The Christmas Letter

For those who missed the print version:

Based on your longstanding friendship with the David Overly Family, you have been selected to receive a ballot for the 2012 Overly Awards.  (You’re welcome!)  Upon completion, ballots should be returned to us at (home address)*

Best thing about living in Utah (select one):

□   For the first time in five years, we didn’t have to pack up and move (hallelujah!)

□   We don’t have to deal with airport security to visit family and no one in our minivan cares if the kids are crying

□   We can watch LDS General Conference in our pajamas

Best lesson in patience (select one):

□   David, for trudging through two more busy seasons at Big Prestigious Company

□   Bonnie, for cleaning up after innumerable twin-related disasters

□   Bonnie, for teaching Michael how to tie his shoes

Biggest accomplishment of the year (select one):

□   Bonnie, for successfully potty-training the twins

□   Bonnie, for successfully potty-training the twins

□   Bonnie, for successfully potty-training the twins (What, you think someone else should win this one??)

Funniest thing to come out of 6-year-old Michael’s mouth (select one):

□   “Mom, I finished cleaning my room!  Don’t look under my bed, okay?”

□   Trying to decide between marrying his friend, Samara, or his friend, Clara:  “Mom, can I marry two girls?”

□    To dinner guests:  "My dad's been caught by the police three times!"

Best thing about Michael learning to speak French in the language immersion program at school:

□   If we are ever stuck in France, Michael will be able to ask where the bathroom is

□   We have an excuse to eat more pastries

□   We can now sound more intellectual by legitimately using phrases like “joie de vivre” and “soupe du jour”

Most creative disaster concocted by our almost 3-year-old twins, Matthew and Leah (select one):

□  The one where Matthew opened the garage freezer, turned the temperature to “off” and then shut the door, resulting in over $100 of ruined food and Mom spending an hour scraping rotted chicken guts and soggy roll dough off of every shelf

□ The one where Leah and Matthew performed what can only be described as a “spice dance” in the kitchen, using entire jars of cumin, ginger, and red pepper flakes,  and, as a bonus, a bottle of blue food coloring

□  The one where Leah and Matthew were caught naked on the bathroom counter, up to their knees in a sink overflowing with soapy water, rubbing a stick of butter all over each other and the mirror

Most difficult disaster to clean (select one):

□  Butter smeared all over the inside of the toaster

□ White-out painted (and dried) all over the kitchen bar stools

□ Vaseline smeared on the carpet

Cleaning product which has done the most to ensure the twins’ continued survival (select one):

□ Mr. Clean Magic Erasers

□ Clorox Wipes

□ Little Green Carpet Cleaner

Best Way to Keep In Touch With Us (select all) :

□  Send us an email at (email address)

□ Check our blog: www.overlys.blogspot.com

□ Call us at one of our phone numbers:

     Home:   xxx-xxx-xxxx

     David Cell:  xxx-xxx-xxxx

     Bonnie Cell:  xxx-xxx-xxxx

We Want to Wish You (select all):

□ A Merry Christmas

□ A joyful New Year

□     Scales that have been set back ten pounds

*Don’t worry, you don’t actually have to return the ballot (unless you want to, of course - in which case, drop it off in person and stay for a visit!)   

Love, The Overlys

David, Bonnie, Michael, Matthew and Leah

God is Not Dead

On Tuesday, July 9, 1861, with the nation in a midst of civil war, a fire in the home of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow claimed the life of his beloved wife, Fanny.  Henry had tried to save her from the raging flames and sustained serious burns.  Fanny was buried three days later, on their 18th wedding anniversary, while Henry was confined to bed, fighting to live.  

Listen to the story, as told by Edward Herrmann and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.  Its message is more important and relevant than ever:

"...For Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, as one war rages without, another rages within.  For the next two years, Christmases come and go.  Henry writes, 'How inexpressibly sad are all the holidays.  "A merry Christmas!" say the children, but that is no more for me.  Perhaps some day God will give me peace.'

