I am such an awesome mother!

I got Ellie's wings to stand up straight! Woo Hoo! Go me! How did I do it? I put bus wire around the edges and soldered the wire together. Um, yeah, Ellie has an awesome Mommy who knows how to solder!

I also managed to get her cute little green booties to fit around some existing shoes. Hopefully that means she will be willing to wear them now!

I'm awesome!

There is hope yet

Ellie went trick-or-treating with Grandma yesterday and put on her costume (the main portion) without a fuss. And apparently she wore the hat to her costume for 15 minutes yesterday! She still refuses the shoes, but at least this gives me hope on getting a picture or two.

I also need to figure out how to make her wings stiffer because she came home looking like a dieing fairy. You know, one that was sprayed by a can of Raid or something. That's not the look I'm hoping for. I have approximately 8 hours to stiffen the wings up! Wish me luck!

Ellie visits the doctor

At our 18-month check-up, the Doctor walks into the room...

Mommy: Look Ellie, it's the doctor!
Ellie: Na na na na na na na na na! (Shaking her finger at the doctor).

Daycare Pictures

It's picture time for the kids at daycare and this morning I was all proud of how I am a good mommy. I got Ellie dressed up in her cutest dress. Ok, it's her only dress, but it's still cute. It is a Halloween dress with cats and pumpkins and a bow... oh, just trust me on the cuteness!

Anyway, I am all proud of myself for making her look so cute. I even managed to get a black bow in her hair. She was ready for pictures!

Then we saw her best friend. This little girl is just so pretty. She wears the best clothes! For pictures, she's dressed up in this adorable pink number that almost looks old-fashioned. And she has a pink bow in her hair. And she has more hair.

Now I can't do anything about the last item, but seeing this little girl dressed up for pictures took away some of my pride in how I remembered to dress Ellie up so she would be cute.

Hmm... Is it better to dress up a child in super-cute outfits, or is it just the thought that counts? I vividly remember a time when my mom forgot to dress me up and I ended up taking pictures in an ugly plain white turtleneck. I always wanted the super girlie dresses that the other girls had. And since I know a certain Grandma who would be more than willing to buy such things, shouldn't I have put more effort into making her "pretty" for her pictures instead of just "cute"?

MUST... GET... PICTURES!!!

Ellie hates her costume. Let me rephrase that. Hate is a strong word. Ellie HATES her costume. She's a cute little fairy. I forced it on her the other day so that we could go to a Halloween Party and she spent the next 5 minutes or so trying to convince everyone (Grandparents and Daddy) to take it off because she knew Mommy wouldn't. When we got to the Halloween party and put her on the floor to walk, she freaked out. Apparently she did not like her cute little elf-shoes. She absolutely refused to go anywhere with them on her feet. She also refused to wear her headband, so we were quite a site while trick-o-treating... she had her main costume on, but Daddy was wearing her pink headpiece and Mommy had her elf shoes on her hands.

Where's a camera when you need one?

Hopefully trick-o-treating at the daycare on Friday will go better. I MUST get pictures of her being a cute fairy, even if she's a cute pissed off one!

Halloween talk - FEARS

Since Halloween is approaching, let's talk about some fears.

Some of Ellie's fears:
Loud noises (her response: Oh Oh)
Small dogs (they're all talk)
Laying down in the bathtub (maybe she doesn't like water in her ears)
Mommy leaving (what can I say?)
Forgetting Bun Bun (Mommy has my back!)

But the most recent fear we've discovered:
Moving furniture. We visited Grandma this weekend and Grandpa was helping us push the bed up against the wall so that we wouldn't have to worry about Ellie falling off. She was NOT happy that we were moving the bed. Not happy at all. Afterwards, she practically refused to be on the bed. It was like she thought "Oh no, I saw how this thing can move! It's not safe up here!"

Sometimes it's strange to see the world through a toddler's eyes.

If baby ain't happy...

You know the saying "If Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy!" I think they got it wrong. When Ellie is unhappy and cranky it makes for a completely different evening experience, one that is way over-rated.

Running sideways

It's been about 6 months now since Ellie learned to walk, but I have to say that I don't think I will ever stop getting a kick out of watching this little girl run. I'm not sure how she does it, but somehow she manages to run straight even though her legs are going to the left and her arms are flailing to the right. I love it.

I call myself "the cock"

Ellie LOVES her new French music (given as part of the French class we joined). The theme is "Life on the farm." Between every song, she says "Mo! Mo!" while signing "More! More!" She's even requested more music as soon as she gets into the car.

That's the good part. The bad part is that it gets stuck in your head very easily, yet it's French. Luckily for me, I understand most of the French, but poor Michael does not. As such, it figures that the lyrics he ended up getting stuck in his head are:

Je m'appelle le coq. Le coq.

So he's been going around singing "I call myself "the cock"! The cock!"

Count with me!

Mommy: Can you count with me?
Ellie: Eh!
Mommy: Can you say "One..."?
Ellie: One!
Mommy: Two...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Three...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Four...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Five...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Hmmm... Let's try again... One...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Two...
Ellie: Two!
Mommy: Good job! You're so smart!

