Welcome to 2012!!! Thanks to all my loyal followers! I appreciate you reading and commenting on my blog through out the past year. I hope that you are enjoying the story of our life!
As the first blog entry of 2012, I'm going to use this time to decompress from the past few weeks of HOLIDAY MERRIMENT, and catch you all up on how the RUSSELL'S Celebrated this year.
We both had the opportunity this year to have the week between Christmas and New years off from work. And it was AWESOME!!!
Our Christmas started the week prior to Christmas when we headed down to My parents house near Airdrie to see my side of the family. We had a really nice time visiting with my parents and my brother and his family. It was a pretty nice uneventful weekend and we had nice time relaxing and visiting.
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| Craft time with Grammy... Gingerbread house construction. This is a FOAM craft as William's allergies prevented me from buying a real Gingerbread house kit. This kit was super fun and easy! William loved it and did a GREAT job decorating it! |
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| Present opening time! Thanks to everyone who got William a gift! They were great! He loves playing with his new toys and especially the PLAY DOUGH! |
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| Grandpa and Grammy with the Kids! Cant believe all the kids are smiling! If only my Dad's eyes weren't closed! |
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| William and Mac, horsing around! |
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| Airdrie Festival of Lights. This is a PRESTON family tradition. Every year we go together for a walk around. Its a little disappointing this year as they haven't been able to add much to the light displays over the past few years. Its a great family friendly activity that is all volunteer and I hope that they can continue to grow this Festival! |
After a quick week at work, we prepared for Christmas with Clayton's side of the Family.
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Busy Busy!
Thanks Grammy and Grandpa... Ya he's Great... (Insert Eye Roll here). Who doesn't Need a 7 ft Frosty on there back deck! And yes William LOVES LOVE LOVES him. |
We had Clayton's brother, one of his sisters with her husband and Clay's parents here for Christmas this year. Christmas eve we headed out to Baba's house for dinner. Then everyone came back to our place.
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| Cookies William decorated for Santa, along with a letter for Santa... I think it said "DEAR SANTA" and that was about it ;) |
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| Tradition prevails! Our Christmas Eve in front of the Tree Shot. |
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| Christmas morning. SANTA CAME!!! oh man did he ever!!! It took about 12hrs for William to finish opening his gifts! But in all fairness he was not feeling well. He slept most of the afternoon and finally perked up in the evening and finished his gifts around 8pm. |
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| Quick costume change first thing thanks to a leaky diaper! |
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| SANTA DID COME!! |
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| In the mists of the chaos |
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| Baba, Gedo, Anna and Nadia joined us for Dinner. Thanks to everyone who brought a dish. Here is the dinner spread. Not bad for my 2nd ever Christmas Dinner! |
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| The Table... Not too fancy but not too bad either! |
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| Don't worry Clay there is PLENTY of FOOD! |
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My FAVORITE picture of Gedo EVER! HE HE
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Christmas was great. Everyone left boxing day, and we got a whole week of NOTHING as a family! Much of it was in front of our new 47" TV that was purchased Boxing day.
I do have to admit its pretty nice... A huge upgrade from our 27" old style TV, Which I did manage to sell, however it took 2 of us to move it upstairs and out of the house! MAN that thing was HEAVY!!!
New Years found our trifecta in JASPER. We had never been before, so we mostly just looked around. Its beautiful! We tobogganed and went swimming at the hotel a couple times. New Years Eve we went to a "fancy" restaurant, where Clayton chased William around and found him under a table of 6 people hiding... Thankfully most people find William Cute and are pretty understanding when his spirited personality shines through. We were in bed by 1000pm and couldn't quite convince William it was New Years, according to him it was too "Snowy and Cold" to be a New year.
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| Little Traffic detour on our way in to Jasper |
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| This picture turned out creepy, but its the toboggan hill. |
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| Jasper Lodge... So nice!!! And I would totally recommend Jasper if you have to take your dog. Very pet Friendly! As you can See Tessa got to chill out inside the Lodge in front of the Christmas tree. |
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| HAPPY NEW YEAR! |
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| All dressed up and No where to go. Slightly disappointing but that didn't stop us from donning our good clothes. :) |
Well that was our last few weeks. We have removed all the decorations from the house and they are all safely packed away for another year. William has asked everyday for the past 1.5 weeks where Frosty is... remember my Halloween hell? Well now its FROSTY hell! I'm trying to explain to him that it will be next year when all the decorations come out again, but the concept of time is tricky for an almost 3 year old.
Time to pack up!
****Its been a little over a week since the Christmas stuff was taken down. I have not yet put out the "regular" house decor stuff that I usually have out through out the year. I love this time of year, because my house is so bare. But I love the contrast after having the clutter-y glow of Christmas stuff up for a month! I think I will start putting stuff back up this week. Do you enjoy the bare look your house has after Christmas?****
