The Russell's Have moved!

We have offically moved in to our new house in LACOMBE ALBERTA.   June 8, we moved the 2nd load of crap... I mean stuff down from Whitecourt.  And William and I have spent the week in Lacombe, unpacking and exploring.  Tonight Clay is heading down with the Last load, and by next friday we no longer own 2 houses 3 hrs apart!

I worked right up to the day before we left (small price to pay for taking the summer off!)  And Clayton is still working in Westlock until the end of June when he will transfer to the RED DEER Shop.  We are beyond excited to have our little family back togeather in July, after 10months of Clay working away from home!  Its been a really long tough journey and hopefully we can get back on track in our new home, new community and with our new opportunites!

Summer looks like it will be busy, and although I already have a list of things I want to do with William I do plan on keeping up with my blogging.  Look forward to a tonne of MOMMY and ME posts!

I cant upload pics tonight (as my camera cord has been lost in the confusion of moving)  but I will try to share some pics from our last few weeks soon!

Thanks to everyone who helped us with this move!  Your muscles were greatly appreciated!!!  I know I say this every time I move but NEXT time (I kinda hope there isnt a next time;)... but...) NEXT TIME Im hiring a moving company!!!

The "plan" is OFFICIAL

Well as you can see its been a busy month! 

For those who dont know we OFFICIALLY sold our house this past week!  So end of June we will be relocating down to Lacombe, AB

I am very glad the house is sold because it is very hard to live in a SHOW-READY home with a 3 year old, and 2 cats and a dog!  Poor William wasnt able to do much playing over the past few weeks!

But it payed off because 27 days later the house is sold and our plans are on track! 

Now we can enjoy our last few months in Whitecourt and in our house (which we will miss)

Beautiful weather this weekend and my Boys took advantage of it!

William has had the back door open and has been out in the yard almost all day today, I forgot how much this kid LOVES the outdoors!

Bikes to sleds? NO WAY!

Spring Teased us this week.  The snow had almost completely melted from the roads and sidewalks.  So out our bikes came!

Our first Bike of 2012.

A nice long Ride!

William didnt make it the whole ride... he fell asleep about half way through.

Tessa was tired for 2 days... She may be slightly outta shape due to our sluggish winter attitudes.

William got his bike out too this week.  He went all the way around the block!  Such a trooper, especially on the $2 garage sale trike that has the crooked wheel.  He loves to bike and we have been debating what to do for William this summer, since his current Tricyle is pretty sad looking.  He has a BIG WHEEL trike we got him 2 years ago, but he cant reach the peddles yet.  He is alittle small for a 'big boy bike', so we may have to find a better tricyle for him this year.

Such nice weather, then we wake up this morning to a blizzard!!  Its not suppose to be very nice weather this week, but the sun in shining now and the snow that fell this morning is melting!  MELT SNOW MELT!  Your not welcome!

The rest of the weekend has included cleaning... Our house is on the market (for those who didn't know)  And we are currently trying to keep the house spotless for showings.  Not so easy with all our critters and a 3 year old.  Luckily he likes to clean... See him help me out by wiping the chairs off. 

FROM THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR

PINTREST my new love!!! I found this awesome idea for hot dogs with

 spaghetti in them. 

 We had them for lunch today.  Great for kids!

Ive been trying tonnes of ideas that Ive found on PINTREST lately!  Watch for future posts with all my awesome great 'Pinning' experiments!

'Precious' and Battling for the Middle Ground

William's FIRST VISIT TO THE DENTIST!

Teeth brushing in the his house is a battle, as I know it is in most households that have young children. 

Our battle involves crying, yelling and the eventual pinning a 3 year old to the ground or 'swaddling' him in a towel.  There for I was not looking forward to the first visit to the Dentist.  I was sure that there would be no looking at William's teeth that day with out either some major tears or wrestling moves.  But as most kids do, William surprised me!  He was excellent.  He sat on my lap and let both the hygienist and the Dentist count and check his teeth... 

Here he is with his bag of goodies (It seems that when my back was turned he cleaned out the prize cupboard) and his new hat he got for behaving so well!

 I never gave my child a soother, no particular reason really, by the time I wanted to introduce it he wouldn't take it... However he quickly substituted his blanket for one and it has stayed securely in his mouth ever since.  When he was a baby I would alternate between about 4 different blankets hoping to decrease his reliance on one specific object, but by the time he was about 1.5yrs old he refused the rotating blanket system and 'Precious' was born.  The blanket sucking issue, it has been a loosing battle over the past year.  And it is causing a lovely over-bite in my child's mouth, but I didn't get in to TROUBLE at by the dentist! YEAH!  

