Tales of Professor Poopypants,
brought to you by Captain Underpants,
hated by Mother Wears-the-Pants,
loved by Dallin Smartypants,
and read by Daddy Sillypants.

Dallin would rather have Adam read to him at night than me. I was so glad when he started bringing home Captain Underpants books!

The other day I heard them reading and just had to document it for posterity. No wonder Dallin likes Adam to read to him-he does a great Professor Poopypants. (You might want to fast forward the first part, it's a little difficult to hear)



From now on Adam will be known as Professor Poopypants, or just Poopypants for short. Feel free to use his new name at any time; work, church, on the telephone, or when sending email.

Long live Adam Poopypants!!

It's been a busy week and for some reason I don't have many pictures-bummer! But, I need to catch up on news of what we've been doing:

I've been interpreting a couple of days a week. It's good to get out of the house and stimulate my quickly deteriorating brain. I've also been reading like a mad-woman to complete an independent study course to gain CEU's (Continuing Education Units) and keep my interpreting certification. There are several PTO events looming on the horizon and Young Women activities are also keeping me busy.

Dallin had pack meeting this week and LOOOOVES scouts. He finished his Bobcat and we're starting to work on his Wolf now. He's also taking piano lessons and trying out for baseball. He's trying to "Play up" into the Minor A league with a friend of his. He did a good job at try outs and most importantly he had fun. We will find out what team he is on in March. He's working hard in school and we're spending extra time at home on reading and math facts (I hate math facts). After school his favorite thing to do is find a friend to play with.

Maura is getting two more teeth and has been grouchier than usual. She loves going to the babysitter when I go to work. She giggles as we pull into the driveway of the babysitter and walks to the door and knocks herself. She is a busy little bee that would rather be out doing something than hanging around the house. We attached a baby seat to my bicycle and we have enjoyed riding around the neighborhood. She has a hard time entertaining herself and demands my attention often. Her latest way of getting attention is to pinch and grab my leg if I'm working on the computer-little stinker! She's starting to sign more lately. She can sign: more, please, bath, all-done, food, shoes, and night-night. We are really enjoying her cute personality.

Adam is enjoying his job and he's really good at it. I'm glad that he comes home happy. (It helps that he gets to ride his cool motorcycle to and from work). He's done several modifications to it and enjoys tinkering with it when he gets the chance. The kids are always so happy when he gets home from work. He and Dallin enjoy reading Captain Underpants together each evening.

That's about it for this week...tune in next week for more excitement in the lives of the Russell Family.

Winter

My dad lives in Star Valley Wyoming. He often sends me pictures of what he is doing. He especially likes to send us pictures during the summer of beautiful mountains and lush grass as we are baking here in the desert. But right now in Wyoming, it's WINTER.

They've gotten a lot of snow this winter (the pile of snow is higher than his truck).

He sent me an email detailing his chore of shoveling the roof.

He does it several times during the winter to keep his house standing. The weight of the snow would cause the roof to collapse it if he let it pile up. It's a big job. I feel very sorry for you dad.


We have a lot of work to do around here too. It is WINTER after all. We have to mow the lawn...

pick rocks out of the flower beds,

Trim the bushes,

pick the peas,


and other WINTER chores.


Wish you were here dad, we would love some help with the yard! (hee hee hee)

My dad, the pecan...

Have I ever said my dad is a nut? Yep, certifiable! He's one of those good kinds of nuts though. Like a cashew or pistachio.

He always has some project he is working on, some of them a little nuttier than others. This is the most recent. I think it is mostly Colleen's idea, but dad is always game for an adventure.


They started an "Old folks home for horses" is how he explained it to me. It's called Jackson Hole Regional Horse Rescue. Sounds like a fun job (if you love horses, that is).

He sent me a message today about how it's going:

The last four days we have acquired 7 horses, given to Jackson
Hole Regional Horse Rescue of which Colleen is CEO.  A guy called on
Wednesday and said he couldn't afford to feed his two horses any
more, gave us two mares, a 14 year old and a 5 year old.  We went and
got them and brought them home, then fixed up a water trough for them
and started feeding them gold-plated hay. ($150 per ton)  Then
Thursday Roger Coles at the bank called and said they repossessed
five horses and two of them were so skinny they were on death's door
and would we like to take them or should they take them out and shoot
them.  Colleen, of course, said she would love the challenge.  The
brand inspector said they had to lean against each other to stand
up.  We went and got them, an older mare and a yearling filly, and
yes, they are skin and bones but they can walk and eat.  So we took
them to Bedford and put them in Darin Day's barn and put some feed
and grain into them.  Will be taking care of them every day, along
with Chip who is there with a badly cut foot which Colleen and I
doctor every other day.  then today, Saturday, Roger Coles called and
said they couldn't find homes for the other three mares so would we
come get them.  So in a very heavy snowstorm we hitched up the
trailer and went and caught them and brought them home.  Three mares,
a very skittish black one, probably unbroken, a good chestnut which
is gentle enough it probably is good riding, and a tri-colored paint
mare kind of smallish which is butterscotch, white, and black
colored.  pretty mare.  So we have a menagerie.

