flaming gorge 2009

We just had our Daines family vacation to Flaming Gorge this past weekend.

Flaming Gorge is one of my favorite places on earth and we've been going there since I was a wee child...two weeks old to be exact. Lots of memories have been created there, from the trailer, to buying rings at the Lodge, to making a tree fort in the "forest" behind the trailer, to catching loads of fish and eating them the next day for breakfast, to catching my first fish on a flyrod on the Green River (probably my dad's proudest moment of me), to begging my mom not to tell the story "Falling Rock" anymore. Flaming Gorge is a great place.

Unfortunately, the water is way too cold in June to boat, so about the only other thing to do is fish, and fish we did!

Other things not documented in pictures:

-Jonah waking up at 2:30 in the morning and being wide awake. The only way to get him back to sleep was to take him on a car ride. So we drove to the dam and back at 3:30 in the morning.

-not having heat or hot water the first day. It rained and rained and we were all bundled up in the trailer freezing our buns off waiting for the propane guy to come fill up the tank.

-the best dinners. My mom can make a delicious dinner just about anywhere.

-my dad trying his hardest not lose his cool while teaching Scott how to flyfish the river.

-another rousing game of Psychiatrist. This has become a tradition and is always hilarious.

Some quotes from that game that only my family will find funny:

-"Oh I know! You're my eyes!"

-"Who do you look like?" "Osama bin Laden" "Oh...you're ZORRO!"

-"It HAS to be Zorro's brother!"

-"Are you an orchestra?"

-"Are you an earwig?"

Laurz and I decided to match so we wouldn't lose each other while floating the river. Actually it was more like we just walked out of our rooms wearing the exact same outfit.

Jonah getting psyched for his first river-floating experience. Needless to say, he did not enjoy this lifejacket one bit.


The only fish caught on the river was by Scott at lunchtime.

There may have been a little cheating on Will's part...please don't tell the Forest Rangers.

So happy to be out of the lifejacket at least for a few minutes.

The next day was fishing at the ultra-secret family fishing spot. Unfortunately, no fish were caught on the bank, but the kids who flyfished on the float tubes all caught at least one.

Perhaps the funniest moment of the trip was the following of Libby:

I was so glad I caught it on tape. She told me she was going to play like she was on the TV show "Wipeout" so I thought I'd better film and that's what she did. Not even on purpose.

The whole family minus parents. A great time was had by all.

sledding

I took Jonah sledding with my mom and siblings on Monday and he seemed to enjoy himself.

russell family vacation: part deux

Since Jonah decided to interrupt our family vacation last August by being born, we decided to take another one in January. We started at Kerri's basketball game, went to dinner, and then headed up to the cabin. The next day we went to breakfast, went tubing at Soldier Hollow, and had an adventure with Sterling's flat tire. We had made reservations for Sterling and Lorie at Chez Betty and when we went to the car after tubing, we noticed Sterling's car had a flat tire. So, Sterling, Lorie, Jonah, and I drove back to the cabin so they could make their dinner and Scott and the girls could fix the tire. They ended up not being able to fix it because his car did not come with a spare tire, just an air pump and some jelly stuff to hold it in until you can get a new tire. Needless to say, they showed up to the cabin in a cab about three hours later with a huge platter of fried Mexican goodies from Don Pedro's.

We all had a good time hanging out, playing Phase 10, Hearts, and our new Wii. Kerri, Scott, and I also made a sweet sledding hill down the neighbor's driveway, across the street, and down another hill. We're looking forward to the next Russell Family Vacation, whenever that may be.

Scott forgot to bring snow boots, so he had to borrow Grandpa's sweet boots with no traction and warmth. Doesn't he look a little like Santa Claus with the red shirts, suspenders, and black shiny boots?

Jonah and Dad on the kiddie hill.

christmas 2008

So it's February, but here is what our Christmas looked like:

Christmas trees.

Mom, Jonah, and Christmas cracker crowns.

Grandma and Jonah.

Jonah as Baby Jesus (3 times).

Christmas jammies.

Drooling over his new girlfriend (Kit Kittredge).

Goofy Dad and tired Jonah.

Opening presents.

A baby with lots of crap.

We went a little overboard on his presents, but it was a good Christmas with family, too much food, and a lot of love.

more wedding

Here are some more pictures from the wedding I took on Scott's camera. Mine still won't let me get pictures off of it.

The lovebirds:

Lauren's dress was gorgeous. When we were dress shopping I told her that when she tried on THE dress, she would know it was THE dress. I was sort of kidding, but she knew when she tried this one on that it was the one. And she found it at the first dress shop. Talk about low maintenance! I went to like ten places.