We have tried repeatedly to wean William of his beloved 'Precious' blanket over the past year.  It started last June, when we left for holidays with out 'Precious' (by complete accident!)  We figured well we will just wean him now... perfect, 2 weeks no blanket access... he will be cured!  We returned after 2 weeks, traumatized by the most wicked temper tantrums that we have ever seen.  I cant put in to words the desperation, anger and frustration that spewed every night from my 2 year old over the 2 week holiday.  And when we arrived home, he found his 'precious' and promptly popped it right in to his mouth and fell asleep. 

We have put some house rules in place since in regards to 'precious'; its suppose to be a 'in your room only blanket'.  Meaning if you want to suck on it go to your room... but exceptions always exist... Sickness, difficult days, transitions to day home, dental visits (did you see it in the above picture).

He is at the age now that we tell him that the blanket is not to go in his mouth outside of his bed, and he understands.  He does the same thing every time; Pops it out of his mouth and asks "why?".... "BECAUSE I SAID SO!"

I have to admit to most of the blame for the increase blanket use lately, with Clayton gone most of the week, my energy level for battling the blanket middle ground has wavered and I put my white flag up most days and surrendered.

A few months ago I attempted to fix this blanket issue once and for all.  A light bulb idea came to me one night while I was getting ready for bed.  VINEGAR!  Yes!  Lets make that blanket so gross and smelly he wont want to put it near his face!  I soaked it for most of the day in an approx 90% vinegar/water solution.  Then hung it to dry and gave it back.  3 days later the stench was nasty and the blanket was still securely in the possession of my child's mouth. 

And that bring us to the dental appointment and my trepidation.  Well the good news is I don't have to worry too much right now about removing 'precious' from our home.  Hopefully William will soon realize big boys don't suck on blankets.  (Highly unlikely, seeing as his favorite show is CHARLIE BROWN and he really identifies with Linus).  But a mother can dream right?!

"Precious" securely protected... FOR NOW!

AN AMAZING FEAT and A BIRTHDAY TREAT!

William Accomplished something utterly awesome and amazing today!!!

He completed a puzzle all by HIMSELF!!!

Way to go Monkey!  You ROCK!!

FROM THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR (My new Segment :))

My Hubby celebrated his 29th Birthday This past week. Unfortunately he was away at work, but a short 1.5 hr drive that evening and William and I surprised 'Daddy' and took him out for supper!

We even  made a cake and went swimming at the hotel we spent the night at!  It was a great birthday celebration and sooo ROMANTIC (just kidding!)  Clayton and I slept in separate beds and were asleep by 1015pm... William was a sleep by 11pm.

Mommy and William on our Breakfast date the next morning... Daddy was already at work :(

St Patty's day Celebration!

Luck of The IRISH!

St Patricks day was once again celebrated in the Russell house!  And although I didn't put up any decorations,  (I know GASP!!!  )  We Russell's celebrated our Irish heritage with GREEN food!

My new addiction is Pintrest.... It rocks!!! And for those not yet aboard the PINTREST train, It is a bookmarking site... meaning you can tag pictures/articles/ideas etc and collect them online "boards".  I found a tonne of GREEN ideas and look at what I came up with :)

BREAKFAST

Yes those are GREEN SHAMROCK pancakes... I know I'm awesome!  And what is even more awesome... is that I had stupidly given my 'green food coloring' to my friend this weekend.  SO I colored these pancakes with BABY SPINACH pureed!  Yep... I'm amazing ;)

Thanks to PINTREST Clayton got to make a 'rainbow' fruit plate :)

And yes those are GREEN sparkle shamrock shapes on my Pancake... I cut a quick template from a scrap piece of paper and sprinkled away!  Super easy :)

And super tasty!  William informed us that the sprinkles were "very tasty!"

SNACK/LUNCH

I actually did use Green Food coloring a couple days before when I baked my St Patrick Chocolate cookies!

This was our snack, Green cookies and Green Fruit shake (PINTREST AGAIN!)  The Fruit shake was colored using the spinach leaves... and I'm not kidding when I say you don't taste the spinach!

SUPPER

What is more IRISH then Beef and Potatoes? 

Nothing!  Our GUINNESS beef stew (we had to use Rickard's Red instead of Guinness unfortunately!)

Thanks again PINTREST!

Look at my Ukrainian enjoying his IRISH stew:)

So there you have it a fun food IRISH day!  I'm proud at how awesome we did at celebrating my Irish Heritage!