Baby is crying

A while ago Grandma and I were playing with Ellie and some dolls. She still hasn't really taken to dolls, but I am still hopeful.

Grandma: Look Ellie, the baby is crying.
Mommy: What do you do when a baby cries?
Ellie: (laying the doll down on a blanket) Nigh nigh!
Grandma: Oh, that's nice of you Ellie! Night night Baby!
Mommy: (proud of Ellie's thoughtfulness)
Ellie: (grabbing a pillow, she smashes it onto the baby's head)
Grandma: Oh dear. Well, I guess that's probably what most of us would *want* to do.
Mommy: Sigh. Maybe next time.

Spanish Classes

I tried to take Ellie to Spanish classes but was disappointed. It turned out that it was a little more lecture-like than I was expecting. I guess I expected Spanish songs for Ellie to dance to. Don't get me wrong, I think the class was great. Just not for Ellie's age yet. I've decided to go to the French class instead, since it is supposed to be musically-based.

However, I did get a kick out of a little girl at Spanish. She was probably 4 years old, and her mother left her at the class. She was kind of a little snot and was obviously a single child because she did not have any patience with the other "babies" in the room. Every time one of the younger children would pipe up, she would say something like "Oh no. Not again. I can not concentrate with this kind of racket!"

At the beginning of the class, when the teacher came up to her and asked (in Spanish) how she was, she said "Umm... I think I speak English, but I also speak a little bit of Mommy and a little bit of Daddy." Then at the end of class, she came up to the Spanish teacher and said "I've given it some thought and I've decided one thing for sure. I do not think I understand you."

As entertaining as she was, let's hope the French class ends up better suited for Ellie's age.

Undressing 101

Ellie's first attempt at taking her shirt off:

I want to take off my shirt. What's the first thing that needs to happen? Mommy always takes my arm out of the shirt. That's easy enough. I'll just pull on the sleeve until my arm comes out. Hmm, it seems like I can't pull it far enough. I know! If I push the other sleeve UP then surely the first sleeve will have more space to be pulled down. Hmm, that didn't work. Why didn't it work!? It should have worked! Let's try again! UGH! ACK! This sucks! Forget it! I didn't really want my shirt off in the first place!

Jumping 101

A post I've been meaning to write for quite some time now, but it still applies...

How to Jump:
1. Begin to prepare yourself. This includes clinching your hands and wiggling your butt.
2. Bend down.
3. Stand up.
4. Bend down. Wiggle your butt.
5. Stand up. Giggle. That was close!
6. Bend down.
7. Stand up! Woah!
8. Bend down.
9. Stand up really quickly! You almost left the ground that time!
10. Bend down.
11. Stand up quickly again. I think your left foot actually jumped!
12. Wobble. Wobble. Giggle.
13. Take a break. That was a little scary.
14. Think about what might happen if you ACTUALLY do jump... you might not be able to land! You might fly off into space!
15. Repeat because it's fun anyway.

Secret step number 15b: Repeat while on a bed. This inhibits the body's natural fear of landing, making it significantly easier for your feet to actually break contact with the surface below you.

An Explosion

Wow! In the last couple of days Ellie has exploded into words! It's incredible.

One such example, she started saying "Gapa" when Grandpa and Grandma were visiting this last weekend. This surprised me, though, because of all the grandparents (and there are a lot), I kind of expected the first one to get a name would be one of those that she sees often. However, she hasn't seen this Grandpa in 9 months! And when he was here, she was shy around him. So it came as a surprise that she kept asking about him whenever he wasn't in sight, or if he went downstairs she would say "Gapa Oh Oh" over and over again until he returned.

So many words! Even daycare mentioned it when I picked her up. This girl has definitely decided it's time to talk!

More music please

Ever heard of Connie Talbot? She's the six year old little girl who won Brittan's Got Talent show. She really does sing impressively for someone so young! See for yourself.

My mom bought her CD. It's filled with great cute songs for a little girl to sing, though they are all still adult songs. For example, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, I Believe, and Wonderful World. What I like about it is that even though she is a really good singer (she can hit Whitney Houston notes and durations), you can still tell that she is a little girl singing.

Ellie can tell too. She loves the CD. The first time I played it, Connie starts singing and Ellie starts dancing. Then Connie paused for a necessary instrumental portion of the song, and Ellie said "Mo! Mo!" while signing "More! More!" She did not want to listen to the instrumental nonsense! Bring back the little girl!

Mystery Solved

Grandma recently bought Ellie a dog toy. Sometimes baby toys make great toys for dogs and visa-versa, though I'm not sure which one is cheaper. This is a stuffed cat that sings (meows) when you close its mouth. I think it's a horrible evil dog toy because I've always hated it when people encourage dogs to attack cats, call it a left-over pet peeve of mine from my ex-step-father.

Anyway, the tag on the cat said that it sang "How much is that dog in the window?" though I could never get the notes to line up. In fact, it drove me crazy that I couldn't figure out how to get the cat to sing that song. I'm anal sometimes and because I couldn't figure out where the song began, I was somewhat obsessed with getting the toy to sing properly.

