PJ Jonas – Page 155 – Teaching Families to Work Hard Together

Daddy Solutions

Have you ever noticed that moms and dads respond to the same situations very differently? I know this, and yet, Jim still surprises me with how differently he handles some of the problems our family is always creating. I easily admit that many of his solutions are better than mine. But quite often, Jim will…

October 22, 2007

Seeking Shelter

So tell me, have you ever tried to fit 10 people in a 10 x 10 room for half an hour? What if the room is more than half taken up by crates of canning jars? And the ceiling is only 5 feet 2 inches tall? And you’re underground? Oh, and it is waaaay past…

October 19, 2007

The never-ending to do list

In a large family, there is ALWAYS something that needs to be done. Always. Not most of the time. Always. Usually I put it on my to-do list, and there it stays, either to die a peaceful death, or to be moved up to emergency gotta do right now status. That is why nobody in…

October 18, 2007

Be glad you don’t have any boys… ?!?

While we were in the hospital with Hewitt’s pneumonia, we had some prescriptions that we needed to fill. Normally this is my duty, but I was sticking with my little boy and did what any good mother would do in this situation – I delegated it to my husband. So off Jim went with the…

October 18, 2007

My new look

After 7 years of not having bangs, I decided to have them again! I cut them myself – so don’t say anything negative 😉 I have had several comments that now I REALLY look young. What do you think? Who is older, me or Jade?

October 18, 2007

No girly dress-ups

We have a dress-up trunk. The children pulled it out about two months ago and played with it. After a while, there was general grumbling from the boys that the trunk was too “girly”. There weren’t enough boy things to dress-up as. They were right. The trunk mostly contained my old prom dresses, bridal gowns,…

October 18, 2007

A Messy Family Tradition

Family traditions are very important to me. I work hard to try to establish ones that are not date specific and require little prep time. I’ve found that when I have a family tradition that HAS to take place on a certain day, inevitably it is a bad day and I have no energy (or…

October 18, 2007

Dad can do anything

Hewitt got a Cars magna doodle type toy from his Grammy and Gumpy after his hospital stay. It comes with an attached book that shows you how to draw the different characters from Cars. This toy has been a huge hit and something that gives Hewitt quite a bit of control in the family pecking…

October 18, 2007

A Hospital Stay

Last week, Hewitt woke up with a “cold”. He had been perfectly healthy the night before. He was having rapid, shallow breathing and was lethargic. Those were his only symptoms. No coughing, no fever. By midafternoon there was no improvement. I didn’t like the way he was acting, so I made an appointment to bring…

October 18, 2007

Square Dancing, Anyone?

About a month ago, we were invited to go square dancing at a friend’s house. Now, the Jonas family never does anything half-heartedly. If we were going to go square dancing, we were going to do our best to look like square dancers – or at least a cheap imitation of country hicks 😉 The…

October 18, 2007

Squooshy hugs

Having 8 children is absolutely wonderful… and crazy! But when the crazy starts to overwhelm, I try to focus on the wonderful. And right now, wonderful means lots of warm, squooshy hugs. You know, the kind where the arms wrap around you and the child tries to squeeze you as hard as he can? I’ve…

October 17, 2007