"And then Henry learns that his eldest son, Charles, who ran away to join the army, has been critically wounded in battle. Henry rushes to Washington to bring his son home, and after days of searching, he finds him barely alive.  With the outbreak of war, Fanny's terrible death, and now two years later his son desperately clinging to life, we should not be surprised that on Christmas Day 1863, Henry reaches for his pen and writes, "It was as if an earthquake rent the hearthstones of a continent.  And in despair I bowed my head.  'There is no peace on earth,' I said.  For hate is strong and mocks the song of 'peace on earth, good will to men.'  

"Reading his words today we ask, when conflict rages, and pain, grief and loneliness overwhelm us, where is the music of hope and peace?  For Henry, the answer to that question has everything to do with Christmas.  After Fanny's death, he had written, 'So strong is the sense of her presence upon me, that I should hardly be surprised to look up now and see her in the room.  Death is a beginning, not an end.'  

"On that Christmas morning, it is clear to Henry that war, injury, and even death are not the end.  The rising sun turns the icy river to silver, and the windows of the Longfellow home to gold.  Henry's children bundled in winter wool are whisked past snowy fields through wooded hills and valleys along the road to home.  They look up, blinking and giggling in the falling snow, and they hear the sounds that make Christmas Christmas.  They hear the bells!  From his desk, Henry hears them too.  Renewed, he plunges his pen into fresh ink, joyfully drawing it across a sheet of snow white paper: 

"I heard the bells on Christmas day, 

Their old familiar carols play

And wild and sweet the words repeat, 

of peace on earth, good will to men."

"In those bells the message is clear: on Christmas day a child was born in a stable.  Of that child Henry writes, 'Tho in a manger thou draw breath, thou art greater than life and death.'  And so He is!

"Then pealed the bells more loud and deep, 

God is not dead nor doth he sleep.  

The wrong shall fail the right prevail

With peace on earth good will to men."  

"As the bells ring on Henry dips his pen again and again.  Because Christmas lives on, Fanny lives on, Charles lives on, a nation lives on.  And we, each one of us, may live on as well, in hope and peace forever."

First World Problems: Thanksgiving Edition

Every year, without fail, there it is in the news: whiny American workers who feel that being required to put in hours on Thanksgiving Day is a cruel and unusual punishment akin to slavery.

Since I wrote about the issue last year, I won't rehash the argument. I'm simply going to say this:

WORKING ON THANKSGIVING IS NOT A HARDSHIP.

Thank you.

And to those who were "disgusted" with the retailers who opened their doors on Thanksgiving, let me give you a hint as to how business works:  If no one comes to buy anything on Thanksgiving, stores won't be open on Thanksgiving.  But, as it is, businesses like Wal-Mart and Target make a ton of money by opening for business on holidays.  The fact that they choose to take advantage of this doesn't make them evil, it makes them smart.

Another thing that doesn't make companies evil?  Paying low wages for unskilled work. (I can't count how many articles I've seen in the last few weeks lamenting the fact that "Not only does Ima Cashier have to work on Thanksgiving, Wal-Mart only pays her $8 an hour!!!!")  One should not expect to be paid a "living wage" for doing a job that requires no skills beyond basic literacy and breathing.  If you want to earn more, you must make yourself worth more by gaining the necessary skills, schooling, and experience to move up the ladder or into a different job.  Companies can't just hand out $20 an hour to whoever needs to pay their bills without taking into account the job being performed or the value of the work.  If they did this, the company would implode, and then no one would have a job.

No one working at Wal-Mart is chained to the cash register.  If you don't like how the company treats you or what the company pays you, it is your responsibility to do something to improve your situation; i.e., gain the necessary skills or schooling to earn more money, or get a different job.  And for anyone who thinks that refusing to show up for work is "doing something", you should be fired.

Are companies always squeaky clean in their treatment of employees?  No.  But, again, if you don't like your current situation, it is your responsibility to change it.  That means you might have to find a different job.  You might have to move or go back to school or work more hours, and you might have to turn off the cable TV and the cell phone service for awhile.  A company's responsibility is not to sit around figuring out how to ensure your happiness -- that's your job -- nor to pay you more than you are worth simply because times are tough.  Yes, it's nice if companies can show a little compassion for their employees, but compassion is not doling out salaries or benefits without regard to the value of the job being done; compassion is helping employees increase their value by making sure they have a job to do.

