Happy Birthday!!!

Well, we have made it to three. It is an exciting age. Here is a list of some of the things Ella can do this year that she couldn't last year:

1. Dress and undress herself

2. Use the potty (thank goodness)

3. Do some chores (put her own plate in the sink, put her clothes in the dirty clothes and wipe down the coffee table)

4. Negotiate with the best of them. When we ask her to do something we often hear "what about......(fill in the blank with Ella's idea of how to get out of doing what she doesn't want to).

5. Draw pictures of things that we can identify (faces, spiders, rainbows, and the letters "L" and "H").

6. Spell her own name.

7. Put together a puzzle.

8. Tell a joke (they aren't as funny as she thinks they are).

9. Sing a song (favorites are "I Love to See the Temple" and "The Colors Song").

10. Name all the different candy bars (yeah, she is genius).

And I am sure there are many more. She is a wonderful little girl and has filled our last 3 years with lots of laughs.

A Local Celebrity...

Here she is at the park...trying to keep her identity concealed from the paparazzi.

And here is the most recent sighting with her best friend "blankie".

To: Those Who Have Been Here Before...

I can't keep clothes on this child. I understand that she needed to learn how to undress herself and am grateful bc now she can use the bathroom...but seriously...how do all the Moms out there keep their kids dressed?

And please tell me I am not the only one who leaves their child alone for one second only to find this....I mean the rain-boots do add a little something interesting but I think a shirt would be nice too.

I always thought it wasn't such a big deal that she wanted to be "all maked" all the time but as of late it is starting to cause problems. You see it was always one of those family secrets that no one else knew. When I took her out in public she was always dressed so I figured people just assumed that she was also dressed at home. But lately, my secret is starting to get out. This is partly bc I can't seem to take a picture of her dressed but that was just the beginning. We also have the problem that our neighbors both have boys a few years older than Ella that like to play outside our sliding glass door. So now I have to keep the curtains closed most days. And we tend to have friends that stop by and I am afraid they are going to stop coming bc they don't want to see Ella in her under-roos. Not to mention that they might call CPS bc it looks like we don't feed the kid.


We tried have tried a few tactics:

1. We let her pick her own clothes out..but they still only stay on for about 2o min.

2. We told her she was a big girl not a baby...but she just said "I want to be a maked baby".

3. We had a talk with her about modesty. She even admitted during it that Mommy and Daddy wear clothes and don't go around "all maked" but somehow the behavior did not change. Instead she added a little dance called Ohh, My Naked Tooshie that is preformed whenever the tooshie is exposed (don't worry there are no pics of it).


And so now I am requesting help from the all those who have been here before...please tell me there is hope...I really would like to get some clothes on the child.

Ella the Midwife

I LOVE my midwives!! Not just because they take good care of me but because they let Ella be a part of everything.

They let her see how much she weighs and they take time to talk to her about having a baby brother. But Ella's favorite part is when she gets to turn on the little machine and find the baby's heartbeat (as shown above).

As a side note, I went back and forth about whether or not to put this picture up because, well, this is not my best side (not that I have one right now). But I decided to anyway..hoping that everyone would focus on Ella's happy little face as opposed to my huge belly (though I do have a good excuse!).

Art..Art..Art

Ella LOVES art projects!!! She is always creating something for me to display around the house. I enjoy her artwork but I think my house is looking less like it belongs to me all the time.

She is slowly taking over the whole house. It started with the fridge..where she could put her art up by herself with magnets that were supposed to teach her the alphabet. Ella has found that they hold art projects fabulously. Then she moved on to the glass door on the bookshelf and finally the door to the basement. She needs tape to hang her projects in these locations which requires my help but if I refuse she is devastated and I don't want her to think her art isn't beautiful (even though some of it isn't so worth displaying).

But then...I got this great idea. We would color hearts and cut-out letters that would spell "Daddy Rocks" to hang on the sliding glass door for Chris's birthday. Genius right??? I mean, Ella loves art projects and this is an easy gift she can give her Daddy. Well I didn't think about the fact that she would never let me take them down. I would try and she would say "that is so sad, the poor hearts and ABCs".

So, the only way to get rid of them was to hang something else in their place. Which meant that Ella and I spent the day making shamrock streamers for St. Patrick's Day.

Sometimes I wish I had one of those houses that was decorated like in the magazines. It seems like it would be so luxurious and relaxing but then I look at this....

And I am convinced that my home is more beautiful than any picture in any magazine.

So, maybe no interior designer would decorate their house like this...

But at least for today...I don't care!!!!!

A Star is Born!

Why did I say that???

It was so exciting when Ella starting learning words. And then when her words grew to cute little sentences. And then her sentences to whole stories. It was fun, I repeat WAS.....

I say this because lately I have been hearing things come out of her mouth that sound really familiar. They are the kind of things that I say to her because after all, I am in charge here.

Ohh, how I wish I could take them back, seriously!!

And so I proceed with the list of things I wish I would have never said:

1. "Do you understand?"
I asked Ella why she didn't want to do something this morning and she told me "I just don't want to, do you understand?? I just don't want to!!"

2. "Now!!"
Ella frequently tells me, "I want my milky, NOW!" (the fact that she calls it "milky" doesn't make it cute).

3. "I hate this!!"
Ella will randomly tell me something that she hates. "I hate meat!" is one of her favorites.

4. "I can't carry you because my leg hurts."
Ella has a broken leg from time to time now, mostly around the time that she needs to put her clothes in the hamper or put her plate in the kitchen. She says, "Ohh, my leg hurts!"

5. "If you do that one more time!" (with the finger point)
When Ella is frustrated with me she will tell me, "One more time!!" And yes, she has got the finger point down.

6. "We have to leave in 2 more minutes."
In my parenting classes at BYU "they" said to give your kids a warning before it is time to leave a task they are enjoying. Well, either this advice is craziness or I choose my words poorly because now Ella just keep asking for "2 more minutes." And it ends up that I am putting on her coat and boots while she is screaming, "2 MORE MINUTES, 2 MORE MINUTES!!"

7. "What did you like the best?"
I thought it would be a good thing to ask Ella what she liked the best about her day but she picked up on the phrase "the best" and now she uses it all the time. Like for example at dinner she likes to say, "I wanted chocolate the best!"

Isn't parenting funny? I thought I had to teach a little girl how to grow up and be a good adult and now I see that I might need to grow up (just a little) too.