This morning Ella requested banana, breakfast bar and yogurt. I obliged. Only Ella doesn't like it when you "break" her food. We don't cut sandwiches in half. We don't cut up fruit. We certainly don't break our breakfast bars in half. When the breakfast bar broke in half, Ella declared herself done, despite the fact she'd only eaten two bites. That, my friends, is even more neurotic than me. ...
Crappy Birthday to You!
Well, our actual birthday wasn't so great. I had visions of laughs and good times. Ella wore her birthday outfit to school, we sang the song in the car. We were going to Burger King for playgrounds, crowns and chicken nuggets... what could possibly go wrong? Tummy ache. MAJOR tummy ache. She skipped her nap and cried instead. She refused to go to the bathroom. We went to Burger King, it was sort of a disaster. Molly spilled her orange soda right after we got there. Ella wanted to sit on the potty. Twice. She screamed the whole time we were in there! Then she ate about two bites before going outside. She cried. She cried if I didn't play on the playground. She cried if I did. She cried when we took a picture and when we went down the slide. She cried. When we got home we were going to ...
Happy Birthday, Ella!
This is what we were doing two years ago today! ...
Christmas Hippo
Gran called me at work a few weeks ago to ask me what I thought about getting Ella a nap mat for Christmas. "Sounds good," I say. It turns out to be a really cute pink hippo mat from a local monogram shop. Great, she'll be sleeping on a mat by Christmas and can use it for preschool, too. Fast forward to yesterday. I get to Gran & Poppy's for family night supper and they are all out playing on the front porch. There is the Christmas Hippo laying out on the ground. Ella, of course, is thrilled and practices napping for me. I said, "I thought this nap mat was for Christmas?" "It is," my mother assures me. It seems that the Christmas Hippo had been making the rounds yesterday afternoon. Poppy & Ella had practiced napping on the porch, in the kitchen and the sun room. I just laughed, ...
Fancy Ella
If you've never read Fancy Nancy (affiliate link), then you should. If you have read it, then you'll recognize that picture to the left. It's Fancy Ella, which consequently, looks very MUCH like the illustrations from this book. Here is a quote from the inside cover, "For Nancy, there's no such thing as too, too much; she loves her frilly bedroom, her lace-trimmed socks, and her pen with a plume. Nancy teaches her family how to be fancy, too." Ella LOVES Fancy Nancy. Gran bought it for her and they read it almost every day. Ella can almost recite the book and her favorite part is, "Ooh, la, la." I have it on good authority that Santa is bringing many more stories of Nancy's fancy to our house this Christmas. Anyhoo, for Ella's birthday, Gran (my mother) and Auntie K (my sister, Kamin) ...
Birthday Blessings
We're studying a book in my Sunday School class called "The Air I Breathe" by Louie Giglio; it is about worship. Although, I admit I haven't been reading it as often or as diligently as I should, I've learned a lot both from the reading and the discussion with our class members. In a nutshell, this book is about how we are MADE to worship, whether we know it or not. Just because you aren't a believer or aren't in church at this moment, doesn't mean you aren't "worshiping." We were made to worship. If we aren't worshiping the Lord right now, we must be worshiping something else. The message of this book has really hit me were it hurts because I don't always have an attitude of worship. This week we read a portion of the book that talks about being in a constant state of worship. Is this ...
Vaseline, mice and blogging
Okay, I admit it. I read blogs. Actually, if I were being perfectly honest, I'm obsessed. I love reading about the families of total strangers. I love seeing how people discipline their children, love their husbands and decorate their houses. I have several friends with blogs - they've been begging me to start my own. If I started a blog, what would I write about? We already have a website, full of pictures and stories about Ella... what else is there to talk about? Yesterday was Ella's birthday party and I decided after a huge success that I had blog material after all. This afternoon, Ella was playing in her room with all of the birthday loot and I found myself with nothing to do! I sat down, signed up with blogger and created by banner. As I was sitting at my computer enjoying the ...