1829, Roman Catholics in England werenot permitted to practice their faith openly. Someoneduring that era wrote this carol as a catechism song for young Catholics. It has two levels of meaning: the surface meaning plus a hidden meaning known only to members of their church. Eachelement in the carol has a code word for a religious realitywhich the children could remember.


-The Partridge in a Pear tree was Jesus Christ.

-Two turtle doves were the Old and New Testaments.
-Three French hens stood for faith, hope and love.
-The four calling birds were the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke & John.
-The five golden rings recalled the Torah or Law, the first five books of the Old Testament.
-The six geese a-laying stood for the six days of creation.
-Seven swans a-swimming represented the sevenfold gifts of the Holy Spirit--Prophesy, Serving, Teaching, Exhortation, Contribution, Leadership, and Mercy.
-The eight maids a-milking were the eight beatitudes.
-Nine ladies dancing were the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit--Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self Control.
-The ten lords a-leaping were the ten commandments.
-The eleven pipers piping stood for the eleven faithful disciples.
-The twelve drummers drumming symbolized the twelve points of belief in the Apostles' Creed.
So there is your history for today. This knowledge was shared with me and I found it interesting and enlightening and now I know how that strange song became a Christmas Carol...

Merry (Twelve Days of) Christmas Everyone.....

Going on a tree hunt!

It was a beautiful blue sky day today! We visited Merrywood Farms here in Canby late this afternoon!

Oregon Civil War Game

Matt and Ryan took a trip down to Eugene today to watch the Oregon Civil War Game at Autzen Stadium, thanks to tickets that Matt's mom was able to get from her boss ("Thanks Lorna!!!") They had a great time! The game was close, and although it didn't have the outcome they had hoped for they had a fabulous time cheering on the Ducks! Note: Brandon was thrilled with the outcome-- as he and my father are Beaver fans!

And the stockings were hung....

......by the chimney with care, in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there!

A visit to The Pittock Mansion!

With Christmas only 31 days away (but who's counting????) and a large list of places to visit, people to see and tasks to be done, we decided to take the family to Portland and tour The Pittock Mansion! You can find out information about the mansion at http://www.pittockmansion.org/. If you click on the photos below, they will enlarge and you can see more detail!

Ryan, Tyler, Tori, Sarah, Brandon and Ryley in the circular driveway.
Front of the Pittock Mansion.
Our favorite room in the house was the "Library"! Each of the 23 rooms in the mansion were decorated in a "Fairy Tale" theme. The library's theme was Beauty and the Beast.
Entering the "Music Room". They had 3 people playing instruments. Aside from the flute and guitar, they were instruments we'd never seen before, and are not sure what they are (if you know, leave us a comment).

The ceiling of "The Smoking Room"
The formal dining room, decorated as Alice in Wonderland.

The back of the Pittock Mansion.
The view from the back yard of the Mansion. It overlooks downtown Portland, and in the distance you can see Mount Hood.

A great week!

Just an update from our family! We have had another great week. The kids were home from school for the entire week ~ much to our delight. It is so nice to have them home all day! My parents came up on Wednesday and stayed through Friday to celebrate Thanksgiving. We all played a mean game of pictionary and ate way too much! Unfortunately I didn't think to get a group photo, so we will have to try and remember next year.

The kids wrote their last letter to Santa last night (Thank you for the letter writing kit cousin Malachi!!!)
On Saturday, Matt's mom stopped by on her way home from Matt's brother Justin's. We celebrated an early Christmas with her, since we won't see her during the holidays.
Sarah opening her Xmas gift from Omie!!

A teary goodbye to Odin

With the upcoming sale of our home and relocation, we decided it would be in Odin's best interest to find a new family for him. We put him on Craigslist on Thursday and Friday night his new family came to pick him up. It was a very tearful goodbye, as we have raised him the last 9 months. Below are photos we took that evening before the new owner and his sons came to claim him. The good news is the new owners live in Camas, Washington (where we will be relocating). They have a large fenced yard for him to run in, and 3 boys (ages 9,11, and 18) that are very excited to make him a part of their family. They invited us to come and visit when we move up north!

Christmas Cards for our Soldiers Overseas

Something cool that Xerox is doing....

If you go to this web site, www.LetsSayThanks.com you can pick out a thank you card and Xerox will print it and it will be sent to a soldier that is currently serving in Iraq . You can't pick out who gets it, but it will go to some member of the armed services.

How AMAZING it would be if we could get everyone we know to send one!!! This is a great site. Please send a card. It is FREE and it only takes a second. Wouldn't it be wonderful if the soldiers received a bunch of these? Whether you are for or against the war, our guys and gals over there need to know we are behind them...

We LOVE Halloween!

It is pumpkin picking time!

This is our second year visiting Bauman Farms! You can visit their website at http://www.baumanfarms.com/fallactivities.html. They have tons of things to do -- corn mazes, hay mazes, a wooden fort, apple sling shots, hay rides.

The kids survived the completely dark hay maze (it only took them 1 hour and 45 minutes to get all of the way through it), a corn maze (that had seen better days), and the pumpkin patch where we ended up with 206 pounds of pumpkins!!!!