So, if you're a nut like my dad or just want to learn about the nutty tree I fell off, take a look:
Jackson Hole Regional Horse Rescue.

Maura's Game

I'm not sure what she calls it, but it is one of her favorites.

First, she chooses a magnet off the refrigerator,


Then she puts it in her mouth,


and gives it to me with her teeth.

We played it for a looooong time today. She is a CHARACTER!

All about Maura...

As if I don't have enough pictures of the girl.

She is such a phone lover. At such a young age, how does she know what to do with the telephone?


I'm terrified of the teen years.


Maura loves it when friends come to play. We had a few (11) friends over the other night so their parents could go out. Maura had a blast! She and Rylie spent some quality time together perfecting their piano skills.

I was amazed at how long they spent together at the piano. They just played and laughed for the longest time. (Note the difference in hair length-they are only a couple weeks apart in age-poor Maura inherited my hair *sigh*)



They worked very well together. Maura turned pages and Rylie sang along.


She is such a fun girl. We are so blessed to have her!

Today was the big day!

Here he is at 6am getting ready to leave the house. Impressive, don't you think?

We went and watched Adam finish his half marathon. The Woolf's came with us along with about 50,000 other people! We had to park about a mile away then hurry through the crowds to find a place where we could see Adam cross the finish line. We stood around in a big parking lot looking over the heads of the crowd to try and find Adam. We were afraid we wouldn't be able to find him! Can YOU pick him out of this crowd??

When we got there, we were early and had to wait a while. The kids were exhausted from our mile hike (imagine doing 13??).



We watched and waited for almost an hour and then, there he was! We scrambled to get good pictures (unfortunately, I am not a professional photographer-I'm a little disappointed I didn't get better pictures).

Here he is!



He was with Ruth, his friend from work he had trained with. They are awesome!

We are so proud of him! He was a little disappointed that during the race he had problems with his knee and needed to stop and get it wrapped, but he finished in good time. He really is amazing to me!

My hero!

I can't wait to see what he is going to do next...


Oooooo, I almost forgot. When we got home he took a shower and came out looking like this:


Maura didn't recognize him, but I sure do! LOVE the baby face!

The big race!

Did I tell you Adam is doing a half marathon?? Can you believe that! He is so amazing! He has been training for about 5 months now and has really improved. He just read an entry he made on his web site at the beginning of his training and he was complaining about how tough it was to run 3 miles. Now he runs 8 or 10 miles three times a week! AMAZING!

I'll be sure to post pictures of the finish line! Check out the info of P.F. Chang's Rock 'n Roll Marathon!

ARRRRGH!

I began today by sitting down and making a list of projects I wanted to accomplish this week. (*As aside note, I am a list person. I make lists and crossing things off-it gives me a sense of accomplishment. Sometimes I make lists of things I have already done just so I can cross them off! GRIN)

Close to the top of the list is "Make Blog book for 2008".

After a few errands, laundry, cleaning bathrooms and sweeping floors, I put Maura down for a nap and opened my "BOOKSMART" program to begin the process. Much to my dismay blurb.com does not support blogger any longer! That means my formerly easy process of one click to import all my 2008 pictures is now nine-million clicks importing one picture at a time!!!! *%#&@!!!

I sent a plea to blurb.com and the blurberati replied they are working on the problem and hope to have it fixed sometime in early '09. %#$$@@!!

*SIGH* so now I'm staring at my blog entries wondering what to do...do I wait to see what happens or begin the picture-by-picture importing process....*%$#!!

My list-crossing off has been foiled #$%#@!! Blasted Blurberati anyway.

Humor of an 8-year-old or Bekki eats her words

Dallin is an emerging reader and he wants so badly to read chapter books. He will put them in his backpack and carry them around even though they are too advanced for him. He tries so hard to read them, but quickly gets overwhelmed. I've been struggling to find a chapter book that isn't too overwhelming yet interests him.

A million years ago when I was studying to be a teacher there was a discussion about literature for children and whether or not it mattered what a child was reading as long as the child was reading. I wholeheartedly stated that- any book is good as long as it interests the child.

