I got together with a friend of mine last Sunday to help her recover a couple of lampshades in her living room. Don't they look cute! It was nice to 1. get out of the house for a while, 2. get a little crafting in, and 3. feel a sense of accomplishment because not only is the project completed, but the project helps complete her new living room.
Just a heads up if you're thinking about covering lampshades... the bigger the shade, the tougher the project. I'd definitely recommend starting with a kid-sized shade. Good luck!
Don't I look like a big girl! These days I'm refusing to sit in my high chair. I love to sit at the table with mommy. I miss you a lot. Please come home soon.
Ella wore her new butterfly dress from Grandma yesterday. She LOVED it! So much so that later in the day, after getting soaked with the garden hose, she threw a huge fit because we wouldn't let her put the wet dress back on. She ended up in just a diaper...
(Info for future sewing endeavors: it fits right now, but I'm not sure how much longer she'll be able to wear it. The top is pretty snug around her belly and sort of pulls up while she's sitting. We love the fullness of the skirt. Ella spent a lot of time twirling around in circles. :) The skirt length is nice. Also, she has now worn the pjs and the top fits great with some room for growing, but the bottoms fit perfectly right now - both in length and around the middle with a cloth diaper.)
Ella and I spent a little bit of time walking around downtown Sheridan yesterday - both for errands and a special smoothie treat. We got several compliments on her beautiful dress.
And here it is on our beautiful girl, the trouble was, she was much more interested in hugging my legs than getting her picture taken:
Ella had a big day yesterday! We said goodbye to Daddy (off to LA for a conference), had Molly over while Mommy went to the dentist and then had Allie over while Mommy taught piano lessons. Here's the lucky baby-girl with her wonderful sitters:
So we've been told several times we should enter this lovely picture of our child into a messy baby photo contest. It just so happens that Disney Family.com has such a contest going on right now. But, we have to have your votes in order to win. So, log on to family.com, search for "messy baby face picture contest" and find our beautiful girl. Or, try this link - I think it will take you directly to her picture so you may cast your vote - Messy Ella.
Thanks, Mom, for the new shoes and clothes. Ella loves these crazy clompers! (Sorry about the picture going the wrong direction. I don't know what's up with it and have no patience with trying to fix it.)
Last night I just finished a 3 session Food Preservation Class/Workshop. Our 3 evenings focused on freezing and dehydrating, water bath canning and pressure canning. The first night we blanched and froze green beans as well as dried bananas and apples. The following day I borrowed Amanda's dehydrator and dried some cherries and apples. The second night we water bath canned salsa. It was super yummy and now I want to make a huge batch! The third night we made lentil stew (theoretically to pressure can, but ate it instead) and pressure canned carrots. The whole thing was quite informative and even more than that, quite empowering. I'm pretty excited to put my new knowledge to work.
Now I just have to decide what we would like to have on hand over the next year. And, we have to discover what kinds of local produce are available right now for us to preserve. I've been searching online for u-pick farms and orchards in Wyoming and Montana and have come up with a few leads. Hopefully we'll have a couple weekend adventures to share with you here soon. :)
The rest of our life is pretty "normal." Eleanor continues to grow her vocabulary daily, has started doing some fancy stomping and/or kicking tantrums and is adjusting really well to daycare a couple of afternoons a week. We're still running most mornings and I'm loving the time I get in the afternoons to practice the flute and piano. It is wonderful how just a few hours has made such a difference in my outlook, patience and general well being. I'm looking forward to 8-9 students in September (still with hopes of gaining up to 12) as well. Seth is working hard and getting ready to head off to LA for another training conference in a week or so. He's enjoying "playing" with fishing and hunting buddies.
So we're finally a bit greener, but still feel behind in terms of what we're used to. I am definitely impressed by our tomato plants started by seed, however. They were also sort of slow to start, but are beautiful these days.
I've been lazy about taking any more pictures of our garden, but it is growing quite successfully! We currently have more lettuce than we can possibly eat, and thus are making even better friends with our neighbors. We also have sugar snap peas (yum!), burgundy beans, carrots, basil, chives and potatoes. We're still waiting on the green beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, apples, grapes, cilantro, sage and parsley. I'm confident we'll get both cucumbers and tomatoes before the frost hits, but we'll see about the others. People around here say there is often a hard frost near the end of August or beginning of September that usually halts everything - but, if we can survive it then the season extends well into October. We're hoping for the best.
I'm fairly satisfied by this year's experiment, but have definitely learned things about gardening in Wyoming that will change our approach next year. At least we've been successful enough to think we'll have a garden again next year! :)
Eleanor had her 15 month Well Check yesterday and we had the opportunity for Daddy to come with us! This was especially helpful because the appointment took FOREVER. Ella still appears to be a wonderfully healthy, strong kiddo.
She is 32.5 inches long (96th %), 22 lbs 5 oz (42nd %) and has a head that's 18 inches around (54th %). So, she continues to be fairly tall and thin, although not terribly so (thin, I mean).
She continues to check out great in terms of her developmental abilities. We are amazed daily at the new words she uses and skills she seems to gain. The newest fun word is "uh-oh!" Anything that drops on the ground gets an "uh-oh" (in a very serious tone).