And sometimes, that means clocking in on Thanksgiving.

So let's quit whining and get to work.

Le Blog Post

Last Sunday we had dinner guests.  Sensing the need to adhere to the laws of childhood which demand that family secrets be revealed to the general public, Michael seized the moment of passing the garlic bread to announce, cheerfully:  "My dad's been caught by the police three times!"

Luckily, the "Kids say the darndest things" banter was enough to distract from an in-depth discussion of David's no-longer-secret meth habit.

Kidding, kidding!  It was actually marijuana.

But seriously, a few speeding tickets sound a lot more felonious when your five-year-old is telling stories that conjure up images of a police chase and attack dogs.

Or, in Michael-the-French-student's case, chiens d'attaque.  At least that's what Google tells me, and I took an oath to love, honor and obey Google until it gives me bad driving directions.  Besides, an apostrophe in the middle of a word looks way more French than what I would tell Michael, which would probably be something like "le dogs" or "le woofs" or "le *incoherent phlegm noise*."

As part of his language immersion program, we are required to read to him for at least 20 minutes in English every night.  For those of you who think this sounds like a simple task, let me introduce you to the seventh circle of hell bedtime at our house.  This is an activity where we get everyone in their pajamas, squirt toothpaste all over the counter, make sure someone pees on the floor, and then start fights over who gets to sit on Mom's lap to read Hop on Pop for the fifty-seventh time.

Even a foray into the infamous Curious George Learns the Alphabet by Reading Webster's Complete Dictionary last week felt like a welcome break from Dr. Seuss and his hop on popping.  But that was mostly because I got a laugh out of the fact that George learned "G is for goldfish.  The goldfish looks gay."

Really...?  How can you tell?  Was the goldfish wearing a pink shirt and skinny jeans? (Even taking it at face value, how exactly does a goldfish look "happy"?  It seems to me that a goldfish who won the lottery and a goldfish who recently lost his mother would look equally enthralled with the world, which is to say, not at all).

But Michael loves alphabet books so we read them.  And animals, so we read about them.  Last week he even asked me to add a few creatures to our family gratitude list:  "I'm thankful for the birds and the bees, Mom!" he said.

Hmmm...

Just what are they teaching him in those French classes?

Shepherd's Pie: A History

Last night, figuring I should utilize the Sunday-roast-and-potatoes leftovers, I made shepherd's pie for dinner.  Curious about the origin of the dish, I turned to the internet -- Why is it called shepherd's pie?  Are there shepherds in it? -- Well, I learned that the term "shepherd's pie" first appeared in 1877 after a woman named Mary Shepherd (nee Lamb) got tired of her children complaining about what was for dinner, told the little darlings to "shove off" and dumped all the leftovers in the fridge into one casserole dish.  Then she stood over the table with a pitchfork until the ungrateful brats had finished every bite.

Okay, okay, I might have tweaked the history a bit.  But that's because I've had my own run-in with shepherd's pie.  You see, once upon a time when I was a wee lass, my mom served shepherd's pie for dinner.  Being the obedient, grateful child that I was, when she scooped it onto my plate, I said, "Why thank you, Mother, this looks delicious!" and I ate the whole thing.  Then I offered to do the dishes.

Hahaha!  Whew!  I couldn't even keep a straight face while writing that.

What I actually did was whine and complain and moan about having to eat it.  I whined and complained and moaned so much that my mother finally turned, scooped up a forkful of potatoes and gravy, and smeared it in my hair.

This escalated my whining to utter hysteria.  "Mom!!  N-n-n-nnnow my hair is messy!!"

She did the only reasonable thing:  She dumped an entire pitcher of water over my head.

I tell you this story not to embarrass her, but just to say, Mom, I now know EXACTLY how you felt.

And shepherd's pie?  I kind of like it.

Go figure.

Mice

Arrrrrr, Matey!