Today is our 5th Anniversary and I can hardly believe it. I guess when I think back through all the time and experiences Seth and I have shared, it seems like a long time, but just right now, in the present, living, our time has gone so quickly!
I'm always struck with a huge amount of gratitude as I begin to think about Seth and our marriage. Thank you for being such a kind, generous, loving husband and father! I so look forward to discovering where the next 5 years will take us! (Please ignore the ridiculously tired eyes in above picture, for some reason I couldn't find a better pic of us together - we really need to fix that!)
Eleanor's hair continues to grow so slowly! It is at a stage right now where it hangs in her eyes if we just leave it alone, but it's not quite long enough to easily put in pigtails or a pony. So, I pulled out some old clips of mine and tried them out. They worked great for about an hour. :) Then Ella decided to pull them out repeatedly. She did think she was quite pretty, though, when they were first put in and she had on this pretty dress. :)
P.S. The spots on her nose are rug-burn marks. Lovely, I know. We're kind of inundated with facial injuries right now... hopefully this will change soon.
One of my favorite things about Eleanor is her continued love for the outdoors. She loves to ride in her stroller and take long walks (and runs!), but she also loves to take walks herself. During these walks she picks up all sorts of things. She also stops and examines just about everything in her path! The above picture was the assortment of treasures we arrived home with a couple of days ago. Of course, a few got lost along the way. :)
Eleanor and I set out for our typical 6.5 mile run this morning while it was semi-cool. Apparently along the way we lost her Blanket... but didn't notice until several hours later when she needed to go down for a nap.
I panicked. Seriously, how could I have missed us dropping Blanket!? And how would we find it? What if someone had already picked it up...
Amidst all the questions I vaguely recalled a portion of our run where Eleanor was babbling a lot and I asked her why... unfortunately I couldn't recall the exact place where we were during that time.
We headed out for our second 6.5 miles of the day - backwards along the route to save my legs from the tough hills at the end - in the blazing noon sun. We asked everyone we saw if they'd seen a brightly colored baby quilt... nothing. We even stopped by the ice cream stand at the park to see if they had a lost and found...
4.5 miles into our search we saw Blanket: folded nicely on top of a park bench at the bottom of Sparrowhawk Hill. Thank goodness someone found it and had the insight to know it was important and would be looked for!
30 seconds later Ella was asleep, Blanket at her side and one of Blanket's yarn ties in her hand.
So, I'm utterly relieved that Blanket has been recovered. I'm also totally exhausted. I might have to rethink my run tomorrow morning. :)
Ella and Blanket, Reunited
Such a happy occasion!
Strangely, I think the last time I took photos of Eleanor and Blanket, she was wearing the same outfit...
These are from the Rodeo Parade - Eleanor's first real parade experience. It was fun, but long and Ella didn't appreciate sitting in her BOB quite that long... I think next year will be more fun. These are from the Rodeo itself. We went on Thursday night, so things weren't quite as busy or crazy as it gets by Saturday. Again, this was really fun, but it was hard to get Ella to sit still for quite so long. We didn't quite make it to the end of the night. Next year will either be easier or we'll consider getting a babysitter. :)
So we've actually had quite a few fun activities lately that haven't been documented in picture, and thus, haven't gotten to the blog...
We attended the Wyo Rodeo, took a trip to the Tongue River Reservoir where Eleanor had her first lake swimming experience, and this last weekend held a garage sale with Amanda and Kayli. Now I know these don't seem like great blogging adventures when there aren't any pictures to go along, but I think we'll want to remember they happened next year (or whenever) when we look back over this summer.
Since the reservoir experience, Eleanor has been drawn to all types of water. Fun, wet and messy!
Since the garage sale I've been reorganizing the basement since we now have some much needed storage space open. I also decided a month or so ago that I needed to move all my sewing and craft stuff downstairs to allow Eleanor free reign of our bedroom... finally I've gotten the couch into our bedroom and the craft stuff sort of set up in the family room. I'm actually really excited about this new set up because I think it will allow me to do a bunch of the scrapbooking and sewing I have piling up while Seth watches TV in the evenings. Anyway... we're also trying to decide what to do with the bedroom downstairs... I'm thinking of transforming it into a play room for Eleanor which would hopefully help me on days when I need to be teaching and have someone here at the house watching Ella. We'll see.