Jonah zonked out and looked pretty comfortable....

The Russells were very supportive and came to the reception. Maybe it was just to see their favorite grandson...

And no, Lorie is very angelic, but that is not a halo around her head.

Jonah and his beautiful Aunt Kelli:

Jonah in his cute outfit. It kind of looks like leather, but don't worry, it's velvet...or probably velour:

Jonah was surprisingly well-behaved and we all had a great time. I can't wait to see their wedding video because Scott, Emma, and I were dancing towards the end and Emma was doing some Elaine-style dance moves but she didn't know the videographer was filming her. When she found out she was so embarrassed. I hope he puts it on the video.

Anyway, I love going to weddings no matter what anyone else says. They are always special and make me remember my wedding day and why I chose to marry Scott. This one was no exception.

the wedding

My camera is being stupid and won't let me get my pictures off of it, so these are pictures from Emma's camera. I would really like to post about our Christmas festivities, but that will have to wait until I can figure it out.

Lauren and Brandon were married on December 30th and it was a beautiful day and a beautiful wedding. We are so excited for them and excited to have Brandon in our family. Weird how those kind of things happen. I never expected him to be my brother-in-law when I took him to that Harvest Dance back in high school!

Here's a picture of the Russells. I think it's cute except for Jonah is turning his head. Oh well. You can't expect much from a four-month-old in the way of posing for photos.

And here's a picture of the whole Daines fam-damily. We are continuing to grow at an unbelievable rate.

jonah's first college football game

My favorite picture of my guys.

My favorite picture of Jonah.

Not my favorite picture of us.

So we had tickets in the MUSS for the Utah-BYU game. If you know us, you know that we are a family divided among college football teams. I am a Utah fan. Scott is a BYU fan. Jonah is neutral for now, but I'm working on him. Now that Scott goes to the U, he is slowly making his way over to the dark side. The game was the same night as the Coldplay concert and I didn't want to leave Jonah with a babysitter all day, so we decided to take him. It was cold, but Jonah was probably the warmest one in the stadium. He was a little freaked out at first by the loudness, but quickly got over it and had himself a great time (he slept). I was very proud of Scott for cheering for Utah even if it was only to keep us safe. If he had even clapped when BYU did something good, we probably would have been attacked by the crazy students. The MUSS is WILD! We had fun and it was a sweet game because the Utes won and now they're headed to the Sugar Bowl. GO UTES.

Sorry about the poor picture quality. Of course my favorite pictures were taken with my phone.

thoughts on motherhood

If you read my earlier post, you would know that Jonah was screaming in my ear while I was typing it. Now he is sleeping soundly on my chest and as I was looking at the post about his blessing, I got a little emotional. Motherhood can do that to you. Occasionally I will look at him or a picture of him and be totally overcome with emotion. I love being a mother more than anything in this world. It is the hardest thing I've ever done. It is emotionally draining, and not just with happy emotions. There are anxious emotions, sad emotions, worried emotions, frustrated emotions.

I love babies and I always have, but he is a hard baby. I will admit that. Maybe it's just because I've never had my own baby before, but I don't remember my little brothers and sisters being hard. And I was fifteen when my youngest sister was born, so I would remember. I will also admit that I was scared out of my mind when we found out we were having a boy. I had heard horror stories from Scott's mom about him as a baby and I was terrified that our baby was going to be the same way. Turns out he is! At least we know he is his father's son! But even though this is hard, the best parts come in the little moments. Like when he is sleeping soundly on my chest and I can smell his new baby smell and kiss his cheeks off. Sometimes I can't stop kissing his cheeks. Or like when I give him a raspberry on his tummy and he opens his mouth wide like he is trying so hard to smile and I can almost see it. His face is so sweet when he does that. Or when he does his complaining coo. He doesn't cry but since he's not crying he has to be complaining. It is such a sad voice and it makes me laugh everytime because he is so serious about it.

I was thinking the other day that I can't wait until he grows out of his fussy stage and I can't wait until I can feed him something other than breast or I can't wait until he fits into all his clothes or I can't wait until this or that. Then I realized that I will never have today back and soon he'll be off on a mission or gone to college or married and having kids of his own. I probably will look back at these days and wish I had them back even though I would have to listen to his constant screaming. I am trying to remember the moments that make me really happy and cherish them. They make all the hard work worth it. I am trying to make it so that I won't have to look back and regret that I didn't soak it all up when I had the chance.

blessings

On Sunday, October 12, we had Jonah's blessing. It was a special day for us and we are very blessed to have Jonah in our family. I'll keep some notes about the blessing in a different place because it's probably not very appropriate to have it on the internet, but Scott did a really good job and it was very touching. I'm a lucky woman to be surrounded by these cool boys! I could really get used to this!

