Life With Ella

We started off the day picking up mommy from across the street. The Giant’s Community Fund was collecting baseball gloves and money to help make sure each Junior Giant would have a glove to play with. Mommy was working – trying to help the kids. Ella got a hot dog and we were ready for the next part of our day.

Mommy and Ella in front of the ballpark

Look how happy Ella looks with her very own hot dog

We went to see a children’s production of Winnie The Pooh with Stella, Juliet, Helen and Ron in the afternoon. It was a really sweet production. The girls were amazing. They were super quiet and really paid attention during the entire hour!

Here are Ella and Juliet and one of Juliet’s friends with Winnie the Pooh after the show.

Ella, Stella and Juliet taking a ride on a Trojan horse outside of the theater

After the show, we all went to our homes and the girls rested. Tonight, we walked over to the kids park behind the ballpark and watched Kaboom…some amazing fireworks that a local rock station puts on. Before we left for Kaboom, Helen and Ron had some friends over and Helen bought a cake. She was so sweet and put 2 1/2 candles in it and we all sang (is that really a word?) “Happy half birthday” to Ella. Ella is 2 1/2 today!

Ella driving the boat at the kid’s park. This was the first time we went to the park at night!

Stella wearing Sunny’s glove. She kept coming up to us and trying to scare us with the glove.

Ella and mommy watching Kaboom. Ron and Juliet are in the background.

We had a fun day today. We started off at Stella and Juliet’s house with a playdate with the other kids (Mei, Kai, and Tyler). The kids had a lot of fun together. I took Ella home and she seemed exhausted, but she failed to take a nap. The best she did was put her head on the pillow for about 10 minutes. Later in the afternoon, we ran some errands around the neighborhood and ended up at Borders reading lots of books. Mommy met us at Borders. Tonight, we went to the ballgame with the Kim/Arenas. Everyone seemed to be having a great time, but around the 5th inning, Ella began to cry and said she wanted to go home. Helen and I took Ella and Stella home and Ron, Juliet and Sunny stayed for 2 more innings. Ella ended her night running into the hallway completely naked screaming that she wanted to play My Gym by the elevator. Of course we wouldn’t let her which made her cry and then she finally surrendered and went to sleep. Here are some pictures of Ella that I took today. She had many different looks.

Here is a picture from this morning at Stella and Juliet’s

I took these two after Ella’s “nap”. She was snacking on apples and soy butter

Here is Ella about an hour before the baseball game. She was fully clothed and we were hanging out listening to music. All of a sudden a song came on and she said, “I want to take off my shoes, shirt and pants and I want to be naked and have on my tutu” so of course, we followed her orders!

Ella with a big smile on her face after having some cotton candy at the ballgame

We took a little walk around the ballpark…it was a cold and windy night

Ella has always been into her books, but recently she has been telling us, “I want to read it by myself”. This morning, Ella woke up, came downstairs and started “reading”. I say reading in quotes because she obviously doesn’t read, she just puts the book on her lap, gets a really concentrated look on her face and flips through the pages. She had a pile of books on the table, sat down on the big leather chair and went through each book. I took these 2 pictures when she was reading “Llama Llama Mad At Mama”.

Today, we started the day going to a Country Fair at Children’s Day School. This was the first event at CDS that we have been to as a family. It was fun, a little hectic, lots of kids and parents…I don’t know if we’re ready for all of this! Ella watched a sheep get sheared, played on the slide, looked at the chickens, played a few games, had a cupcake and some cookies – she really had a good time. Here are some pictures…

Ella told us that she was driving to New Jersey

Playing a beanbag game

Ella about to meet the boy on the other side of the wall who was giving her back the beanbags

Ella and some other kids checking out the sheep with her new haircut

Here are some of the CDS chickens

Helping Ella climb up the curvy pole

Ella and mommy having some fun together

Look at our cute little chicken

We came home and Ella had some gnocchi (Ella’s request) and then Ella took a little nap. At around 4:00, we all headed over to the Channel park to go to Brandon’s birthday. The party was a train themed party – the birthday boy loves Thomas the Tank Engine. It was a really sweet party and Ella had a blast. Ella had a lot of treats including sugar cookies that she decorated and icing from a green and a blue cupcake.

Ella arrived at the party in her red car

Here is the birthday boy Brandon riding on a cool train that his parents set up

Here’s Ella riding on the cool train

Waiting for the big bubbles

Look at all of the bubbles! Mommy did a great job making bubbles with Hariel’s dad Malcolm

I got it!

Look at the amazing bubbles that mommy made

Look at the cupcake cake

Giving Brandon a happy birthday hug

Beautiful Ella on top of tall mountain

After the party, we went over to Stella and Juliet’s to drop off Juliet’s birthday present. I didn’t have my camera, but I think Ron got some really cute shots. Tomorrow is Juliet’s birthday. We can’t wait to celebrate Juliet!!!

Ella has had a cold all week. She’s getting better, but it’s making her a little more sensitive than usual. Her cold wasn’t so bad to not take her to My Gym and she was really looking forward to it, so we went. Ella had a great time there, but was more mellow than usual. After class, we went over to Crossroads Cafe and had some lunch. After lunch, Ella told me that she wanted to go to the pet store and buy a present for Bug and Towby. We went and Ella picked out 2 yellow balls and when I asked her if she was going to give them to the dogs, she said, “No – I’m going to keep them.” We came home and I tried to get Ella to take a nap but she refused. We took a walk over to Borders and spent a lot of time there reading books and playing with puppets. We came home at around 5:45 and Ella took a bath. After the bath, we went over to Helen and Ron’s for dinner. It was a great dinner and the girls had a lot of fun, but towards the end of the night, Ella was playing in Stella and Juliet’s cardboard house thing that they have and Juliet tried to come in, and Ella shoved her in the face. This was really a first for Ella and we squashed it right away – Juliet was OK, but it wasn’t a good thing. We let Ella know that she couldn’t do push or hit Juliet or anyone. We had Ella say “I’m sorry” which she was hesitant to do at first and then we made sure that she knew why she was sorry. We’ll continue to stay on top of this. I think she was really tired and messed up from her cold, but that’s no excuse for doing that to Juliet. By the end of the night, Ella walked up to Juliet, gave her a kiss on the head and said, “I love you Juliet”. Ella fell asleep at about 8:45 which is unheard of for her. Hopefully she’ll feel better tomorrow.

Ella happily swinging on a swing at My Gym

Walking down the street after My Gym playing and dancing around with her red ruby shoes

Sitting and meditating in our Zen garden

Towby telling Ella a secret

Look at this beautiful mellow kid – I wonder what she’s thinking about

Chillin’ on a bench at the Crossroads Cafe. Ella took her ponytail out of her hair, climbed up on the bench and just got a huge smile on her face.