Stawberry Jam, Anyone?

For anyone who doesn't know, Bryce is absolutely obsessed with homemade strawberry jam. He won't even eat store-bought jam from our refridgerater any more. Instead, he will persist on having homemade jam until I've finally heard enough about it and I just do it. And its not that I don't like making it (its really not that hard), I just can't make more than 2 or 3 batches at a time because I don't have the freezer room. Two batches of jam barely lasts any amount of time at our house, so this time I decided to make him quart-sized jars instead of the pints. Caleb saw Bryce get it out of the freezer the other night and exclaimed, "whoa! that's a lot of jam!" Indeed it is! Hopefully it will last a little longer . . .

Cookie Date

I started a new incentive with the kids to reward good behavior: Good Girl and Good Boy charts. If we have a good behavior that day, the older kids get a sticker on their chart (James got one if he didn't pee in his bed - but he's done with that so now its a good boy chart). Anyway, they fill up their chart and get an ice cream date with Mom! It's usually really good motivation for them, and I like the chance to take them out. James just finished his chart for the first time, and seeing as it is like 8 degrees here (!), we went to a new place called "Crumb and Get IT" to get cookies instead! Its a fun place where you choose your dough and your mix in and they make it right there for you, nice and warm. Then we went to Starbucks and shared a Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate (way yummy! - thanks for the tip, Kyle!). It was so fun to be just me and him! The whole time we were eating our cookies, he kept breaking his cookie up in pieces and explaining to me which piece was Lucy's, Caleb's, and Daddy's. How generous! I kept telling him that he didn't HAVE to share, but he insisted.



This other picture is just my cute crawling Annabelle wearing a vest that I was wrapping up for a baby shower that Caleb insisted on trying on her!

A little Freaky!

Caleb had these googly eyes and gave them to Lucy and James yesterday. We were eating a snack at the table last night and i looked over to see James drinking from his cup with this strange eyeball looking back at me! The picture doesn't quite do the trick, but it totally weirded me out. The rest of the night he was going around trying to scare me with his floating eyeball (kind of reminded me of Mad Eye from HP!).

New Year's Eve

We spent the last week in Danville, PA with our friends, the Parkinsons. It was fun to see their new house and tour around their new town! The kids had a great time playing games, watching movies, building forts, playing in the snow, and whatever else it is that kids do. The adults had fun eating really good food (my pants really don't fit the same way they did when before we got there!), playing LOTs of fun games, talking, watching movies, shopping, and celebrating the new year together. I was planning on joining my sister, Kristen in the big apple to see the ball drop in person, but a big snow storm kept me from going. Luckily Kristen came to visit us the next day and it was sooooo great to see her! What a fun week!

Christmas, finally!

We love Christmas time and it all happened so fast! We had a good time making treats for people, making Gingerbread houses, caroling, eating treats, and just being together! Its been so nice having Caleb and Bryce home. We've played lots of games and been quite busy. I'm a little sad that school starts on Monday! Oh well. Real life comes back so quickly! We were here at home for Christmas and then drove to DC a few days after to spend time with our cousins Peter and Kuuipo and their family and to do the temple and temple lights and stuff. It was great fun. Merry Christmas!

Christmas Letter

For those of you we missed, here's the link to our Christmas Letter! Hope this Christmas season finds you all merry and bright!

http://jorgensenchristmasletter.blogspot.com/

A Florida Thanksgiving

We spent our Thanksgiving Break in Florida this year with ou friends, the Raymonds!!! Oh what fun we had! I bravely drove down on Saturday with the 4 kids by myself. We were origianally all going to go together on Tuesday when Bryce would be home from his confrence in California, but I just couldn't wait that long! So, we arrived a few days early to "help" out with the new baby! Ok, Ok, I just really wanted to see the baby really bad :). We did try to help as much as we could though. The weather was absolutely perfect the whole trip - lower to mid 70's and sunshine all the time! The kids spent a lot of time outside, mostly playing in the black Florida dirt/sand, but also catching little frogs and working all day making up "parties." Bryce flew in Monday night and we were glad to have him join us! We spent the rest of the week going to the beach, touring the church ranch (picking oranges and wild-life watching), and playing in Orlando. We visited Downtown Disney (which was really quite amazing!), and we road the monorail around to some of the Disney resorts and to the DisneyWorld park. I was hoping that Bryce would catch the Disney fever and have an overwhelming desire to take us there next year. I think that did it. Anyone want to join us next summer?! We are home now and still trying to get settled into our tiny home. It seems that everytime we visit someone with a home, our apartment seems to shrink! We had a fantastic trip and it was so good to share the holidays with people we love. Happy Thanksgiving!