Saturday we spent a lot of time at Grandpa's house painting and fixing. There was a huge crew there and it was a very productive day!

Adam isn't into painting, so he opted to try and level the stoop by the west door.

Dallin tried his hand at painting and did rather well!

Adam eventually moved on to doors and worked for a long time trying to help them make it fit. It was a HUGE project.

We went back again on Sunday night to a much cleaner house for snacks and to hang out with our cousins. It was a really fun weekend (minus the broken arm part).

X is for X-ray

Yep, we learned the meaning of this one. Little Maura out-did her brothers and gets the award for the first Russell child to break an appendage.

It happened Friday night while she was playing at a friend's house. She took a short fall off the slide and hurt her arm. The friend called us and we came to check her out. She was sad and didn't want us playing with her arm, but nothing seemed to be terribly wrong. She was very brave and most of the drama came from her being so tired that night.

She fell asleep in my arms and when she woke up as we were driving home she perked right up and wanted to eat and watch a movie. We sat with some ice for a while and she chatted with us but didn't want to move it or touch it. We decided that we probably should take her to get an x-ray just in case.

Luckily our Dr. has twilight hours so we headed there. After a brief inspection he guessed it was probably a buckle fracture and that we needed to go get x-rays and get it splinted. WHAT?? He doesn't do that in his office!! (*%$!!@#@!) I wish we would have known that and we would have gone straight to urgent care! (And saved us an office visit fee!)

Off we went to Phoenix Children's Urgent care. They were super efficient, x-ray, splint, and a chat with the doctor on call and we were out in an hour. They again referred us to an Orthopedic surgeon to cast it. (*%$@#^@&%!) Seriously people, are you doctors or what?? I'm a little frustrated with the whole "We won't touch it, you have to go to a specialist" attitude.

We are suppose to make an appointment for next week.

So far it hasn't slowed her down a bit! She slept well Friday night and then went with us to help paint Grandpa's house. The cute sling lasted about 10 seconds before she took it off and wouldn't put it on again.


When people ask, "What happened?" she tells them, "I fell off a slide and broke my arm." in such a grown-up and matter of fact manner. So funny!

Grandpa called her his little quail with a broken wing and that really bugged her. He teased her mercilessly all day. It was funny to see her get mad and run away from him.

She's starting to milk it now. If I ask her to get dressed, or pick up her toys, or put her shoes on she will say. "No, mom. I can't do that, I have a broken arm." (Huge eye roll).

Oh the drama!!!

Garden

Well, we did it. It took a couple of weeks to get the entire thing done, but we rented a rototiller, pulled out the weeds, leveled it, planted it and set the soaker hoses on a timer. Now we just need to keep the weeds out of it and see what happens!





We planted Peas, corn, spinach, carrots, brusell sprouts, squash, lettuce

Maura found a "squirmy" and wanted to keep it as a pet.

St. Patrick's Day!
(or as Maura called it "Christmas Patrick Day")

I'm not quite sure how she came up with it, but she called it Christmas Patrick Day the entire day.

Our fun neighbor suggested another bike parade and playing at the school. We all met at our house to do the decorating,






then off we went around the block and to the school. Maura and I were in the front trying to keep all the bicycle riders out of the street and going at a leisurely pace.

Then along came the rest of the crew. I think we were strung out the entire length of the street.

Adam stayed behind to do some yard work. Thanks Honey! Mwah!


At the park, the kids played, the parents sat and gabbed, painted green fingernails and ate snacks! I love this neighborhood tradition!

Spring Break Arizona Style

Meanwhile, back in Arizona, Maura and I spent a lot of time in the sun. We helped Jonesy on the house for a few days then took a mini-vacation to Tucson with some friends.

We made some fun stops on the way. One of them was Rooster Cogburn's Ostrich Ranch. They have a little petting zoo where you can feed the deer, goats, lorikeets, donkeys and the Ostriches.

Fallow deer were very fun to feed.

This was a creative way to feed goats, I thought.


It was less intimidating than having the goats attack you for food.

The lorikeets are always fun to feed,

Ostriches on the other hand are really big and very aggressive. While they were strange to look and and very interesting to learn about, Maura wasn't going any where near them and I don't blame her!!



The Tucson Children's Museum was a fun stop for the day. It's similar to the Phoenix Science center, just on a smaller scale. I love it because it is so kid friendly and easy to keep track of everyone.





That night we ate dinner at Denny's 'cuz kids eat free and we had 4 adults and 12 kids. It was quite the adventure! We overwhelmed the poor newbie waiter. The kids did great and the food was good, it just took a long time to get the food and about 45 minutes for him (and the manager) to figure out our bill. Again, another adventure!

Then to the dollar movie (it turned out to be $1.50) to watch Tangled.

