Uncle Nee -aka Uncle Jamie

Uncle Jamie is a tough one to figure out, but I do know Ella seems to like him :) She has learned to say Jamie, but prefers to call him "Nee." He is one of the few people that Ella will let carry her/pick her up. She asks him to play the "ball" game that her and her daddy play-that she doesn't even ask me to play.
Last weekend we were at our ritual Mexican dinner out. Ella was getting restless, so I gave her a sheet of sparkly ocean themed stickers to keep her occupied. Ella put one sticker on her hand, one on my hand and one on her daddy's hand. She could not reach "Nee," to give him his sticker, so he reached over to grab his sticker. He then proceeded to put it on his forehead. Well, Ella thought that was VERY funny, so she passed him another sticker, which he put on his face as well. A sheet of stickers later (including the ones she gave me and her daddy) were on "Nee's face. Nee then carried her out of the restaurant with a face full of sparkly stickers. Ella was happy, Nee was happy, I got to finish my drink(so I was happy)and BT-well he is always happy ;) Jamie kept the stickers on so I could get a pic when we got home :) Although I think Jamie is weird I do know he has this uncle thing down :)

Books

This girl LOVES books. We read an average of 20 books a day together and she "reads" at least that many on her own. This makes her teacher-mommy very happy!

Splish Splash

We are now official members of the Botanical Gardens. Not only is this a gorgeous place to take in all the beautiful plants, flowers, trees, various creatures (turtles, geese, ducks), it also has a children's section. There is a big area where the ground is squishy and all different types of fountains and geysers of water run from April 1st through October. Here are some pics of Ella enjoying the water fun. The last pic is of Ella's friend Hayden, (my BFF Angela's son) he is 1. Ella calls him-Hay :)

Friends

Here are some pics from our house this weekend when we had some friends over. Sophia is the little girl sitting with Ella. They are beach buddies and get together at least once a week. Too bad I did not get the pics of them rolling around on the dog beds!

Dancing Queen

This is a video of Ella dancing in her twirling tutu and waving her 2 magic wands. I turned the TV on one of the channels that are just music (no not MTV). Anyway it was a Kidz song station. Personally I think it is for older kids because I did not hear one Hokey Pokey or Wheels on the Bus....Ella decided to break it down to some song from High School Musical. Enjoy, I know I did :)

Ella & Mama

Music Class and the Zoo with Grandma Sue

Story & Play Time with Friends

Playing in Winchester

Childrens Museum with Grandma Sue

Easter

Ella enjoyed dyeing eggs with grandma. She thought it was so much fun to stir the dye in each cup very quickly and then of course it splashed everywhere and I would cringe (I mean colored dye everywhere...stressful for OCD clean people). We hid a gazillion plastic eggs which contained toys, stickers, goldfish, teddy grahams, princess(lucky) charms, mini M&M's, animal crackers...you know your normal Easter findings ;) and Ella loved finding them and putting them in her basket. She was not too concerned what was in them, so I conveniently removed the M&M's for her:) She did have a chocolate bunny in her Easter basket and 8 books, bubbles, little toys etc. yes no candy, BUT she does not even know what it is, so why start now??? The bunny is at mom's -just no room...Anyway, after Easter at my parents we went to join BT's family and they had another Easter basket for Ella full of goodies! More eggs with goodies in them...goldfish, teddy grahams, cheese crackers, animal crackers (Yes I have a very sweet mother-in-law that follows my anal rules!)
A great trip home overall, as you will see in more pics. I loved spending time with mom(maw), dad(bada) Sue, Bt's mom (maw), Bt's great grandma, my grandma and Bo (NO BO!). Pics of Bo will follow as well because -well he and Ellla are siblings for sure!

Easter pics to come....

Leap Frog

STATS

34 3/4" tall
27 lbs.
Full of sugar, spice and occasional tantrums!

ZOO

We took advantage of the warm weather and went to the zoo today with Ella's friends Charlie and Sophia (and my friends, Melissa and Kim). Ella went once before when she was a lot younger, but wasn't too impressed. Today, she made every animal noise + sign that she knew with the appropriate animal of course. If she wasn't sure what the animal was-well then it was a dog :) So of course none of my pictures look like we were at the zoo, but I did not want to put up just animal pics because this is Ella's blog after all. So here are pics of her running around with Charlie and some at the house. It is difficult to take pics of a moving toddler!











I don't like to tell people all the stuff she is doing, because I don't want to be that mom....but since mostly family reads this I guess I can brag some :)
At my last count she says approx. 65 words (not counting her numerous animal sounds) and at least that many signs. She can ID all the parts of her body, identify a few shapes and count up to 3. Not bad for a one and a half year old!