But, that brings me to a huge part of the last few weeks. I've been considering, searching and making phone calls regarding a part-time child care thing for Eleanor 3 afternoons a week. I've gotten to the point where I'm totally overwhelmed trying to plan and execute piano lessons while having Eleanor with me. I'm also at a point where I'm missing making my own music (Ella only lets me play for 5 minutes or less at a time and she won't sleep at all with the piano being played). Anyway, right now the plan is to have a high school gal come to our house on Tuesday afternoons and then to take Eleanor to a daycare center on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. It will all total only 9 hours a week and hopefully give Eleanor some positive socialization time while giving me some space at home for music.
Ella's pose here just cracked me up! She LOVES blueberries, so she was in heaven. Plus, she was wearing her special boots. Life can't get much better than that!
We haven't quite figured out if she's trying for Eleanor and just hasn't gotten the last part yet, or if she has an opinion about what her nickname should be...
We've started calling her Ella, though, because she responds much more quickly. It's a good thing we thought of as many variations of Eleanor as we could before we named her and were happy with all of them! I wasn't exactly prepared for her to change her name so early, though. :)
I'm signed up to run the Portland Marathon on October 4th.
I'm not sure if I'm excited or scared, but I'm happy I finally committed. I've had a couple of hard weeks where running hasn't been fun and has felt like it's taken over our lives. I was lacking motivation and drive. Through it all I kept up with my training, but was definitely low on energy and struggling with our family schedule.
I've made a couple of changes (when Eleanor and I get up in the morning and actually putting money down to run) and they helped a bit. I also was craving a creative, artsy project yesterday so I decided to make a pretty running schedule that I don't mind hanging centrally in our house. It has helped to see the remaining weeks laid out in front of me. It's also helped to see a tally of the miles I've already run. I guess it's somewhat silly, but it was also important for me to embrace the commitment our family has made in allowing me to take the time to train and celebrate just how far I've come and how far I'm going.I have this bad habit of comparing myself to other people or diminishing the things I do by thinking, "yeah, but it's not as much as _______" or "not as fast as ______," etc. I'm trying to stay positive and be joyful about my accomplishments - even the little things.
Here are a few things I'm proud of: - running up my hardest progression of hills this morning (which we have plenty of!) at 10K pace while pushing Eleanor in the jogger. - hitting the 450 mile mark since beginning this process - running every single one of my scheduled workouts last week even though I didn't want to (at all!) - experiencing joy while running miles 9 and 10 of a tough 10-miler last week - getting home and thinking, "I could have kept going for much, much longer!"
I have to remind myself that it is okay to feel proud every once in a while. :)
So, I'm sorry if y'all decide my rise in narcissism is too much for you, but I think I've got to have it or I'll never make it to the starting line. Here's to the NW! We'll be seein' you soon!
Before they left, Grandma bought Eleanor a play kitchen. Luckily, we opened the box BEFORE they left... because it seriously took 3 adults a couple of hours to put it all together. So, Ellie woke up the morning of her grandparent's departure to a wonderful new toy. It only took her a few moments to realize there was something new in the living room and take full advantage.
It was still very exciting the next morning. And it stays interesting all morning and afternoon these days. Most of the time it looks like this:And I find small sized cookware and silverware all over the house. This morning Eleanor was filling up her glasses and pots with water from my shower... and rice from the rice box has started showing up in interesting places...
While my parents were here Ellie had a couple of new introductions to water. First, while watering the garden, she discovered the joy of the sprinkler. Then, since G & G stayed in a hotel, we had the chance to take advantage of an indoor swimming pool. Eleanor wasn't quite sure what to think of it at first. But, after she had gotten her shoes back on (to cope with the cold water we assume) she was a bit more interested. Eventually we were able to take her all the way into the water. It was fun for us all.P.S. Now it is very hard to keep Ellie away from sprinklers and hoses!
While G & G Sargent were here we did a bit of sight seeing, too. We headed up into the Bighorn Mountains for some hiking and a visit to the Medicine Wheel. The Medicine Wheel is an ancient site (think 10,000 years old) in the mountains where Native Americans of many, many tribes and individuals journey and gather to pray for healing. It also marks the summer solstice.
It was a gorgeous place and very interesting, but we did get caught in a hail storm while we were hiking. Eleanor wasn't the biggest fan of that, but she survived. :)
(Please ignore the ridiculously tired eyes in above picture, for some reason I couldn't find a better pic of us together - we really need to fix that!)