Apparently I wasn't the only one. While I was getting Ellie ready for the day, I heard the cat start to sing. Daddy was taking his turn playing now. However, after a few minutes and much to my surprise, I could understand what the cat was singing.

It was NOT "How much is that dog in the window".
It was NOT even a single song, but rather three!

"Twinkle twinkle little star"
"Playmate, come out and play with me"
"I'm bringing home a baby bumble bee"

UGH! No wonder I couldn't get the stupid (yet brilliant) cat to sing correctly! I can finally sleep peacefully tonight.

The uses of "Bye bye"

Some of the reasons to use "Bye Bye":

- Bye (usually spoken once the person is completely out of hearing range).
- I'm leaving now.
- Let's go outside.
- I get to go home now!
- Can you still hear me?
- I'll be in the other room if you need me.
- Water goes down the drain.
- The kitty just ran away from me.
- My ice cream is gone; someone must have eaten it!
- My milk is all gone.
- The end.
- The book goes here. Stay Book! Stay!
- Trash goes in the trashcan.

But by far, the best use of "Bye bye"...

The other day the doorbell rang and we were all excited to see who it was. Much to our disappointment, it was a door political salesman who was asking us questions about what we thought of Obama. Needless to say Daddy and Mommy were trying to get rid of him quickly. That's not to say we're anti-Obama. We're just anti-door-salesmen. Anyway, he was good at continuing the conversation until Ellie decided she was bored with this man and had heard enough. Walking up to the door, she loudly said "Bye bye!" and closed it on him! Smart girl! Everyone needs a young toddler during election time!

Sometimes it's good being 2nd place

The other night Ellie was not feeling well. I changed her diaper at the beginning of our bed time routine and she was not happy about it. Rightly so, since she had a bad rash that hurt to the touch.

A couple minutes into reading our book, she needed another diaper change. She made it very apparent that she did NOT want me to change her diaper. Suddenly I had a great idea! "Do you want Daddy to change it?" and her face lit up. So I started calling out for Daddy. She joined. "Da Da! Da Da!" until he finally came up the stairs to help.

She barely complained when he changed her diaper, though it was apparent that it still bothered her. Afterwards, he went back downstairs and we continued to read our books. Then came a sound from her diaper area and she looked up at me and then pointed to the changing pad and said "Da Da!" She crawled off my lap, laid on the diaper pad and started yelling "Da Da!" until Daddy came again. And sure enough, she needed another diaper.

I'm not complaining. If she wants to reserve that special relationship between her and her father, I'm totally ok with that.

Eat, Ellie, Eat!

Should I be concerned that Ellie won't eat for us. No one else has any problems getting her to eat. She loves to eat. Just not for us. It's weird, I tell you! Weird!

Strange job change for Daddy

Daddy is in Maryland right now for his job. To be more specific, he is at JHU/APL, where we used to work. You heard me right. When we were at APL, he was working on the New Horizons mission that went to Pluto (launched a few years ago). As a side note, for those who don't know, I worked for Homeland Protection Programs and a really cool Prosthetic Program, but I digress. Anyway, he worked on New Horizons because APL was subcontracted to build the spacecraft and conduct flight missions from their flight mission room (duh). However, it was SwRI who owned the program and it is SwRI who he works for now. So he's out in MD, working at the place he used to work at, with the people he used to work with, but doesn't anymore.

It's a strange feeling for him, I'm sure. It must feel weird to be back at the place you loved working, with the people you loved working with, knowing that it's not your home anymore. And for me, it's weird too, to know that he's out there without me. It makes me feel like we should all be out there. I guess that goes to show that wherever you end up making your first home, it will always have a soft spot in your heart.

Ellicott City was where Michael and I started (even if we met at CU in Boulder). We loved cute town hunting. We loved the coffee shop. We loved everything about Ellicott City (except that it wasn't in CO). We bought our first house out there, gutted it and made it ours. Even more so than our current home, the one in Ellicott City felt like *OURS*. We started our family there. Even though we replaced the carpet when we moved in, two years later the only spot that was worn down was right in front of the crib. It was where our family began.

So it's weird for him to be out there without me. It almost seems wrong. I think usually when you leave a place behind, it's just that... behind you. Oh, sure, you may visit every now and then, but it's not a part of your life anymore. It's a part of your past. So, for APL to still be a part of Michael's life is strange for both of us. It almost makes us feel like we should still be there.

That and he told me that they now have a Chik-Fil-A right across the street from APL! ARGH! Now that's just plain hurtful and make me really want to move back! Why did he have to tell me that????

Blog frustrations

I thought the slide show thing would be really cool, and it kind of is. However, I can't get it to start with the latest and greatest pictures. How are my fans (that's you) going to know when I add pictures to the slide show? Ugh.

Picture Update

July Pictures

August Pictures

September Pictures

In case you're wondering...

Mommy: Honey, in case you're wondering why the Tupperware is in random cabinets, Ellie was helping me with dishes.