Here are some pictures of him on his blessing day. I loved his little outfit. He looked so sweet and he was surprisingly so calm the whole day. He didn't even cry during the blessing, which I was really worried about. He was wide awake and calm as can be, which is extremely rare for him. Maybe we should dress him up and give him a blessing everyday. Except my mom would go crazy from all the cooking. Thanks Mom! Everyone loved your food!

We are blessed.

one week

We are so excited that Jonah is finally here. This has been an extremely exhausting week, but we are slowly getting the hang of it and we think he might turn out okay.

Jonah was born last Saturday and he came all by himself even though Dad had a triathlon that morning. He didn't care - he just wanted to be a part of the Russell Family Vacation 2008.

We were in Midway with Scott's family and I woke up around 3:30 Saturday morning with horrible back pains and contractions around seven minutes apart. Around 4:00 I woke Scott up and told him I thought I might be in labor. He told me to go back to sleep and that I would be just fine. I told him I couldn't go back to sleep because I was in the worst pain of my life. I don't really wear my emotions on my sleeve, so he didn't realize just how much pain I was in. It took a little bit of overreacting on my part for him to believe me (don't tell him that). Oh, and he also had to go ask his mom if she thought we should go to the hospital. By that time, my contractions were about four minutes apart and they weren't getting any less painful, so Lorie told Scott that yes, he should probably take me to the hospital.

We still had the long drive down Parley's and it was not fun, to say the least. During the drive my water broke, but I didn't really notice because I was too busy focusing on the extreme pain in my back. Back labor is not cool.

We got home and I took a quick shower, packed my bag and then we headed off to the hospital. The nurse checked me and I was only dilated three centimeters but his head had dropped really low, so they let me stay. It was sure a good thing because I was ready to push three hours later. We thought that he would be out in under an hour since my labor had progressed so quickly for a first-timer, but that was not his plan. After pushing for three hours on every contraction (which were only two minutes apart), Jonah finally made his entrance into the world. Let me just say that delivery was the most exhausting thing I've ever done.

We love Jonah more than anything in the world and it is kind of unbelievable to me how that happens. We didn't know it was possible, but it sure is. Even when he is screaming his head off at three in the morning, it's hard not to love him.

For the first time (probably in my life) I feel like this thing that I'm working on is really worthwhile. I have motivation that I've never had before and I love being a mother. Don't get me wrong - it is sometimes so hard and frustrating, but the rewards are unbelievable.

Scott has been the best dad anyone could ever hope for. He has been so helpful and I am really dreading him going back to work next week. We have had so much fun and he has been a huge help. He even changes diapers without me asking! We have had a blast this week getting used to our new lives together.

After a week, we have come to find out that baby Jonah just loves to sleep and poop. I don't say he loves to eat, because he has such a hard time with it. Don't worry though, he's getting his sustenance. He just really struggles sometimes. I know it doesn't help that we're both rookies at the whole breastfeeding thing. He also makes the funniest faces in his sleep. I love to hold him while he's napping and just watch him. It's pretty hilarious. He definitely sleeps with his eyes open and it gets a little creepy when they roll back into his head and you can only see the whites.

We also found out that he loves classical music. No joke. We decided to turn on the radio to classical music while he slept the other night and he slept for a whole five hours! It didn't happen again, but it was sure nice that night. Maybe it's because I blasted classical music in the car to and from work when I was pregnant with him. Hopefully that means he will be smart. I'm sure it does.

This has been a week of extreme emotions on both ends of the spectrum, but we wouldn't trade this experience for anything in the world. We love our new lives and we are so excited to watch Jonah grow and develop. We are just grateful that we're the ones who get to raise him.

he is here!

Introducing

Jonah Scott Russell

August 23, 2008

3:33 pm

7 lbs.

20 inches

We couldn't be happier!

More pictures later...

california dreamin

So last week we took a trip to California with my family. We spent four days in the sun and we had an awesome time. It was a nice little getaway. Here's a rundown of what we did:

Day One - Disneyland

We all had a good time at Disneyland. I sat out on most of the rides and was sort of disappointed every time I walked up to a ride and the sign said "not recommended for expectant mothers" with a picture of a pregnant woman and a big red circle with an X through it, like "going on this ride is as bad as smoking." Oh well, I'd rather be pregnant than be able to ride the rides at Disneyland.

The big kids outside of Indiana Jones - the best ride at Disneyland

Scott, Thomas, Will, and Meg with Buzz Lightyear

Tom waiting for Jedi training. He is a Star Wars FREAK! But not as freaky as the kid sitting to the right of him. This kid came dressed for the occasion and Tom kept staring at him like he was nuts. We were laughing pretty hard at the faces Thomas was making at the nerd.

