ESL (first being toddlerese) Update

"Jingo Baws" aka Jingle Balls, more often aka Jingle Bells.

"Kissus Tee" Christmas Tree

"Ah-na-na-na-nan" Raggety Ann (the number of na's varies anywhere from 2 to 5)

"Siwwy ______" Anything and everything is potentially silly according to Ellis these days.

"Wiggo Eaws" Wiggle ears.

"Dit-do nook...Dit-do baby...Dit-do _____" Thank you (for the) milk...Thank you (for the) baby..."

"I five you." I love you. On the way in from a walk the other day, Ellis wrapped her arms around my neck and said, "I FIVE you, Mama!" At which point I literally melted to the ground in a big pile of lovey goo. Until that moment she had only ever responded to us saying to her "I love you, Ellis." This time was all on her own.

"Downstays" Meaning, please let me go up and/or down the stairs.

"No nap." Pretty clear there.

"He-you-go" Here you go.

"Otch...funny...oovie...funny...otch...oovie..." I would like to watch a funny movie, and by funny movie I mean the one with Shrek (Tereck), Princess (Pincess) and Donkey (Dunkey).

"Rocka Baby" Rock-a-bye, Baby.

"Bootsawn" Boots on, or I know I'm only wearing a diaper right now, but I see a need to wear my boots right now and I need your help to put them on please.

How to live dangerously while wearing white...

Ellis and I were very excited to get out paints for her very first painting experience. At first (and by that I mean all but the last 2 minutes) Ellis was most intrigued by dipping the brush into the water and then the paint, as well as mixing the colors. She tested them out every way possible, including the taste test (passed) and the skin allergy test (also passed). This whole event was a little on impulse, as you can see by the fact that I allowed a toddler to experiment with paint while wearing a white shirt and white sweater. I realized this halfway through and decided to just let it slide. This same impulsiveness with painting is why if you look hard enough, you'll find paint somewhere on most of my clothing.














Ellis' hair is getting pretty long. Though she only lets me put pigtails in when she's distracted by a "funny oovie" (Shrek is her fave), and takes them out as soon as she realizes I've put them in, here are a couple of pictures of her cute piggy tails.




Probably watching the funny oovie again:

Loving this right now

Made me cry. Twice. Stuff like this always does...

Enjoy! (make sure you watch the youtube video :)

Catch up from Thanksgiving, and some others, too

These pictures are all out of order, but here you go:


I decided Ellis and I needed a walk to Target yesterday. Here she is sporting the new hat made for her by her Aunt Kristi---super soft and super cute! (And yes, she is wearing her pj's under all that winter-wear)







Out of the blue this is Ellis' new favorite activity. She crawls into her folded up stroller and one by one piles her animals around and on top of her. She sat in this pile for probably 15 minutes and then said, "Hep, pease." (Help, please) She was a bit stuck and I think starting to overheat...





Here is our little "Santa" for the Christmas celebration we had with Tim, Kristi and Sammy at the Knipp's over Thanksgiving. Ellis was pretty good at staying focused enough to hand out gifts to the people she was told to hand gifts to.


Grandma and the girls:



As I've mentioned before, Ellis has this STRONG face and muscle flexing shake that she does. It's quite intense. Well, as it turns out, her cousin Sammy does the same thing! I couldn't get a picture of them flexing at the same time, but this particular evening they were both hamming it up quite a bit. So funny:





Little Miss Serious in her "nessiss" (necklace) and Grandma's shoes working on the computer:



Ellis had a blast splashing in the tub with Sammy. Sammy had fun, too but decided at one point that Ellis' excitement was maybe a bit much for her :)





All wrapped up in my scarf:




Pretty sunrise out the back a couple of weeks ago:



This reminds me of a paparazzi shot, like Ellis has disguised herself before leaving the house. In reality, this is a typical day in the life of raising a little girl:



Another sunrise:

Little star...

Ellis has a few books with children's song lyrics in them. When Gabe and I read these books to Ellis, typically we sing the songs as we go. Ellis is not a big dancer or singer...until tonight. For the first time ever, she began singing "Tinkle, Tinkle...star...HOW..." with no prompting from us. The three of us sang it together multiple times and she got a little bit better each time. I just put her into bed for the night and I can still hear her singing (or should I say practicing) over the monitor.

What a fun little person she is.

Visit to the Denver Botanic Gardens (along with the Henry Moore sculpture exhibit)