Christmas

These cousins played a LOT over Christmas. Ellis and Samantha together were lots of fun to watch. We hope they'll be great friends as they grow up, and this week was a great start (since last time they were together, neither seemed to notice the other much :)



SOOOO excited to see the movie 'Tangled' in her stocking from Santa:




Ellis is a bit more...forthcoming with her affection, but Sam tolerated this difference very well, head-lock hugs and all:


Hanging out with Uncle Tim:


Playing with the mini-princesses, which were very popular this week:



The almost constant game of chase around the house:
Auntie Janae made things even more fun:






Sweet little baby, Clara just rocking while the rest of us ate dinner:

In a deep conversation together at the dinner table:


Grammy reading the most requested book of all time (There's a Monster at the End of This Book) yet again for her girls:

Air-Hockey with an audience:




The result of mixing all of your new play-dough into one mass: gross.

The girls posing with their Great Grandma Knipp...quite a challenge to get all smiles:





Sunset:

Our Early Christmas

On Christmas Eve morning we woke up and had our first "Christmas" in our new home before driving down to the Springs to spend the rest of Christmas with family.


No help needed when opening gifts this year :)



This is a 2' x 3' floor puzzle that we have now put together roughly 300 times since Christmas:

Snow Day!

These were taken a little before Christmas. We had fun out in the front yard after a pretty massive snowfall. Ellis fell on her face once and was less than thrilled, but other than that, she had a great time.

...or sumpin

This morning Ellis needed to apologize to me and it took some reminding and maybe a little cajoling until she finally (and reluctantly) said, "I'm sorry or sumpin."

Ellisisms

Ellis, to me, as we're walking out of the Post Office today: I don't know about you, Mama.

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Lately, Ellis is adding the word "something" to the end of a lot of her questions. Except she pronounces it "sumpin." For example, "Do you want a snack or sumpin?" "Did you take off your shoes or sumpin?"

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Ellis always reverses her 'because' statements. For example: "I'm too hot because I need to take off my socks." "I'm hungry because I need a snack."

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I mentioned to Ellis that we needed to go to the library today so we could return her books and check out some new ones. To this, she replied, "Oh that will be wonderful!"

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And Ellis has changed her name to Rapunzel, and Gabe's name to Flynn Rider. The movie Tangled occupies her thoughts most waking hours. If you call her Ellis, she will immediately correct you by saying, "I'm Rapunzel." And if I accidentally refer to Gabe as Gabe or Daddy, she immediately responds with, "Flynn is just Flynn, okay?" She never misses. She notices every. single. time. For the last month and a half.

Well...

Gabe walked out of the bathroom after a shower the other day, wearing a towel wrapped around his waist. Ellis liked this because in her mind: "Daddy! You're wearing a dress!"

Gabe (to me): "Are you feeding her lines?"

Ellis: "I don't eat LIONS!"

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Lately, Ellis has been starting many of her responses to questions with the word 'well'. But it sounds closer to 'wyeeeellll'... like she's getting ready to explain something difficult to a child. It's very cute :)

Picture-less update

Gabe took our camera to work to use last week and it hasn't returned.

Yesterday, Ellis (out of the blue) put her hand up as you would to tell someone to stop, and said to me, "I don't have time for this."

I don't remember ever saying this to her. I'm not sure which is worse, the possibility that I've said it without realizing it, or that my not-even-three-year-old has, on her own, decided to cut straight to the point with me.

I've officially enacted the If-you-don't-clean-up-your-mess-when-I've-asked-(too many times)-then-those-toys-disappear law. Ellis has officially enacted the I-have-a-free-will-and-my-will-is-no-longer-to-simply-please-you way of life. Makes for some creative parenting in public--I will not give in to her demands, which means more than once Ellis has thrown a public tantrum. So fun. Especially when we're at the library. Passion is good. Ellis is very passionate.

I'm now in my 33rd week of pregnancy and I am honestly surprised that all indications point to a normal, full-term pregnancy in my near-future. And very thankful. But still pleasantly surprised.

Ellis is very big into character play. It's become so commonplace that often she'll just say as a quick aside, on her way out of a room for instance, "I'm Rapunzel and you're Flynn." or, "You're a princess, and I'm your mom." Exit room. At that point, until we are notified of a change in character, we are not allowed to call her Ellis. You will be sternly reminded if you break character.

Oh man, I love her so much.

We went to story-time at the library yesterday. Ellis was a little shy at first and wanted to sit on my lap instead of the rug. After a little while she decided she wanted to join the other children on the rug. She quietly made her way up to the front and, not so gently, WEDGED herself between two little girls that were sitting right next to each other. Then she hugged each of them.
They both seemed a little thrown. She's very affectionate :)

I've also been the recipient of lots of hugs and "I love you soooo much" exclamations lately. It's wonderful affirmation :)

Unpacking and organizing is slower-going than I'd like, but it will happen. Just a quarter step at a time, or so. We've met two neighbor couples and have been very warmly welcomed to the neighborhood. We're loving the big back yard and had a lot of fun pulling Ellis around in the sled last weekend out there. It feels like our home was made for us, and I've felt at home since the day we moved in.

Where have all the blog posts gone?

Half the people on my list of blogs I love to read over to the right, haven't blogged in weeks, and in some cases, months. What's going on?

Reasons to celebrate

First of all, congratulations to Tim and Kristi and Samantha for their new addition Clara Louise!!! We can't wait to meet you, little girl! Click on over to Kristi's blog to see some super cute baby pictures :) I can't wait to see a picture of Clara and Sam together. A whole lot of sweet.

Secondly, MANY thanks to my mom for responding to my S.O.S. email last week asking her to come save me from my paralysis in the face of all that needed to be done in order to move into a new house and rent out the old one by the end of the month. She came in and whipped things into shape, and by that I mean she packed up our whole house. And painted. And cleaned. And played with Ellis. And cooked for us. THANK YOU, MOM!!!! It was great to have you here.


On the first day of my mom's visit, she was carrying (the fully-potty-trained) Ellis down the stairs when Ellis got right in her face, like a couple of inches away, looked her Grandma in the eye and whispered, "You have yellow hair like me." From then on, they were close buds.


Playing with homemade goo (cornstarch and water):



Thirdly, we are probably moving our closing date up to late next week, which means we'll be able to move in to our new house (in Arvada) a week and a half earlier than originally planned! Woo hoo!

And finally, Ellis has been O U T of diapers for the last week or two (?) which is even better than I imagined. And to top it all off, she's now transitioned from her little toilet to the normal one, which means no more wiping/cleaning out the little one. Just flush the big one. Hooray for that!

Halloween is over, but...

Here are a bunch of pictures from Halloween (ish) time:


Enjoying the (free) festivities at Nick's Garden Center:


Really enjoying pretending to drive a race car at Nick's:


Showing you that this is "the big pumpkin I ever seen!" (that's right, 'big' not 'biggest')




Definitely freaked out by these very realistically carved pumpkins (the others were creepy and she did not dawdle near them):