10 years later I am eating my words...

One day Dallin brought home a chapter book from school he was excited about reading. Some kind soul (cough, cough) suggested he try this book and he LOOOOOVES it! The title of this book? CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS!!!! Now he brings home a different one each week and reads them to us each night. He thinks they are hilarious! The WORST part is that Adam does too! They both get a kick out of some of the jokes.

I HATE, I repeat, I HATE Captain Underpants books. I don't like their jokes, I don't like that many words are misspelled, and I don't like the illustrations, and the stories are just ridiculous. They just seem so crude to me. (I can appreciate that they were written by young boys and bravo for them, but come on!)

I've tried to find other books he is equally excited about and have yet to be successful. So far I have bitten my tounge and tried to live by my former philosophy, but it's pretty difficult when the reader is your son!

So, this morning Dallin was giggling to himself and finally came to me and said; "Mom, this is inappropriate, but I want to tell you a funny thing I read." (YIKES, I THINK IN MY HEAD) He then says; "We shake our big butts when we swim in the toilet." Then he laughed and laughed and laughed.

Well, at least he knows it's inappropriate...darn that Captain Underpants! Curse that Captain Underpants! May you die a thousand deaths! or Thank you Captain Underpants for helping my son love reading!

I'm feeling a little schitzophrenic today....

I will never understand 8-year-old boys.

Getting Bekki

Some say when I was younger I teased my siblings mercilessly. They say I would tickle them until they named 10 candy bars, lick their faces, and pound them on the chest. I really don't believe that (evil laugh) I was a great older sister.

Several years ago, my younger siblings decided to gang up on me and give me back what I dished out. They plotted to attack at a family Christmas party. Jennifer was to lick my face, Gina to hold me down and tickle me, and I think even Katie and David were there to help as well.

History often repeats itself. This year they ganged up on me-again! Here I was innocently enjoying the Christmas festivities when they came dashing around the Christmas tree and attacked!

My loving husband kindly helped by videotaping the entire event.



Thank you lovely sisters. Just remember, history has a habit of repeating itself...(evil laugh).

Homeward bound

Sadly, all good vacations end. The drive home was LOOOONG. We stopped overnight after some slow, snowy roads and did the trip in two days.

Adam was the driver,
Dallin was the sad boy who didn't want to go home, (note the bags under his eyes from days and days of no sleep)
and Maura was the pill who just wanted OUT!!! I was driven to do drastic things to keep her occupied.
The stickers lasted for about 15 min. I really need a new bag of tricks to take on long car rides!

We made it home safely and just in time too. My dad called to tell us the morning we left his thermometer read -27 degrees! YIPES! I think I like 60 degrees better!

Thoughtful Gifts

We had many friends, family and neighbors bring us gifts and let us know they were thinking of us. Thank you all so much-it really means a lot and helped us be more positive through the holidays.

This is a really special one:

I also got a poem attached to a beautiful towel. I'm not sure who sent it, but it touched my heart.

My First Christmas in Heaven

I see the countless Christmas tress around the world below.
With tiny lights, like heaven's stars, reflecting on the snow.
the sight is so spectacular, please wipe away the tear.
For I am spending Christmas with Jesus Christ this year.

I hear the many Christmas songs that people hold so dear.
But the sounds of music can't compare with the Christmas choir up here.
I have no words to tell you, the joy their voices bring.
For it is beyond description to hear the angels sing.

I know how much you miss me. I see the pain inside your heart.
But I am not so far away. we really aren't apart.
So be happy for me dear ones. You know I hold you dear,
and be glad I'm spending Christmas with Jesus Christ this year.

I send you each a special gift, from my heavenly home above.
I send you each a memory of my undying love.
After all "Love" is the gift, more precious than pure gold.
It was always most important in the stories Jesus told.

Please love and keep each other as my Father said to do.
For I can't count the blessings or love he has for each of you.
So, have a Merry Christmas and wipe away that tear.
Remember, I'm spending Christmas with Jesus Christ this year.

Author Unknown

Thank you.

Visiting Garrett

Saturday morning before we headed home we bundled up and went to the cemetery. We had to dig around the headstone a little, but we were able to see it pretty well.
My sister Gina made the wreath.
Merry Christmas Garrett, we miss you!