We stayed in a cheap (and let's say adventurous) hotel that night, and were up early to get ready for the zoo. We lost Maura and Brighton as we were packing up. The two of them wandered into a room that was being cleaned, shut the door, turned on the t.v. and made themselves at home. It was a scary 15 minutes before we found them!

Reid Park Zoo is a fun little place to go. It's a small zoo, but just right for a couple of hours and little legs. Luckily friends shared their cool wagon.

We took a break in the shade for some snacks before heading to the park to burn off more energy and eat some lunch.





While getting ready to leave the park and head back to Mesa, we ventured to use the park bathroom. EWW! Hate those bathrooms, but with no good bushes in sight it was the only choice. While flushing said nasty bathroom toilet my keys fell out of my pocket right into the toilet! With visions of being stuck in Tucson without a way to start my car, I plunged both hands into the flush to fish out my keys. Luckily I caught them before they went down the pipe, but ewwww!! I still cringe just thinking about it.



Yep, we had a very ADVENTUROUS trip!

Spring (ahem) break

While everyone else in the world headed south for Spring Break, Dallin and Adam headed north to Canada. They went to join Adam's brother Jason and sister Sarah in helping his mom do some down-sizing before a move to a new apartment better suited to Phil and his health. Phil is now in a care center to help strengthen his muscles enough for him to be able to move on his own. They expect him to be there for a couple of months or so...

Meanwhile, Linda is moving to an apartment without stairs and closer to her work. It will be better for everyone.

Dallin was SUPER excited to be spending some time in the snow.

The work brigade.


Adam, Sarah, Jason


Adam and his mom, Linda.


A vacation for just the two of them. Dallin loved every minute of it. Dad didn't make him brush his hair, take a shower or change clothes the entire time (okay, that's an exaggeration. I think he showered once in 5 days). When he got home I took all his clothes straight from his suitcase where they were still folded nicely and put them all back into his drawers. *UGH* boys!

He was very proud to note that he did lose TWO teeth on this trip!

I've spent some time during our Spring Break helping my Dad work on Grandpa's house. They have a family ready to move in on April 1st and are really under a time crunch trying to get everything ship-shape before that day.

Since I've been married I haven't lived near my dad. It has been fun to drop in every once in a while and have him and Colleen over to eat or to come watch my kids.

I think I inherited the "get it done" attitude I have from my dad. We work well together I think.

We spent plenty of time up on ladders working on the eves of the roof. It took 6-nine hour days to get the entire thing done. I helped for some of those days, but my dad and Colleen have done the lions' share.



There is still plenty of work to be done before they have to leave. I'm sad they are cutting their stay short, but they have things to take care of back in Wyoming and people who want in the house.

Where to begin...

I have been a blogger slacker. Yes, it has been almost three weeks since my last post and we've been super busy! That's probably why I haven't been able to update lately. It doesn't mean I haven't wanted to! I catch myself during the day thinking about what I should write on my blog, and then the day is over and I haven't done it. *Sigh*

Let's see what I can remember:
Dallin is so much fun. His hair is even more fun (huge eye roll). I took him to get it cut (because he didn't want me cutting it too short) and it still looks like he just rolled out of bed.

He's been taking gymnastics classes now for about 3 months and he still enjoys them! Maura has a class at the same time and it has been really fun for all of us. It's the one sport he hasn't gotten tired of after three weeks.

It's a good thing he likes it, because the kid will never be a basketball star. I watch him play with his friends and he is ALWAYS the short kid. It doesn't seem to matter to him and I hope it never becomes an issue.


A friend watched Maura for a day while I was working and even took some really great photos of her chosen napping place.







This little firecracker just keeps getting sassier and sassier. Her newest thing to say is "Mom, guess how old I am?" "How old?" I reply, "18" she states matter-of-factly, "One and eight."

Okay, okay, the "bug" didn't die... So I'm making a plan to do a garden.

Does anyone have a rototiller I can use? Preferably a smaller one that I can lift into my raised garden bed.

It happens every year.

About this time I get the gardening bug. This is the bug that died a horrible death along with my garden mid July when temperatures were unbearable.

But, every March with the great weather the bug is revived.

So, the bug and I head out to the back yard and this is what we see;



a long dead garden that has grown weeds, rotten fruit, and lawn clippings. Evidently it has become the dumping ground for any yard waste that didn't fit in the green barrels.

"That's okay," the bug says, "good fertilizer".

So, here we go, another season of tilling, planting, weeding, watering and harvesting. Then the cleaning of the vegetables, preparing, cooking and convincing my family that they do indeed taste good and yes, you must eat them.

Hmmmm, maybe I have some "bug" killer around here somewhere...

Awwwww

Grandpa Jonesy gave Maura a cute huggable horse.

She loves it! She carries it around, takes it when she goes to play with friends, and even sleeps with it.

I tucked her in bed a few nights ago and when I went to check on her this is what I found.



Like I said, she loooves that horse!