Happy Icelandic New Year!

Happy Icelandic New Year! We celebrated the incoming of a new year a few hours early - in the Iceland time zone (9 p.m. for us). The girls have been so excited to have a few friends over (16 kids and 8 adults, including our family), helping plan the menu and the decorations, and putting it all together.

We had to do a little research on Iceland, learning that fishing and volcanoes are a big deal over there. We were going to put plastic fish in our punch bowl and make a volcano on our ice cream cake, but that didn't quite work out. The flag made an appearance, however.

We also had chili and baked potatoes, brown sugar 'n bacon wrapped lil' smokies, fritos, frosty blue punch, wassail, and other yummy things brought by our wonderful guests.

We decorated with snowflakes hanging from little suction cup thingies.

Pretty!

We had baskets filled with horns to blow at "midnight".

They were very exciting and very loud.

We had icicle lights and white balloons up.

We had crepe paper and paper snowflakes, too. The favorite game of the evening was "Bananagrams". It was a great night - I loved having it all a little early. It was a fun end to 2009, and we are looking forward to a fabulous 2010.

Sledding

Random Task School

It always amuses me to find little scraps of creative play left behind by the girls. This is the back of a "report card of random tasks" for an imaginary student named Jennifer Ott. It reads:

Our Motto:
"randomness is the key to our success"
-quoted by Madelyn, founder of the random tasks school,
our goal is to teach children to do anything you're told,
no matter how random.

Happy Holidays

Russells Top 10 of 2009

10. Jon taught lots of extra classes this year, and had a crazy time keeping one step ahead of his students while teaching a Flash class for the first (and he hopes LAST) time.

9. Kristin has kept busy with scrapbooking, photo taking, dinner making, primary singing, Hope chasing and baby snuggling.

8. Madelyn has loved changing things up at her school, like supplanting their mascot and starting a school store, as Student Body President.

7. Cailin loves her technology, and shows it with her love of blogging and game playing.

6. Emma insists she never wants to grow up, and would prefer to spend her days having tea parties and playing dress up.

5. Hope has spent the last year destroying everything in her path and making us laugh with her silliness.

4. Amelia joined the Russell ranks in September and is the sweetest baby ever.

3. Madelyn and Cailin are rejoicing at a bus schedule change: from a dreadfully crowded and long bus ride, to being the first drop off from a new bus.

2. Madelyn and Cailin have learned some violin, Emma has learned some reading, Hope has learned to love nursery, and Amelia is learning to sleep.

1. After priming, painting, staining, beadboarding, curtaining and furnishing our home, we are happy to finally take a break and just enjoy it for awhile!

Snowman Dancer

We had a great visit with Jon's parents last weekend. Hope could not get enough of grandma's dancing snowman. She was fun to watch jangling alongside him.

Kitchen Makeover

It's almost nearly completely done! Look at my lovely kitchen. Jon put the last cupboard door on just as we were leaving for Illinois. It was exciting to come home again to our freshly painted kitchen. We still have to put in new flooring and install the lights above the sink and underneath cabinets, but I'm loving the new look.

Here is the before.

Merry Christmas

The girls loved having a live baby to swaddle as we reenacted the nativity. Hope was a gorgeous, albeit a little distracted, angel. Madelyn was able to fulfill her life's dream of playing the part of Mary, and Cailin was dually talented by playing the parts of both Joseph and a shepherd. Emma was a wise man, thrilled to offer her gift to the baby king.

We wish you all the very best. Merry Christmas!

Snow Day

We woke up this morning with a few inches of snow on the ground and a full snow day ahead of us. Hope is very enthusiastic about the new white stuff. She and Madelyn sat on stools and discussed this exciting development as soon as we opened the curtains.

I got furniture rearranged and our tree put up yesterday after several snafoos. I wasn't liking where it was positioned and kept trying to move it, which broke the base and caused me to have to disassemble and reassemble a total of three times. The lights were another headache. We were happy to finally get it up, though, and the girls enjoyed putting on our ornaments. I was surprised to realize almost all our ornaments are ones we brought home from Abu Dhabi - lots of hand painted balls and stars and Santas riding elephants. I'll have to hit some after-Christmas sales and add some sparkle to our tree for next year.

Hope keeps taking down collections of ornaments from the tree. I stitched these little gingerbread people together when I was pregnant with Madelyn.

Hope really likes wearing the stars and pictures around her wrists. We got tired of reclaiming all our ornaments, so we now have a half-naked tree with everything up high out of her reach.

We made real gingerbread cookies today.

I particularly like Madelyn's camel decorated with cinnamon chips and cinnamon dots.

Kitchen update: The lower black cabinets are in! I love the silver hardware, and the paint job looks terrific. The creamy white upper cabinet doors should be going in by the end of the week.

bagladies

The girls wanted to jump on the tramp, so I made them put grocery sacks over their socks to keep them warm and dry. (Emma's not really as sad as she looks.)

As long as no one breaks a leg this will work.

