I really don't even know where to begin - I have debated posting at all because there's far too much to cover, but I guess I won't really try! I posted about a month & a half ago & since then so many things have changed. We moved into our new home March 8 - and Addie started crawling the day before! She is of course, by now all over the place and keeping me busy. I have felt ridiculously scattered and un-me-like over the past few months with all the moving, unpacking, "nesting," etc. along with the every day life things. Almost 2 months later I still don't really feel settled. If any of you have ever moved with two small children, you understand where I'm coming from. In the midst of all this we've had several visitors (crazy, but we loved having Heather & Summer & their kids as well as my mom a few times!), a variety of illnesses (the latest this week is pink-eye and ear infections all around), and a few trips of our own to various places. Life is insane, but good.

A quick update:

Emma's favorite activity over the past months was a trip to see Disney on Ice with her little buddies. They all dressed up as different Disney Princesses (hers being Snow White as always). They were so cute & had such an amazing time. Our new house has a pool and Emma is dying to swim in it! For now she is content to put her feet in the "shadow" (shallow) part and fish with sticks. She's a funny girl! I think the move has been a challenge for her - she asked me just yesterday when we are going back to our old house, and today she asked when someone else would want to move into this one. It's all very confusing. Hopefully that is our explanation for much more sassiness than usual! Its about to wear me out. Then, just when I've had it with her, I will hear her sing from her room at nap time, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteous -never..." Who knows where that came from, but it cracked me up. It's amazing to me how many praise songs she knows, and how much she really understands about the Lord. The other day we were discussing how people get to go to heaven - she first said a man won't get to go to heaven because he was mean, but as we talked I explained that we all do bad things, but we get to go to heaven when we believe in Jesus because He takes away our sins. In her sweet little voice she said, "Well, I believe in Jesus!" I know there are many who would argue that the confession of faith of a three year old is not reliable, but I cannot deny that child-like admission of belief! She will have many years of growing & maturing in her faith, but she knows who Jesus is, and she loves Him.

Addie is 9 months old and precious. She's going through teething (finally!) so we've had several weeks of her acting a little less sweet, but who can blame the kid. She loves her sister and cracks up at her all day long - such a wonderful sight for a mother's heart. She has this smile where she crinkles up her little nose and her chubby cheeks look enormous! You can't help but fall in love with her when you see it. We thought with Emma we were getting a loud kid - we were wrong! Emma has always been very verbal and made a lot of noise from the time she was an infant (still does, just now in intelligible words!), but Addie is deceptively quiet. That is, until she decides she wants to tell you about something, happy or sad, and she has a seriously ear-piercing scream! If you're anywhere in her vicinity when she does it, you will see what I mean. Poor Corey. He thought my sister and I were loud! Addie is still in the 90% for height, but has scaled back to only the 75% for weight. What a chunk! She's going through her loving mommy phase, and mostly that is sweet. She's more of a cuddler than her sister was. Her latest tricks are giving us 5 and playing peek-a-boo. Such a smart cookie.

Corey is busy with a multitude of projects, from mowing our near-acre lot (which we wanted, but are now seeing how much work it takes!), to building a fence to surround the pool, to any other number of honey-do's I keep coming up with (seriously, have you ever tried to hang a picture straight by yourself with a 3 1/2 year old and 9 month old at your feet? Not gonna happen.) As for me, I'm busy trying to keep up with them all! God continues to bless my mentoring ministry - thank the Lord its all Him because otherwise it would really be suffering about now. He is so good to us.

Sorry for the book! I'll try to be better about updating more regularly, but there's a slice of Russell life for now...