All her clothes and shoes seem to be shrinking at an alarming rate. She is definitely into her size 5 shoes (all smaller sizes now being hidden because of some favorites that no longer fit... and thus some previous melt downs because we wouldn't let her wear them!). All her 18 month pants seem to be working their way into high waters - luckily it's summer still and pants are only occasionally needed.
Words Ella uses all the time: Shoes - "shooes" Please - "meez" or "peez" More - "mrr" Goodbye - "baa-ie" Uh-oh - "uh-oh" Up - "up" Open - "ohp-ie" Helping - "elp-ie" Hot - "hot" Hat - "at" Out - "hot" Ball - "ba" Banana - "ba-lululululu" Puppie - "puppie" Blanket - "ba" Binky - "boppy" Kitty - "ditty" or "dat" No - "nn-oh" Good night - "nigh -nigh" Apple - "app-le" Bug - "bee" Yes - "da" with a single nod Mommy - "mommy" Daddy - "daddy" Eleanor - "ell-a" Down - "up" All done - "ah-di"
Sound effects: "vraa" - cars and pushing chairs around "pshh-pshh" - anything that should squirt
Eleanor is running these days and thus keeping us quite active. She loves to go outside and push either a toy lawn mower or stroller down the street - usually with Mickey in or on it. She climbs stairs like a pro and has also shown us her ability to climb ladders... ick. She's tall enough to reach pretty much anything she wants on tables and counters - with the help of boxes and step stools she pushes around to step on. She loves to color and draw, talk on the phone, "blow" her nose (we go through a lot of kleenex around here), play in water, rice or sand, read books, sweep the floor, "elp-ie" in any way we allow and EAT. Her favorite foods are blueberries, peas and string cheese sticks.
It was Eleanor's first day of day care yesterday. So, we decided to dress up. She loved her piggy-tails (for a while). I was totally in love with this shirt - it brought out the amazing blueness of her eyes. I foresee a lot of wear in this outfit because Ella loves the butterflies and Momma loves the color.
P.S. Playing the piano in a quiet house for an hour and a half was AMAZING! I'm super excited that I get to do it again today. The only problem was my shoulders got super stiff and my eyes went blurry after about an hour... it makes me feel so out of it! I have a lot of work to do!
Eleanor had a "pearl" necklace she loved which broke while Grandma Tippin was here visiting. Grandma thought it was sweet that Ella was so upset about the broken necklace. So, when she came upon a new one, Grandma sent it to us. We got it, along with several other goodies, yesterday. Eleanor has worn the new "pearl" necklace ever since.
I thought this beautiful girl should get her picture taken with her new shirt and necklace on this morning... but she had other ideas.
Here she's saying, "shoes!" over and over again - because I still didn't have my running shoes on and she was supposed to be getting a ride in BOB.
Then Ella decided since I wasn't moving fast enough with the stroller thing that she would just take bear for a ride instead:So, Grandma, the princess pendent and the bow came off the necklace immediately, but we still have one pink heart attached. We'll see how long that one lasts.
On another side note, is it just me, or does Ella look like she's grown another foot this week!?
Seth and I hired a babysitter (for the first time!) for our Friday night Anniversary Celebration. It was wonderful to have a chance to sit, talk and eat with Seth without worrying about Eleanor. We thoroughly enjoyed the adult alone time and now plan to do this more often! The main reason we haven't hired many sitters is the whole putting Ella to bed thing... which was a success, but only because our sitter was amazingly patient and determined. I think it took her 4 tries, with short playing sessions in between, to finally get Ella to sleep without screaming bloody murder. Eleanor's normal bed time is 7 pm... and she fell asleep 5 minutes to 9... Anyway, we're hoping this paved the way for easier times.
During our dinner on Friday Seth and I decided it was time for a shopping trip to Billings. So, Saturday morning we packed up and drove the 2 hours up to Montana for a little consumer indulgence. We had a great time and came home with lots of loot. It was incredibly fun to take Eleanor (twice) into Cabella's and Sportsman's Warehouse. She just loves all the animals they have on display! Also, we purchased a new - big girl - carseat! It's fun to have Ella facing forward, in the middle of our backseat, where we can interact with her a bit more easily. She looks so tiny in this new seat, but she liked it so much in the store that she wouldn't get out!
Sunday we went to a later church service (to accomodate an early long run for me) and then spent a great day together just relaxing. We napped, took Eleanor to the park, and took the time to make some really super yummy food (very important to me these days!).
Anyway, I suppose none of this is particularly interesting news, but it was a wonderful, relaxed weekend in which we really enjoyed our time together. So much so that it was hard to watch Seth go off to work this morning.
Last night, while I was making dinner, Seth was helping Eleanor eat and then decided she really needed a bath. When they were done, he released this terrible, roaring creature who came out ready to tickle me: I just love that for some reason, she felt she needed to be wearing shoes!
P.S. I forgot to mention that Seth took a half day on Friday (and surprised us!) for our anniversary. This was a WONDERFUL gift! We really enjoyed having him around more than usual.
I got together with a friend of mine last Sunday to help her recover a couple of lampshades in her living room. Don't they look cute! It was nice to 1. get out of the house for a while, 2. get a little crafting in, and 3. feel a sense of accomplishment because not only is the project completed, but the project helps complete her new living room.
