Wee Hour Post

I am up watching the Royal Wedding coverage. Ella is sleeping through it. I wish she were up just to see the HATS!! I will say this, Ella's Easter dress would have been perfection among these outfits :)
Ella's Uncle Greg had an Easter egg hunt at his house after church. Ella had a fabulous time with her older cousins, Michael and Matthew.



Cousin Matthew tried 'guiding' her with limited success.

Off to get a re-heat on the tea, grab another scone and settle in for more wedding coverage from across the pond!

~H

Picture Thursday

Easter weekend was packed full of fun. On Saturday, we went to a Easter Breakfast-Farm-Hayride-Petting Zoo with Roz, Ava H. and Madelyn. It was messy. But the girls had big fun. Ella wore her best overalls, an original design by our friend Jennifer.

Madelyn, Roz and Ella enjoying their first hayride. Ava is MIA from this shot.

The baby bunnies were a favorite.

For all of my griping (I'm not much of a farm girl), I thoroughly enjoyed feeding the baby goats.

Ella, Ava and Madelyn having a go on the old school McD*onald's merry-go-round.

More to come. Right now, I need to get serious about sleep. I'm up at 4am to watch Wills marry his bride. In the summer of 1981, my mom and I rolled out of bed to watch Charles wed Diana. I have no problem admitting I was up most of the night into the morning watching the coverage on Diana's funeral. Lucille Ball and The Monarchy...OK, so you know my weakness.

There's a small part of me that is hoping Ella will have a 4am wake up, just so that I can plop her in front of the TV with me (tea and scones nearby complements of KatieRoz!) and say, 'This is history, baby." And with all the news of war, unrest and tornado devastation? Maybe all of us could use something joyful.

~H

Elbows

Who knew elbows could be so funny? Ella is fascinated by the fact that when your arm is straight, your elbow disappears. So while you wait for me to sift through photos, giggle with our girl.

Bunny ears and one stunning dress

It has been one busy, beautiful weekend. I promise (I really, really do) that I'll post more photos in the next day or two. I took this picture above, last night. Below is Bunny Ears 2010. As you can tell, the love for the bunny ears has not increased all that much.



Before falling into an Easter feast coma, I had to share this special photo as well. My mom made Ella's Easter dress. It was, without a doubt, the BEST dress at church this morning. She does such an amazing job on her special little outfits. Let's face it - not everyone could wear those kinds of ruffles!


There will be plenty more to follow. Happy Easter to all!

Open Up!

Ella spent a bit of time with Roz this morning at Roz's house. It was a nice change from her normal Tuesday routine with me. It was good for me, too. It was so good that she took a four hour nap this afternoon!

I'm amazed at how far they've come in their playing together. They look like two little old ladies here, solving all the world's problems...

And her first go on the rocking horse, Roz and her cat waiting a turn.


Ella's face is healing up but she spends a great deal of time telling me, "No nose, mama" when I get down to the tedious task of cleaning her up.

And as we were doing art projects tonight, she looked over at her cat sleeping on the chair next to her and said, "Hi Simba. I'm drawing some pictures." The girl can talk. (Simba was unimpressed.)

H, L & EML

It was only a matter of time

Driveway+Running = Boom. Oweee.

I took these pictures on Thursday, the day after her first big fall. She kissed the driveway HARD. No hands up to stop her fall. There were tears and screaming. Yes, Ella even cried too. Larry wasn't home from work yet so I was triage nurse on my own.

Parenthood is not for the faint of heart, is it? She is healing up pretty well. But the entire household is sick with colds. Her constantly running nose offers up some challenges with the cuts. (I'll spare you the details.)

Ella's fabulous sleeping has taken a nose-dive as well. I am not all that surprised. In addition to all this, her two year molars are coming in. I forgot how much fun teething can be. In spite of it all, she was a charmer at her Grandma's birthday party Friday night, and did amazingly well at her Aunt Sarah's surprise birthday party last night. Most importantly, she was an angel in church this morning, waving her palm. We're happy to have a day at home today and tonight, to rest and regroup for a busy week.

Adventures

My dad called last night, asking if he could help me out while I worked from home today. In typical Papa form, he wanted to take Ella to see some of his (work) customers, "show her off a bit", he said. She's been home with us for over a year now. If I had to guess, he's been waiting to do this ever since we returned from China.

We packed her up with all sorts of tricks and snacks for her adventures with Papa. He reports she was absolutely perfect. She could have been a holy terror. We'll never know.

(I cringe at the sight of my refrigerator as the backdrop. Trust me, there are VERY important people on that Wall of Fame. Eliminating is stressful business.)

What's that?

(Hippie-Chick Ella with Roz)

All day long. The girl doesn't miss a sound in our creaky old house or what goes on in the world outside. She is especially aware of helicopters and planes, glad when they've flown over by announcing, "All gone, it's OK". And birds?! She is imitating the blue jays, robins and sparrows without trouble. Perhaps the 'boodies' (birdies) morning songs are contributing to her painfully early rising between 3:30 and 4:30 this past week.

If I haven't mentioned it before, Happy New Year is currently incorporated into every conversation. When she's on the phone having her pretend chats, she says it half a dozen times before ending the call, "...Ummm. Ok. Bye-Bye." She is Happy New Year'ing it up in the car seat while we toodle around the city. I guess our Chinese New Year celebrations had some impact.

The weather forecast is looking promising this weekend. We have sparkling new Ella-friendly gardening tools just waiting to get dirty. We are hopeful she'll take them out for a maiden voyage. She's been practicing her yard-work skills with my mom. I'm certain she'll have a thing or two to teach us.

Yesterday was miserable outside so we packed up the girls and headed to the Mall to blow the stink off.

I found this series of photographs to be the sweetest of the day. They say a lot, I think.

First, Roz is leading. And Ella, although willingly clutching Roz's hand, appears to be giving off the vibe, "Would you slow down?!" Roz is on a mission.

They are happy. I mean, they've got an incredibly long hallway all to themselves, lots of shiny floor, cool lights. What more could they ask for?

They are ornery. It wasn't until this last shot that either turned back to look at us as if to say, "Oh, you two are still here?"

May you get lost enjoying what YOU like to do this weekend! H, L & EML