Russell turned 8

A week ago our Russell turned 8!!

This was his year to have a friends party and after some thought he decided he wanted an Indiana Jones party.

So I started to surf the web for some ideas.

I found out how to make "treasure rocks", Indiana Jones pouches, and what to hide in a pile of sand for an archeological dig.

I put Todd in charge of an Indiana type obstacle course. He does much better thinking outside the box than I do and he turned out a winner for the 12 boys at the party.

We gave each boy a Holy Grail journal with an alphabet code and some messages to decode. There was also some Indy trivia to answer while they waited for everyone.

Todd's obstacle course included swinging water tubes (the swinging swords from "The Last Crusade"), a swing over a snake pit, a pass over a bridge of faith ("Last Crusade"), natives armed with ammunition in the form of small plastic balls ("Temple of Doom"), and a dig for treasure in a huge pile of sand.




















The boys decoded a secret message to find The Lost Ark with it's hidden treasure and had punch in coconut cups with lunch with funny names.

It was great that Russell got to have his party on his actual birthday. I don't think that has ever happened in our history of parties.

He is such a sweet boy. I can't believe that he is now 8.

He will be getting baptized in a week. We are expecting his grandparents this week and look forward to spending some time with all of them.

Besides all the gifts from friends, a new DS game, and scriptures with a scripture bag (from Mom & Dad) Russell got his summer buzz cut for his birthday.

Don't you think he looks handsome?


Some things that make Russell who he is:

*his laugh. No matter what I'm doing, if I hear Russell laugh it makes me smile (I'm smiling just thinking about it)

*his love of video games. Right now he's all into his Nintendo DS that he purchased with his own money.

*his love for music. He plays the piano and actually is enjoying it now. He also loves to sing. His favorite church song is " I Believe in Christ"

*his drive. Russell played baseball this spring and is now on the neighborhood swim team. He loves to improve himself.

*his smile. Russell has a deep set of dimples and when he smiles, he lights up the room.

*his sweetness. He always makes sure he gives me a kiss after family prayer (he also makes sure he gets one in return.)

It makes me a little sad to think my boy is growing up but I can't wait to see what he becomes.

When Russell was younger he loved to have me sing "Puff the Magic Dragon" to him at bedtime. The phrase "Dragons live forever, but not so little boys. Painted wings and giant things make way for other toys" always choked me up when I sang it to him.

It does even now as I think of how Russell's growing up and moving on to "other things". That song will always hold a special place in my heart and I will always associate it with my Russell.

Happy (late) Birthday sweetheart!!

Previous Post

Sorry about the layout of the Memorial Day post.

I could not get it right for some reason.

Hope you can still read it.

Memorial Day Campout

Before we moved to Tennessee we would make at least one pilgrimage to the great outdoors every year.

Since we moved to Tennessee we have yet to spend a single night together as a family with Mother Nature. The oldest girls have gone to church camp. I've gone to church camp as a leader, and Todd's taken Russell & Christian on the Fathers and Sons campout every year but we've never gone as a family.

So for Memorial Day when our neighbors invited us to join them for a weekend camping trip, we accepted.

Here is where the fun begins.

When we would go on our previous camping trips, we only had 2-4 children. Now we have 7! Add Todd & I into the picture and we had to figure out where to put bedding, bags, food, chairs, and other miscellaneous camping stuff for 9 people to get it to our camp site in North Carolina.

This was not an easy task.

We ended up borrowing a travel topper for our car from some other friends. That was after we had tried to purchase one from Amazon but because it was so big, they couldn't get it to us in time for the weekend trip. So we put all the bedding and the 2 tents (oh, minus the pillows-everyone had to hold their pillows for the 2 and a half hour drive.)into the borrowed travel topper. We stuffed the back of our vehicle to the point that we couldn't have seen out the back of it had we wanted to. And we still had to send a card table and our camp chairs with our friends in their trailer.

Now you are probably thinking, "Why didn't they send more things with the neighbors if they had a trailer." The answer to that would be because they had planned to stay until Monday and we were coming home Sunday afternoon.

Upon arrival we found out that the 2 campsites that had appeared to be side by side on the website were in fact separated by another campsite and the public restrooms. (Yeah for flushable toilets!!) We also discovered that we were only allowed to set up our tents on the gravel. We had a 7 man and a 3 man tent to try and squeeze into that spot since it also had to be parking for our suburban, the firepit, as well as the dining area.

We made it work.

On Saturday, we packed everyone into the cars and drove to this place called "sliding rock". It's a place on the river that is like a waterfall but it falls down over the rocks and creates a waterslide of sorts. The pool at the bottom in some places is 8 feet deep. So people come to slide down the rocks.

The water is FREEZING!! (Not that I know that from experience. I opted to be the keeper of the little kids.)

Todd told the big kids that if they went down he would give them each a quarter.

He still has to pay up.

But the surprise of the day was when Spencer announced that he wanted to "go down with Dad". We put a lifepreserver

suit on him and Todd took him to the top of the rocks. He put Spencer's feet in the water before the top so he could see how cold it was but Spencer still wanted to go down. What a daredevil we have in that boy. He did it and not once did he cry or whine. Even when they got to the bottom and he got wet.

I woke up around 4:30 Sunday morning to the sound of rain. By 6:00 it was really coming down and we had our whole family in our 7 man tent by 8:00. That's where our friend, Ms. Rachel, found us when she came with rain ponchos for everyone and to tell us that breakfast was almost ready at their "place".

We broke camp in the rain and we all ended up leaving late Sunday morning as it was suppose to rain all day that day.

It's not very fun to camp in the rain.

We found out on this trip that we forgot a lot of things about camping and so we made a list of things to purchase for our next trip and things to not forget. We also found that Spencer likes to roast the marshmallows for S'mores but he doesn't like to eat them. The kids love to play games. Chess was a favorite on this trip. Afternoon naps are still a good thing and even if it does take a little bit longer than normal to make the food, for some reason it always tastes good.