Life With Ella

I have a lot of stuff to do, so I’m going to make this short. Ella and grandma walked to the Aquarium of the Bay today. It’s on Pier 39. It’s a 7 mile round trip walk. They all had a lot of fun. Tonight at Ella’s request, Ella, grandma and I ate dinner at Nordstrom. Ella was in the mood for their mac and cheese and french fries. We had a blast. We’re going to NJ on Thursday and we’ll be reunited with mommy and papa. We love you guys – can’t wait to see you.Ella and grandma playing around on the spider on the way to the aquarium.Ella looks really happy and excited to be at the aquarium.Ella and grandma touched the rays today! Ella was really excited to tell me about it.Ella at dinner wearing a new headband that grandma and papa bought for her.Hooray! Here is a very happy Ella after eating a delicious dessert.

Today, Ella and grandma went to yoga, had a play date with Mei, Kai, Stella and Juliet, took a nap, read books, painted, played in the house, and then had dinner together at Amici’s. Grandma is in heaven and so is Ella. I had to work all day and then I had a tennis match at night. Here are some of grandma’s photos from today.

Here’s Ella playing with a train set and the little people. Grandma said that Ella really liked to arrange the people.

Here is one of Ella’s people arrangements

After Ella’s nap, she had some apples and soy butter…she also had grandma put her in her leotard and tutu.

Ella went to dinner in her leotard, tutu, pants, sweatshirt and boots. There is no rain and no need for boots, but Ella took them out of the closet and put them on all by herself. Grandma said that as they were leaving, Ella grabbed her toy cell phone and said, “Oh – I need my phone” and proceeded to make a few calls.

Ella before the spaghetti arrived.

Looks like Ella ate well!!! Yummy!!!

Ella and her artificial sweetener collection.

We are all going away next week for my birthday but Sunny had to leave to go to NY early because she has some work to do. Sunny left this morning and grandma arrived this afternoon. Grandma is mommy’s stand-in for the week. I have a lot of work to do before we go away. Before mommy left, she explained what was going on to Ella. This morning, when Ella woke up (Sunny was already gone), she said, “Mommy went to NY and then she will come to New Jersey and we will all go to Anguilla. Today we will pick up grandma from the airport.” I guess Ella pretty much comprehends and remembers everything. Ella was super excited to see grandma. Tonight, we had a nice dinner with Uncle Ray and Aunt Abigail.

I took this picture of Ella after dinner. She looks like a spacey little elf to me.

They are not happy to see each other at all!

Not one bit!

At dinner, Ella was playing with her necklaces and bracelets and announced, “When we go home, I want to take off my shirt and pants and diaper and crocs and put on these and walk around naked”. Life is beautiful.

We all went to Tyler’s birthday party today. It was a lot of fun. Ella did, however, fall off of an indoor slide and hurt her finger. She was crying for a while and wasn’t really able to communicate what was wrong. I moved every joint in her body to make sure that nothing was broken and there was no blood, so that was good. It turns out she jammed her middle finger on her right hand. It could have been so much worse. After about 1/2 hour, Ella started climbing up the slide again! She said, “I’m not going to fall off and I am going to be brave.” I guess falling off the horse and getting back on really helped the cause. Everyone at the party was really sweet and wonderful. Ella was the greatest!

Here’s a picture of Ella at the party. She is one happy kid and really loves to party.

Here’s Ella climbing up the slide

They had a face painter at the party, but Ella decided that she wanted to have her legs painted. Pretty cool.

Today was a beautiful day. Ella and I started the day going downtown to SFMOMA to get a birthday present for her buddy Tyler. We’re going to his party tomorrow. We came home and went over to Stella and Juliet’s for a play date with Stella, Juliet, Mei, Kai and Tyler. The kids had a lot of fun. Ella started to get a little cranky so I took her home for a nap which of course she never took. At around 5:00 the kids went into the garden and “painted” on the walls. Then we played with bubbles. We had dinner with the Kim/Arenas and took a beautiful walk after dinner. The weather was still great and the kids played in the little park. As we were walking past the ball park tonight, Ella looked at me and said, “I smell french fries”. She was right! We were walking by a concession stand that they allow you to go to if you are not attending the game. We got the girls fries which they loved.

I took Ella to let the dogs out this afternoon and the sprinklers were on in the garden. Ella stood in one corner and was “rained” upon. She thought it was really funny.

Here’s a cool shot of the girls “painting” in the garden.

Ella blowing bubbles again

Tonight Ella practiced her new jumping skills by jumping off this small step. She did a great job but also fell a few times and had pretty raw knees by the end of the night.

Here’s another one of my overhead shots of Sunny, Juliet, Stella, Helen and Ella…almost looks like they were actually at the beach.

I have a lot of photos to share here. We had a great Thursday. First we went to My Gym, came home and went to the baseball game with mommy. After the game, Ella took a nap. Tonight, Stella and Juliet came over while Helen and Ron were at a preschool orientation. We took the girls to the little park behind the ballpark and they had a blast. Phyllis met us over there. After the park, we took a nice walk towards home and stopped at the ice cream place and had some ice cream. After ice cream, we all came back to our house.   What a beautiful day and night.Ella in the elevator on the way to My GymHere we are at the ballgame. It was somewhere in the 90’s today…very hot for SF. Ella was getting a kick out of me splashing her head with water.Here is Ella at the park. She insisted on wearing her leotard to the park. We had a compromise – she had to wear little pants too!Here is a really sweet picture of JulietElla is getting really good at blowing bubblesElla was standing on the back of a tricycle that Ella was trying outElla is a great passenger! She’s giving Juliet a little kiss on the head.The girls playing at “the beach”. Look at those dirty feet!Here’s an overhead shot of the ice cream party.

Seems like we have had so much going on…work, work, a visit to CDS, work. Here are 2 pictures I took recently. There will probably be more pictures tomorrow. I have the day with Ella.

We found a ladybug on our curtains the other night while we were eating dinner. Ella was very excited to hold it. We set it free in the garden a little while later.

Here’s a picture of Ella right before she was going to bed. Last night, Ella fell asleep at around 10:45, woke up at 8:00, didn’t take a nap all day, went to music class and tonight went on a visit to Children’s Day School. Ella played in the playground and investigated the classrooms. After that, we went to dinner at Pasta Pomodoro and then took a stroll down 24th street where we bumped into our friend (and real estate agent) Nadia. Ella took to her immediately, let her hug her and kiss her and it was a pleasure to see. Ella was still in a really good mood when she finally passed out at 9:30 tonight.

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