Christmas...

We just had a lovely 4 day Christmas celebration as a family. It was very nice and relaxing! We pups got some new pink collars (our other ones were STINKY! In fact, WE are stinky and need baths too- get on that, EMMA!) The boys loved opening presents this year (Cole especially), and moved from one present to the next very quickly. We read the story of Jesus' birth from Cole's new Bible. When we woke up in the morning, it was raining very hard. Cole asked, "Is it raining because God poured a cup of water down?"

It's been fun to have Jon home for 4 whole days and not be traveling! I'm sure we won't always have Christmases like this one, but I do hope that we will try to be still and remember why we're celebrating in years to come!

Favorite gift for each kid?

Colton- Legos. He loves those things! (And Jon had a fun time assembling them too!)

Beckett- Chapstick. He'd carry that thing around and put it on all day if he could. He's so proud to have his own.

Peanut Butter Kisses ROCK!

Addie Here. I just wanted to share with you the most delicious treat that I experienced this week. Yes, they might have been sealed in a bag and pushed to the back of the counter top... but I found a way to reach them and eat every single one (even most of the plastic bag too!). These peanut butter kiss cookies were quite a favorite- Jon and the boys LOVED eating them and Emma obviously liked taking pictures of them. I hear they'll be making more and plan to keep them away from me. We'll see how that goes!

Today

Highlights of our trip to Texas

We doggies were not allowed to fly out to Texas with our family for Thanksgiving this year. We're not holding it against them, just saying that Jessica made the effort to drive down with her pups and they had a great time spending time with our family. In this blog post, we're going to pretend we got to have fun in Texas...

Jessica and the boys. Suprisingly Emma didn't take any pictures of Banter and Taupper!

Grannie and Grandpa with the boys. I think we bribed Colton with dessert here...

We went down to Temple to spend Thanksgiving day with family and had a great time!

Zane and Maddie kept the boys entertained and they had a great time together. Zane even taught Colton how to tackle his mommy. Hmm.... Thanks Zane!

Here's Jessica and Al when we went to the Botanical Gardens to take family pictures. It was a beautiful place!

The boys loved playing with Jeremy and Chillon. The boys quickly warmed up to Chillon when she gave them a piece of gum. GUM is their favorite these days! Beckett finally keeps it in his mouth now.

A goofy family photo. Those are always fun.

The boys' favorite activity in Texas was a train ride in Fort Worth. We went twice and the train went through the park, across a river and under another (real) train track. They thought it was great!

Besides the trains, an all week favorite activity was playing in the leaves in Ima and Papa's backyard. Neighbor kids came over.

They ran, jumped, hid in & threw all over- wonderful fall leaves!

skydiving

As some of you may know, Jon got to go skydiving while he was out in Texas to celebrate turning 30 this year. He dove along with his brother, sister & dad. They had an amazing experience!

Jon's grandparents along with his Aunt Sheri & Uncle Benjie joined the rest of the family to watch the event and we all had a great time together. The boys had a great time playing outside, drawing with chalk on the pavement & watching their daddy jump out of a plane!

[ Beckett liked playing in the doorway to the airplane hangar. ]

Beckett's 2nd Birthday!

BECKETT is 2 years old! Since our family was in Texas for the big day, Emma and Jon took the boys and a few of their friends to Plaza Fiesta, an amazing Latino mall with a gigantic playplace in the middle. The kids had a blast!

just some cute pics from this week...

{WHO LOVES THESE BOYS?}

{Beck made it to the top of the playground jungle gym and daddy was very proud when he saw the picture!}

{Colton was in a very photographic mood this day!}

{Beck shows Colin which way to hit the stick on the playground}

SUPER halloween

SUPER Lion and SUPER Fix it Man will save the DAY! The most adorable lion and the cutest daddy wannabe made their way around the neighborhood and collected a fair amount of candy on Saturday night. Unfortunately, those little guys can always use a hand and we weren't invited to walk down the street with cute little humans (Not to mention the fact that we LOVE little humans and would have been a little WILD!). Colton and Beckett's buddies Maddie and Eli came over as a unicorn and a HOTDOG. The hotdog costume was a hit- and everyone wanted to eat him up! Well please leave comments and tell Emma to get working on our capes. We are SUPER dogs, after all. Addie finds a way most nights recently how to position herself on the couch no matter what barriers Emma and Jon place for her. And Jenga's superbark definitely wards off evildoers from the Joersz home- especially that blasted UPS man (Though she did manage to sleep through someone opening our car door one night this week and taking our ipod and gps....)

We have some new friends and a set of amazing pumpkins displayed on our front porch. The Daraja Children's Choir from Africa came to our church for a concert this week and we were able to host 3 boys from Kenya and their chaperone from Atlanta. We had so much fun with Eddy, Kevin, Ian & CJ and wish they could have stayed longer! The concert was awesome- to see the kids' passion for worshiping God was contagious. We painted pumpkins on Monday night and all the boys (including Colton and Beckett) absolutely loved it. The boys also loved the fish and were interested in us doggies, but we were a little too hyper to come in and play! To see more about the Daraja Children's Choir, check out their website! We miss you boys!!!

[Kevin, Eddy, & Ian]

Biking fun!

It's beautiful outside today and so Emma and the boys went on a walk...without us! We were so upset, but then we realized that Cole was riding his bike for the first time around the neighborhood, and we figured Emma wanted to devote extra attention to him rather than keep up with a stroller, a biker AND two pups. She had nothing to fear at all though and should have brought us with her, because COLE WAS A PRO! He did so good! He has been really nervous about getting on the bike and is finally getting used to it. Maybe we'll go on a walk after naptime... and this time, we'll get to go!

Emma and the boys had a great time at Riverbend Farm with Kristie, Norah & Eliah yesterday! Apparently the mornings there are set aside for schools, but they were able to group up with some schools and go on a wagon ride, pick a pumpkin out of a field and then explore all the fun things at the farm! There were fun animals at the farm- even a Beckett sized turkey. The favorite activity might have been the handmade climbing tower/slide made out of farm equipment---or possibly just the wagon ride. The fun time ended with a wonderful picnic in the grass...which ended with a not so wonderful experience with fire ants! Poor Eliah!

[Who loves the boys' new winter hats???]

cute pups...

our new favorite spot.

we have a wonderful new place to sit and relax and enjoy doggy life- a screen porch Jon and some men he works with have built over the past week. we have an amazing new contraption called a doggy door. we love it and think our family loves it too. please come over and visit us to sit in the pleasant new room!

lots of kids at their house....

[we're going to be best buds even though it may seem we're always upset with each other right now...]

Lacey and Kevin went to Atlanta to go to a concert this week and so Emma and the boys went down to hang out with the Keigley kids minus baby Otto. 6 kids 6 and under was a little hectic but fun! Oma came for the night as well and we went to Skytop Orchard Wednesday morning. It was a beautiful day to go apple picking and the kids had a great time. They loved the apple doughnuts and cider. We got together with neighbor friends last night and enjoyed cinnamon apples and apple pie! We doggies didn't get to enjoy the apple treats but heard they were delicious!

this kid...

...is so cute and fun. Beckett has really been into wearing hats lately. He gets upset when his hats don't fit anymore. In this picture, he really wanted to wear Colton's VT hat. He felt like such a big kid and was so proud of himself wearing it. He also likes wearing mommy's hat and just got a new hand-me-down hat from Bergen. It looks adorable on him.