PS-  I did not omit the GREEN BEER... We actually didn't have any :(  I was on call the whole weekend so I missed out on the Green beer.

NEW PICTURES FROM THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR!!!!

MR William and his SUPER COOL pose ;)

MEESKA MOUSKA MICKEY MOUSE

HAPPY Wednesday everyone!

These are what we are looking at today, a lovely surprise from my hubby on Sunday!  They are so pretty!

TURNING 3, MICKEY MOUSE STYLE!

We had a little boy who turned 3 on Feb 18 this past month!  And as precedent has proven this momma loves throwing parties!

This year Mickey Mouse came and helped us celebrate a very excited little boy's birthday.  He had been talking about his birthday since Christmas.  And although he tried to convince me several times in January that it was his birthday he finally got to celebrate it on the FAMILY DAY long weekend with some of his favorite people!

Friday night we had his friends over for a Mickey dinner party!

We served HOTDOGS (of course!)

And Mickey Mouse Cupcakes (super duper easy!)

The Kids did a Scavenger hunt with "TOODLES" and "cracked open" a Mickey Pinata both were BIG hits!  I wish I had pictures of them doing these, maybe my mom does! 

The Scavenger hunt I wasn't sure how it would go as the kids were ages from 2.5-3.5yrs.  However they were great! 

I had 4 clues that led the kids from the kitchen to basement, I made a TOODLES out of cardboard and painted it (my husband's job was to 'control' toodles)  the kids had to use 4 'tools' along the way to help find the next clues.  I totally wish I took a picture of what the clues looked like because they were pretty cute!  But this is what the clues said!

Toodles has 4 tools for you!  A pair of safety scissors, A key, a garbage bag and the MYSTERY MOUSE-KA-Tool!

Mommy has lost the cake!  And she doesn’t know where to find it!  Follow the clues and help mommy find the cake!

Clue #1

Running around is lots of fun!  Where do we keep our running shoes?  Front closet! Right!  But that clue is all tied up!  We need a Mouse-ka tool to get it down!

(use the safety scissors to cut down clue2)

Clue#2

Down the stairs and thru the door!  OH NO! A whole bunch of garbage!!!  We have to clean this up!  But we need something to hold the garbage!

(Use the garbage bag to clean up!)

Clue#3

Under the stairs, you will find the next clue!  Why it is all locked up!  How can we get it unlocked?

(use the key to open the door!)

Clue #4

Your almost there!  I hid William’s birthday cake upstairs in the MOUSEKA-Kitchen!

(Found the cake but need some candles!  Try the Mystery Mouse-ka Tool!)

(The Font I downloaded for free off the Internet.)

It was a pretty awesome day! And the little guy was tired!  Thanks to Grammy and Grandpa for helping out!

The next day we had the Family over to celebrate the birthday boy!  My parents, Clays parents, grandparents, and siblings with there significant others all came up for an afternoon of birthday celebrations!

William the Center of attention!

The cake!!!!!!  How awesome is that cake!!! My 2nd attempt at  fondant and it went WAY WAY better then first time!  Special thanks to my cousin TEAL for her encouragement and recommendations!  I even made the marshmallow fondant my self!  And people ate it, sweet but tasted good!

Present opening!  This was actually the best part of the party!  (Quick back story.  Williams BABA brought him a whole bunch of candy when she arrived, and together they filled his pockets with it, for easy sweets sneaking through out the day).

ANYWAY, William opened all his gifts and preceded to stand up and say (WITH NO PROMPTING!)  "THANK YOU, You all get a TREAT!"  and gave everyone one a candy from his pocket!  SO awesome!  I cried!

Playing with his toys.  Grandpa Rick taught him a great game "Pussy cat hunting" with a toy ball thrower gun he got as a gift... Once again, thanks Grandpa.

Had a great couple days with family! My mom and dad left Sunday morning and the RUSSELL clan headed out on to the lake for some fishing!

Grandpa Alan and William inspecting a fishing hole.

Love this Fishing tent Clay has, kept us out of the wind!

No screaming done by this kid! (Something his mommy cant claim) He was right in there picking the fish up and putting it in the hole, showing it to everyone etc. 

The Birthday went great! And I cant wait to do another one next year!  LOL actually I can wait... but it will be fun:)  I wish I had a couple more good pictures from the weekend, so mom when you read this maybe you can send me some?

A couple extra photos from the weekend....

Tessa loves her Grandpa... You should see her FREAK OUT with they pull in!

This is last weekend, we got a dump of snow!  William 'helping'

We finished the rest of the parking pad and this is what William had 'completed'; not bad for a 3yr old :)