Hope's 2-year check up

Hope went to her 2-year check up today. She got a little finger prick to test for lead. At the lab, I kept her sitting in her stroller while I leaned over to help hold her arm while the doctor pricked and squeezed the finger. Hope was a little agitated, until I leaned far enough over for Amelia's head to be right next to Hope's (Amelia was in the Ergo, of course). As soon as Hope and Amelia were cheek to cheek, Hope was calm and sweet and let the squeezing continue until we had 2 vials filled. That baby sister love calmed her right down. We also learned that Hope is extraordinarily tall. The nurse measured her twice, because she couldn't believe Hope had grown as much as she did. She was way off the chart. The doctor said that at the height Hope is at now, she has the potential of being very tall - like over 6 feet! Hope refused to look at the doctor during the examination, and had a fit when she removed her diaper. The Dr, after spending a few minutes with Hope, suggested we read a book about strong-willed children by James Dobson. I suppose it couldn't hurt!

First Snow

We got our first snowfall yesterday - just a light cover, but enough to have a little fun. Not quite enough to do a jump like this one Madelyn attempted. The final impact was not as soft as she had expected it to be.

Emma making snow grass angels.

Cailin enjoying being Hope's pink fluff snowsuit twinner.

Pixie Cribs

Our ward does a Pixie exchange every year for a couple weeks before the big Christmas party. We draw names and anonymously drop off at least 3 surprises. Last Sunday we found these cribs stacked five high, adorned with the girls names and favorite colors. Such a cute idea for these girls. Their dolls and stuffed animals have been sleeping in style.

Happy Day After Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner today. Shawn, Marti and Jack made the trip from Ann Arbor a day late, since Jack wasn't feeling well yesterday. We simply postponed our festivities until we could celebrate together.

We had turkey and noodles, mashed potatoes, green beans with bacon, Rhodes rolls, and salad with pomegranate, kiwi, strawberries and avocado! Fabulous. Dessert followed with pumpkin pie and cheesecake. Emma made the place markers. Thanks so much for coming, guys. We loved having you!

On Thanksgiving Day we got an early start on our kitchen cabinets. Jon a.k.a. "the boy in the bubble" got everything sanded down, and I got a coat of primer put on on the cabinet boxes. We are a couple steps closer to getting it done!

To prepare for the sanding, we emptied the cabinets and dumped everything in the office. Wow.

Pumpkins

I want to stop everything and make these pumpkins right now. If only my to-do list wasn't already a mile long! Great tutorial here.

About Hope

Hope is 2. She loves Elmo and Blues Clues and Bear in the Big Blue House. Hope's favorite foods are pears, toast with grape jelly, broccoli, yogurt, apples, cheese and peanut butter granola bars. Hope loves her daddy. She follows him everywhere and yells "daaaaaad!" and runs to where he enters the house from the mudroom when he comes home from work.

Hope loves to color on paper, in notebooks, on her magnadoodles, and on my walls. She likes us to draw hophops (bunnies), kittys, dogs, balloons and pumpkins for her to scribble on. Hope calls every insect she sees a "bee". Spiders, beetles, ants and bees are all "bees". When asked if she would like something, she says, "do. I do." Hope puts everything in her mouth. We are constantly pulling out coins, hair clips and rubberbands, chewed up stickers and paper, erasers, crayons and small toys from her mouth. Hope loves books to read and to destroy. She loves to go on "walkwalks", and is thrilled when we come across dogs and cats.

Hope loves her sisters, and is so gentle and sweet with baby Amelia. She nuzzles her face with her nose and lips, gives her soft kisses and asks to hold her so she can do aforementioned things. When Amelia cries in her crib upstairs, Hope will run up and bang on the door to try and rescue her. Hope loves to take her nap every day. She sometimes begs for it, and happily cuddles up with her fuzzy soft blanket and sleeps for 2 to 3 hours. Hope is a disaster and a joy, a hurricane and a character, a fighter and a lover. We love this girl.

Apple Crisp

A few days ago I got a bag of Macintosh apples for super cheap, not knowing if I really liked Macintoshes. We usually stick to our Fujis. I was not impressed with the tart, white flesh as an eating apple, so I decided to make apple crisp. My usual go-to recipe has been letting me down the last few times, so I tried something new, and found the most delicious recipe that my bag of Macintoshes have been scrumptious in. I've made this crisp twice this week, and is my new fave recipe.

Apple Crisp

4 c macintosh apples
2/3 c brown sugar
1/2 c flour
1/2 c oats
1 tsp cinnamon
1/3 c butter

Peel and slice apples. Spread in a greased 8x8" pan. Cut butter into remaining ingredients and sprinkle over apples. Bake at 375 for 30 - 35 minutes. Eat with vanilla ice cream.

Thanks for painting

We got the first coat of paint on the walls in the kitchen last night! I brushed in the grooves of the beadboard while Jon followed behind with a roller to smooth everything out. Love the thank you note Emma made Jon.

In Love

I am so in love with this little baby.

Leaf Lost

During our walk home from school today, Emma decided to dash through this massive pile of leaves on the side of the road. I watched her as she suddenly stopped, turned, and looked a bit apprehensive. I asked her what she was doing, and she yelled back, "I lost my shoe in the leaves!"

Oh, yes she did. It took me a few minutes of kicking and digging, but we finally found her shoe in the middle of all those leaves!