Libby LOVES Scott. In fact, all my brothers and sisters love him. It's more of an obsession and I think Scott was glad to get some alone time when we got home. But I love that they adore him.

Scott's other best friend - Will. Will would not leave Scott alone and I had to lecture him a couple times about coming into our bedroom before knocking. He just had to know what Scott was doing at all times.

My mom is so cool.

The always-beautiful Lauren. Here she is either saying "No pictures please." or "Talk to the hand because I miss Brandon." One night while shopping she told Meg that she needed to get home because she had to make a phone call. Like we didn't know who that phone call was going to be to.

Scott and me getting ready to enter the Haunted Mansion. It was one of the three rides I went on. The other two were Pirates of the Caribbean and Finding Nemo. FUN HUH? And yes, I am that pale. Sorry if any of you are blinded.

Mom, Meg, Libby, and Tom on the Teacups - the second best ride at Disneyland.

Day Two - Universal Studios

I don't have many pictures of Universal but it was still just as fun. It was not crowded at all so everyone rode The Mummy and Jurassic Park at least three times. Libby and I became best friends while we sat out of these fun rides. We all went on the studio tour, which is the best part anyway.

This is how Libby felt about being left out. Just kidding, she was actually quite happy because when everyone went on the rides, my dad always slipped me some cash to get treats. He did this because Libby is his favorite youngest daugher and I am his favorite oldest daughter (and he felt bad that I had to sit there and babysit while everyone else had fun). He's the best.

Day Three - the beach

We stayed in a house on Hermosa Beach and boy was it awesome! The house was really nice and the beach was beautiful. The waves were big enough to be fun. We rented some boogie boards and everyone caught some good waves.

Libby having the time of her life.

Some of the kids laughing at Tom after he was taken out by a huge wave.

Libby was so excited to find sea shells. She found some pretty neat ones.

Libby again. Sorry, but I just love her so much.

Two beautiful beach babes. After some hard core boogie boarding, Emma lost the big yellow bow on her swimsuit. Sad huh? It's a cute swim suit!

And you can't leave the beach without burying at least one person in the sand.

Day Four - California Adventure or the worst day of my life so far.

Just kidding, it wasn't THAT bad. But it was pretty bad. It was 94 degrees and California Adventure is pretty much all outside. At Disneyland they have gift shops right outside of all the exits, so I would just go chill inside the nice air conditioned building. But this was not so at California Adventure. It was hard. I got really ornery and was only happy after I had eaten a good meal in an air conditioned restaurant and basically you will see later in the post what the effects of the heat had on my pregnant body.

This is actually at Disneyland on the train. We went back to Disneyland after the lines at California Adventure were 70 minutes long. Totally not worth it to stand in a line for 70 minutes in 94 degree weather.

This is Libcorn from Cornis (she made that up herself).

On the way home from California Adventure we decided to drive down to Huntington Beach (which is amazing by the way) and then take the Pacific Coast Highway back to the house. I guess Emma got a craving for popcorn, so we stopped at a movie theater and bought her some popcorn. Libby spent the next two hours crafting this hat from the popcorn bag and when we stopped at a grocery store, this is what we saw. We asked her what her name was and where she was from and she said that she was Libcorn from Cornis. That weekend she was also Wigglytooth from Toothville because she got her first loose tooth, which by the way was one of her favorite parts of the trip. Funny what kids think is entertaining. She is such a goofball sometimes and I just love it.

Driving on the PCH was beautiful when we were in Orange County and once we got to Los Angeles County, it just got really ugly. I'm never living in Los Angeles or the vicinity. It's just not very attractive and when we got home I was really grateful to live in such a beautiful, clean place.

So this is what happened to my body when I spent the day walking in really hot weather being pregnant:

Not too bad when you're looking at them from an angle and they're being raised in the air. But you can definitely tell the left foot is retaining a little bit of water.

But this is what they look like from straight-on. GROSS HUH? I'm okay with you laughing at them. I actually laugh really hard every time I see this picture.

So what it boils down to is that I'm not looking forward to the summer. This was not cool. Luckily they have gone back down to their normal size. When we got home Sunday morning, I ran immediately to the bedroom, grabbed three pillows, placed them on the couch in the comfy corner, laid down with my feet elevated, and didn't get up for probably six or seven or eight hours. It was really cool to have an excuse to lie there ALL DAY LONG.

So all together, we had an awesome trip. We seriously love my family so much and we were so glad to get to spend a couple days with them. We were DEFINITELY ready for some quiet time when the trip was over though. Thanks to Mom and Dad for making it happen!