My After Christmas Gift

I bought myself a flip video!! I LOVE it!! We've had a video camera for years that we never use because it has too many buttons and cords and tapes and bags and such. It's a great camera-don't get me wrong-but we rarely pull it out because of the hassle.
My sister got this camera for Christmas and I just had to have one. It has a total of 4 buttons on it and is the same size as my point-and-shoot camera. The BEST part is that a USB port flips out of the side and plugs into your computer! EASY. It's technology that is just my speed! When I figure out how to edit video and put it on my blog, I will! (Don't hold your breath...har har)

Cousins Making Memories

One of the best parts of going to Wyoming is hanging out with cousins! Rae is always the ring leader in whatever activity they are doing. We invariably have to watch a "play" with music, dancing, costumes and interesting directing! They LOVE it!

Rae is such a talented and thoughtful girl. The minute we pulled in the driveway she handed out a piece of paper with a string bracelet (that she made herself) taped to it with this message:

At first glance this may just seem like a piece of string, but really this is a bracelet. A bracelet that holds all the cousin memories; from sledding in the backyard to doing plays in the basement. Wear this bracelet on your right wrist at all times and if you do you will hold all these great memories every second of the day.

All the kids immediately put on their bracelets and wore them the entire time. Dallin and Maura still have theirs on. Thanks for the memories Rae!

Christmas, take two!

Grandpa Jonesy and Colleen saved Christmas for us! They had piles of gifts under their tree for all of us. They gathered us together for a picture of the grandkids, then opened gifts.
R-L Dallin (8), Rae (13), Brannen (9 mo.), Halle (6), Reese (8), Maura (1), Blythe (8), Collin (8 weeks), Jude (4), Brady (11), Jeffrey (9).

Jonesy passed out the gifts and the chaos began.
The gifts were all so generous and thoughtful!
One of the favorites was "Joker" (or is it "Trailride???) that Jonesy and Collen made for us. We have good memories of playing this game with Uncle Kevin and Aunt Jerri and my mom. Grandpa made a special effort to play with all the grandkids and teach them the game.
The boy with the big eyes did some great posing and showing off his new hat! He is such a cutie! He is so full of smiles for everyone.
Maura also posed with her hat and her "Kiss lips".
SMOOCH!
We had a really good time hanging out at Grandpa Jonesy's house. Thanks Dad and Colleen.

Winter Sports

Adam couldn't hang out with Kelly and not do some fun winter sports. We all convinced Adam to try snow shoeing and I think it was a hit!

He had a great teacher and guide.

He only struggled a little,

but got the hang of it quickly. It was a great workout and they had a tremendous view!
This is the town of Grover, Wyoming. If you look closely, the long red-ish building in the center is the church house where my dad lives. One block down and a little to the right is the yellow house Gina lives in.
This is the Grover Cemetery where Garrett is buried. In the bottom corner (a little off to the left) of the cemetery you can barely make out a flag pole. He is buried just to the left of it right next to his grandma Jones.

We are so glad Garrett is in a beautiful place with family to watch over him.

We made it to Wyoming!

On our way to Gina's house in Wyoming, we stopped to visit friends in Logan. After a nice chat and delicious dinner, we headed north. It had been snowing off and on most of the day and once it got dark the roads deteriorated quickly. As we traveled over smaller and smaller roads through the mountains we found ourselves driving slower and slower through slush, snow and then ice.

We were almost to the top of one of the passes when we just couldn't go any further. Our car (without snow tires) couldn't get any traction and we just spun and spun. Adam got out and pushed for a bit (he's quite the man) but finally gave up. A nice couple stopped and asked if they could help but they didn't have chains or cell service. Just when we thought we would have to turn around and head back to Logan another couple stopped and suggested they pull us to the top of the mountain and we could make it out of the pass.

He got out his chain and he and Adam (by light of Treo) hooked us up. By this time Dallin was a basket case. He was sobbing and scared that we would never find our way out of the woods. We hugged him and talked about how grateful we were to nice people who stopped and how we should always help others when we can. We made it out of the mountains and for the rest of our vacation Dallin reminded us we needed to buy chains!

After a looooong drive (normally a 2 hour drive turned into 4 1/2) we made it to Star Valley! We thought we could just sneak into Gina and Kelly's house and not wake anyone, but of course all the kids were awake waiting for us to get there. We sure felt loved!

The first thing on the agenda for the next morning was sledding-of course!! So, out came the snow clothes.Maura was grateful for the use of the puppy-dog hat.
Dallin thought the goggles were cool!
My dad has several 4-wheelers and lots of sleds we used for hours and hours and hours!
The boys all got on one sled,
the babies on the other (minded by Reese of course).
We even pumped up the raft we use on the lake and tied it behind-it was awesome!
I think Dallin had more fun than anyone!
Well, it was a tie between him and Adam (hee hee).
Okay, a three way tie!
Who knew snow could be so miserable and so much fun!