This is just a little sampling of some events from the past week on the Russell side of the family.  This week I will be updating with all the news and pictures since last Saturday, beginning with the camping trip for Lindsay’s birthday (and a birthday post for Lindsay, and for Ted – who had a birthday this week as well – would also be nice!).  Now that the summer is winding down and work starts up again, things will probably get back to routine around here.  There’s been a lot of running around the last few weeks, days spent with friends and family in summer’s prime, making lots of memories to share!  However, it has left little opportunity for sharing – until now!

To tide you over, until I can get recaps of our recent happenings, here are the photos from the shoot with Katherine.  I made the dress for her and we decided to use Bruce’s property (our family friend) as the backdrop – I think it was a wise decision.

All of these thumbnails are clickable so that you can see the larger images.  Coming this week: 1.) Camping Trip, 2.) Ted’s Birthday Party and 3.) My Visit to Carol’s House.

It’s been nice cold and snowy here for quite some time, and it got me remembering our summer fun!  I’m also headed with a bunch of friends to Medieval Times tomorrow, which brought the Disney World road trip back into the front of my mind!

I know we’ve had posts about this when it was happening, but just for fun, reminiscing purposes, here are some of my favorites from the Disney World road trip!

We’re all very excited around here because the new Harry Potter World will soon be opening up at Universal Studios!  That might just mean another summer road trip this August!  We shall see…

For the second time in a year, school has been cancelled today, which means no work for me, and no school for Jack.  Willa told me last night that he declared he is coming to my house – he thinks of this as his new snow day ritual.  So I’m looking forward to having lunch and hot cocoa with Jack and Willa later, probably after we have shoveled our respective front walks.  The snow is still coming down, however, so I’m trying to delay a bit so the job doesn’t need to be done twice!

I realize that I should also probably address the lack of posts except for the recent one for Katherine’s birthday.  Life has taken a busy turn around here, with a lot of Sundays busy apartment hunting or spending time at shows or with friends.  It has left little time to post a new picture of the week, and the weekdays have proved to be even busier than the weekends.  I hope to resume pictures of the week as soon as possible, but it may have to wait until after the school play.  Costuming is in full swing, and the show is in just five weeks!  Rest assured that I will post enough photos of the week to make up for the missing weeks!

Stay tuned – there will likely be some pictures coming later of our fun-filled snow day!

A few weekends ago, at our Ladies’ Tea, we played the story game.  For those not well-versed in the fabulous story game, you take one sheet of paper and write one line it.  Then you pass it to the person sitting next to you, who continues the story using your one line.  Then they fold the paper down, covering the first line so that the next person can only see what they wrote.  Each person to write a new line only gets the previous line to go on to continue the story.

During our game, in which we all started a story and passed nine different ones around, we created this.  Note the DOUBLE reference (completely coincidental) of Chuck Norris:

Did you know frogs USED to have wings?

Of course I did, do I look stupid to you?

Looks are deceiving.  If I was judging your looks I would’ve thought you were young.  But you lied about that, didn’t you?

Don’t you know that if you lie, your nose will grow?

And don’t you also know that Chuck Norris’ tears cure cancer?

I hope he wins a humanitarian award someday.

Either that or a swift kick in the ass… I can’t decide.

When in doubt, always ask WWCND?  What would Chuck Norris do?

And once you’ve answered that question, life will truly make sense.

During my mini-trip up to New Lebanon to visit Grandma and Ted and spend time with Pam, Katherine and family friend Donna, Katherine and I put together a photoshoot, mostly involving her and her violin.  Here are some of our favorites.

Some are duplicates that we are editing to see which versions we like best, so any comments on which ones you like are most welcome!

J

Just noticed that some pictures of the geese that were hanging around on the property and in the pond made their way into the gallery as well!  Enjoy!

Just for the fun of it!

I’m trying to get to each person in the family, so here are some highlights of more people:

Today, Kate led me to yearbookyourself.com, and Lindsay and I have been having fun with it all afternoon!  I have created tons of old yearbook pictures of family members.  Here are just a few of the highlights (for those family members who want to see them all, I’m posting them on my facebook):

Bonus points if you can guess who’s who!