Matthew Scott Russell

Alison normally posts on our blog, but she's busy and the pictures are in demand...

Pictures first.

Alison and Matt, just after birth.  He didn't fuss too much, I was surprised that he didn't.

Matt was still blowing bubbles I guess, but this is him getting weighed.  7 pounds, 14 ounces, 21 inches long.

Got a shot of him taking a nap.

Chillin' under the warming lamp, waiting for his first bath.  He was MAD about being cold and taking his bath.

Still waiting for his bath.

After his bath, I got to pick out a hat for him, so naturally, I chose Honda red.

The next morning, I'm tired!

Family picture.

We were scheduled to go in on Monday night, but they were too busy.  We ended up waiting until the next morning to go in.  We showed up to the hospital about 9:30 in the morning and got settled in.  They checked Alison and she was dialated to 4cm already, so they started her on oxytocin.  Nothing happened all day it seemed like until about 4pm.  They broke her water and then a bit later started a much stronger dose of the oxytocin.  She went into active labor at about 5 or 5:30.  Alison asked for an epidural and it took forever.  The doctor had to put it in twice because it wasn't working right.  She was only numb on one side.  After the second try, she was good and numb.  As soon as they were done, they checked and the baby was about to come out!

Alison pushed for about 30 minutes and Matt was born.  I'm so grateful that everyone was healthy and everything went so well.  After he was born, we got moved to the recovery room and Matt had his first bath.  He didn't like that too much.  Then we all went to bed, we were tired.

Nothing Beats Homegrown Tomatoes

So we haven't watered our plants in a few days (oops~!) and I was expecting to go out to our garden and everything be wilting and dying, but instead I got surprised with these!

A couple of early girl tomatoes, which finally ripened!  We grew these tomatoes last year, and by mid-July we were getting ripe tomatoes, so this year has felt like forever getting ripe tomatoes.

Those are sungold cherry tomatoes that we tried this year.  They are so delicious! and the plants are humongous and competing with the tomatillo plants for room, which is quite a difference to the beginning of the year when they were dying.

And they are delicious!  Now I just have to make sure I don't eat all of the cherry tomatoes before Ryan gets home.  We have more ripe regular tomatoes out there too, but I couldn't carry anymore in my shirt.. my belly seems to take up more room than last year when I went picking tomatoes...  By the way our tomato plants are monstrous!  They can't stand up anymore, even with the wire thingys, and I really think that they make 6ft tall or more easily if you stood them up straight. 

Our garden also looks like a jungle! I'm sure it doesn't help that we have our lettuce plants flowering and seeding, weeds growing rampant where our peas were, and the grapevine trying to climb over the fence and take over everything, but that's what a good garden does right?  Next time I really need to remember to bring my camera with me to take pictures of the "garden" because everything is going crazy.

Time to go eat a tomato sandwich for lunch! :D

The Past Two Weeks

So the past two weeks have been hectic, busy weeks spent with family. Ryan and I had Adam's family staying with us for Amy's wedding, which was this past Friday. It has been a blast being together, and although I feel like I took lots of pictures, looking back through the pictures makes it feel as if I'm missing lots of other times we spent time together. 
Anyways, enjoy the pictures:

These are some flowers that Ryan picked for me when he went on a Jeep trip.  He told me that there were only a few bunches of the pink/red flowers and when he was picking them he kept thinking to himself that a ranger was going to drive by and arrest him for picking a rare-endangered flower for his wife.

Happy little Tanner.  His parents haven't gotten a really good one of him smiling yet, and pictures definitely don't to him justice about how cute he is.

I think we visited the Bountiful Temple on the hottest day they were here, and we couldn't walk the grounds either because the temple has been closed for maintenance.

We also visited the Hogle Zoo as a family..

..where Mom tried to have Dad eaten.

Mackenzie enjoyed playing in the splash park in a neighborhood close to ours.

Then we took some pictures while waiting for Amy and Michael to come out of the Logan temple.

Aunt Connie Wade always was able to get at least one smile out of this little guy.

Here they come!

She even let Joseph and Mackenzie hold the boquet for a moment when they ran up to see her.

Christina and Me

"Short" and fat next to "tall" and skinny.. although I think 4-5inch heels helped.  My ankles were non-existent on Amy's wedding day from standing and driving so much.  They're still recovering.

Ryan and Me

Handsome hubby at the reception later, but my camera was dying so I didn't take too many more pictures.