Christmas Day

Christmas morning began at 2:30 am when I saw lights and heard sounds coming from the living room.  Instead of Santa I found two kids (Kerri and Jarin) rummaging through their stockings.  Trevor had already come and gone.  I sent them to bed again and awoke two minutes later to five kids singing Christmas carols at our door - it was 6 am.  We turned on Christmas music, had a prayer of thanks, opened presents, ate breakfast and went back to bed (just the parents) for two more hours until it was time to get ready for church.  I love Christmas on a Sunday.  I wish Christmas was always on a Sunday - with church being at 11 o'clock that is.   I can't think of a better way to celebrate the birth of our Savior.

I think Makayla may be one of the last ones in high school to have a cell phone.

Welcome to technology!

After church we drove to Redmond to celebrate with the whole Jensen clan.  Grandma and Grandpa gave EVERYONE an awesome family history binder.  It is full of family trees and stories from both the Jensen and Christensen side of the family back to the mid 1800's.  The kids sat right down and started reading the stories.  We played a round of white elephant gifts and grandma won the famous Christmas goose.  Unlike Andres and Kylee who hid it in our bath tub after the Pack party, Grandma stole and kept it.  Yeah!

Lico and Lica gave the kids Just Dance 3 and an extra wii remote.  We totally had a blast dancing the next day.  The girls danced for three hours straight and stopped only to refuel their energy.

Merry Christmas!

Froggy on the Mantle - part 3

*Day 20:  Froggy plays Jenga with the presents.  Froggy!

*Day 21:  Froggy goes fishin'.  Froggy!

*Day 22:  Froggy rides the zip line he made in the kitchen.  Froggy!

*Day 23:  Froggy shows off his muscles to Minnie.  Froggy!

*Day 24:  Froggy sleeps under the Christmas tree with the kids.

*Day 25:  Froggy waits for everyone to get up on Christmas morning.

Merry Christmas Froggy!

Thanks for making our December fun.

Christmas Eve Eve

Christmas Eve Eve is always our big fun family day.  We started out by taking the whole family to Costco (nutty) to buy breakfast for the next couple of mornings.  We combined the trip with a quick stop (one hour) at the library.  We are such a nerdy bunch.  For a late lunch, Cameron took the kids to Pizza Pie Cafe (free kid coupons from school) while I cleaned and cooked watched The Help.  Then we made gingerbread houses, ate snacks, watched A Chrismas Carol and slept under the Christmas tree listening to dad retell the story of Elephina.  It was a good day.  

Christmas Eve:  

-Everyone got warm cozy robes except Jarin, he got pajamas.

-Yummy dinner of ham, baked potato bar and veggies.

-Christmas Eve concert of Christmas music on the piano by the kids.

-Dad read Luke 2 and everyone shared their favorite Christmas memory.

-Short trip to Ro Minervini's home to reveal her 12 days of Christmas family - us.  (We secretively took small gifts to her for eleven nights and left running and giggling.)  She invited us in for songs, hot chocolate, cookies and Christmas cheer.  The kids said this was the best part of the whole night. 

Merry Christmas!

Homemade Laundry Soap

I have been making our laundry soap for over a year now.  I started out by making liquid detergent, but that was too much work, took too much time and too much room and I didn't like it.  Then I switched to powder and love it for my HE machine. It doesn't have the Tide smell that I like, in fact my clothes don't smell at all but it cleans.  That's what counts, right?  Upon searching different recipes, I finally found one I like.   I found all the ingredients at my local store.

Homemade Laundry Powder 

4 bars of Fels-Naptha

4 cups of Borax

4 cups of Washing Soda

1 box of Baking Soda - a lot of people don't use this, I don't think it hurts so I add it.

1 cup of Oxi-clean  

Grate the bars with a cheese grater.  Blend about two cups at a time of grated soap for a couple of seconds in a blender to a fine consistency.  Don't blend too long or else it will melt a teeny bit and harden in the bottom of the blender.  I learned the hard way.

Mix all ingredients and store in a container.  

Use one heaping tablespoon for light loads and 2 tablespoons for heavy loads.

I add 1 scoop of oxi-clean to my whites too.

I don't know how much money I am saving, I just know it is A LOT!

Froggy on the Mantle - part 2

*Day 13:  Froggy toilet papers the tree and gets stuck.  Froggy!

*Day 14:  Froggy hangs out in the kid's underwear.  Froggy!  (the kids were NOT amused)

*Day 15:  Froggy turns the milk green.  Froggy!

*Day 16:  Froggy has a snowball fight.  Froggy!

*Day 17:  Froggy hold Baby Jesus.  Ohhhh, Froggy.

*Day 18:  Froggy takes Minnie Mouse on a date.  Mickey's mad!  Froggy!

*Day 19:  Froggy plays the piano for the carolers.  Froggy!

Stay tuned for Froggy's last days to Christmas!

Christmas Sing

The yearly school Christmas sing is one of my favorite events to attend now that I don't have toddlers to cart around.  As soon as I see one of my cute little Jensenites, I walk pass two hundred people to the front, snap a couple of pictures, walk back to my seat  and enjoy their  Christmas carols.  It is a great thing I tell you.  I love it all - from K to 6th grade!  

These pictures remind me of 'Where's Waldo?'  Can you find a Jensen or two?

Froggy on the Mantle - part 1

Have you heard of the Elf on the Shelf?  It's a big Christmas sensation right now.  It's about a cute little elf that comes to your house with a book and sits on your shelf to make sure you are being nice so that he can report back to Santa.  During December nights the elf gets into mischief and the kids have to look for him in the morning to put him back on the shelf.

Instead of an elf, we have a frog.  This is Froggy on the Mantle with a magic Christmas hat.  He came a couple of days before December to scope the Jensenites out.  He gets into as much mischief as any elf.  The kids wake up every morning looking for Froggy.  Kerri even gets up around two in the morning to catch Froggy in his mischief.  It's been great fun!

*Froggy collecting our Santa letters.

*Day 1:  Froggy took over Oreo's bed and toy.  Froggy!

*Day 2:  Froggy is trying to turn the water on to take a bath.  Froggy!

*Day 3:  Froggy was caught drawing mustaches on our photos.  Froggy!

*Day 4:  Froggy fell in love with the Christmas Goose.  Froggy!

*Day 5:  Froggy hanging from the ceiling fan.  Froggy

*Day 6:  Froggy got into the band-aides.  Froggy!

*Day 7:  Froggy bowling with our toilet paper.  Froggy!

*Day 8:  Froggy making a snow angel from flour.  Froggy!

*Day 9:  Froggy took over the 'star spot'.  Froggy!

*Day 10:  Froggy brings us all the goodies to make Gingerbread Houses.  Yeah Froggy!

*Day 11:  Froggy playing Monoply with the Webkinz.  He has most of the money.  Froggy!

*Day 12:  Froggy was too tired and slept on the mantle.  He did take Oreo for a ride later that day.  Froggy!

Stay tuned to see what Froggy does the next 12 days.