The (Very Prolific) Russon Family Reunion

More Russon's than you can shake a stick at...after this was over we all felt like whacking each other with sticks, not just shaking them! Dad had to be coached through how to make his camera take pictures with the timer, "all this new fangled gadgetry!"

It's all fun and games...

...until someone (almost) loses a tooth!

Christmas morning

Once again Santa somehow found us at Grandma and Grandpa's house, not sure the old guy can continue to do that for much longer!

Doing time (Christmas time that is)

The warden is carefully explaining to the new group of inmates why the typical orange jumpsuit has been exchanged for red pajamas. Shortly after the picture was taken, a riot occured and none of the food survived the altercation. All were promptly remanded to their cell blocks until Warden Santa could decide if they were naughty, or nice.

Storm Watch 2008

It may not look like much in these shots (especially to those of you in snowier climes) but this was just the beginning. By the time the storms finished a week or 2 later, there was over 2 feet of the white stuff at our house. That's a lot by any standards, but for Seattle, that's ginormus! It pretty much shut the state down for several weeks. School was canceled for 3 days, church was canceled for 2 weeks straight (all you Utahns can be jealous of that!) and everything just ground to a halt. It was pretty while it lasted though.

Killer Do's (a.k.a. Fun with Shampoo)

Thanksgiving

Well this year we couldn't talk any of our family into braving the snowstorms, canyons and long drive to come see us for Thanksgiving. Then our friends all headed off to their families for the day, so we spent it all alone this year...sniffle. We cooked way too much food and spent way too long in the kitchen for something that was over in 20 minutes. I'm thinking pizza next year!

Halloween!

Miles officially broke all previous records in how much candy he collected trick-or-treating. We had to measure it in pounds instead of pieces, and even that almost broke the scale! I can just see his dentist rubbing his hands with glee over all the future work he'll need. Shay proceeded to drag her bag between the houses, ("I do it, you no help!") and left a trail of candy as the pieces fell out of the hole she scraped in the bottom. She insisted on running between every house, but fueled by a sugar high, never even came close to winding down before we finished, chased in by the cold and not by a lack of desire to continue. Lisa even channeled a little cross between a witch and Elvira and donned said costume.

Even my work got in on the action, and I went as the "40-year old Boy Scout." Andrea is the "wicked witch" (and oxymoron for any who know her) and Cheryl went as "Major Pain," (my contribution to her costume.)

Football 2008

Football is once again upon us. Miles played this year for the first time, and despite breaking his pinky early in the season, had a great time playing receiver, cornerback and special teams. This was his first taste of football, being a converted soccer player this year. Cole came back for a second year of flag football with pretty much the same team as last year. Cole helmed the team as QB and is now busy trying to decide which college he's going to play for. Gotta dream big! Gage and Shay (along with mom and dad) were pretty much kept busy running from one game to another. Gage played soccer and did much better at actually playing this year and not sitting on the sidelines asking when it was time for the treats! Unfortunately since I was coaching and Lisa was chasing Shay everywhere we actually didn't get a single picture of Gage in action.

Cabo Wabo

In October we (meaning Lisa and I) went to Cabo San Lucas with our friends the Reynolds. We left the kiddies with Aunt Nikki (kudos to her for coming out despite being sick due to pregnancy with twins! If that didn't swear her off any more kids, nothing will!) We had a great time at a "adult only" spa, so needless to say, it was so quiet, I pretty much slept the entire trip. We had great weather and caught up on all our missed sleep for the past year, by the pool, while being fed fish tacos intravenously. Of course the highlight of Aaron's trip was snapping pictures of a vulture eating a dead animal on the beach, or the giant rhinoceros bug outside our room. Lisa's was the baby turtles being released into the ocean. Fun was had by all. I'm not sure if Brooke left any sun in Cabo, she pretty much sucked it all up while we were there. I even got a chance to pull out my "prison Spanish" (a patient of mine once asked me if I had learned my Spanish in a Mexican prison, guess it's pretty bad!) and wow the locals with my dictum and accent. I'm sure that they never figured out that I wasn't a local, but a gringo on vacation instead, I'm THAT good!

Are you looking at me?!

Back to School!

After a great summer, it was back to school. We did one last trip with the Reynolds and the Strattons over to Lake Chelan for Labor Day, but unfortunately we forgot our camera, so no photos of the backflip I did on the wakeboard. Bummer! We had a great time boating, playing at the park by the house we stayed at, eating way too much food and playing games. It was a great way to end the summer and now the kids (including Gage) are headed back to school.

Shay's 2nd Birthday!

Shay celebrated big number 2! We teamed up with Max again since his birthday is only a few days later. Shay got all the girly stuff she loves, a purse, necklace, shoes and cell phone. I'm not saying it's genetic, but she sure hasn't learned that from the boys! Her cake was shaped like one of her two favorite things (the other being hair)...a flip-flop! If you don't know, Shay is obsessed with shoes, especially flip-flops, and has been known to not only steal other peoples shoes if they are left lying around, but actually took a shoe off of a little girls foot at the park so that she could put it on her own foot. Max also got his favorite cake shape, a car (which to him is like shoes to Shay.)

NOT her shoes!

Birthday kiss from good buddy Max!