Halloween Playgroup

Ella and I co-hosted a Halloween playgroup with my friend Lindsey and her son Nico. It was so much fun! Lindsey did an awesome job setting up the Fall display for us to take pictures in front of. My little cow enjoyed playing with all of her friends!



Ella was totally in character...she's eating grass!

Ella and her friend Owen were trying to figure out why they were dressed like this.

A visit from family...

Last week, my mom, my grandmother (Mamaw Doby), and my mom's sister (Aunt Sheryl) came to visit. I'm pretty sure they all came to see Ella :), but Brad and I enjoyed our visit with them as well!

We happened to be having a Mom's Night Out at Lime restaurant while my mom was in town, so I brought her along. It was lots of fun!

What's New...

Sorry that I haven't posted anything in a while. So, here's what is new with us: Ella can pull herself up, clap her hands, kind of say "Mama" (sounds more like "Maba"), eat finger foods, and wave at us. Seriously, she does something new everyday! Something else worth mentioning, in addition to all of Ella's achievements, is that we are building a house (woohoo)! We are super-excited!!! We will definitely keep everyone posted as things progress.

On Tuesday, I took Ella to a Halloween playdate. It was a blast!! All of the kids dressed up in their costumes...so cute. I will be posting pictures later. Brad and I are making our families wait until Halloween to see pictures of Ella in her costume. They don't even know what she is dressing up as :) For now, here are some random cute pictures of Ella. Enjoy!

We had to take the bumper out of Ella's crib for safety reasons. One night I went in her room just to check on her, and noticed that she was sucking her thumb through the railing of her crib. Of course, I had to take a picture:)

The Latest...

Sorry that I haven't updated the blog in a while. Now that Ella is crawling, I have little time to do anything more than chase after her! When she is napping, I usually attempt to get some housework done, but I can tell you that it is piling up. Needless to say, blogging is low on the list of priorities.

Ella continues to get faster and faster with her crawling. Brad and I literally have to keep our eyes glued on her to keep her from getting into anything she shouldn't. The other day, I noticed that she was crawling full-speed toward our dog (Olive), who was lying on her dog bed that Mim Mim (Grandma Sheila) made for her. Olive is scared of Ella (and everything else for that matter), so she jumped off her bed and ran to the other side of the room. Ella just crawled right onto Olive's bed, rolled over, and started flailing her arms and legs and laughing. Normally, I wouldn't just let my child lie on the dog's bed, for obvious reasons; but, I had to get a picture just this once.

Here are some pictures of Ella and Olive interacting. You can see the fear in Olive's eyes as Ella approaches her. Brad and I were in the background telling Olive "it's ok," so that she wouldn't run away. Wouldn't you think we would be saying that to Ella instead? I have also included a picture of our cat (Lily) hanging out in Ella's crawling tunnel. This is what our household is like.

Park Play Date

Here are a few pictures of Ella swinging and playing with her friends Hannah and Marigny at the park. We mommies love the play dates just as much as the babies do!
Oh, and as you can see, Ella is quite the serious little swinger. She's so funny...anytime that she is in a new situation, she gets really serious. She must get that from her daddy ;)

Ella Patrol

Ella officially started crawling this past Thursday (October 2). Prior to this, she was using rolling as her primary means of transportation. She would occasionally get on her hands and knees and rock back and forth, but then decide to just roll where she wanted to go.
So, on Thursday she was sitting on the kitchen floor while I was preparing her lunch. I glanced down at her, and there she was crawling full speed ahead right to me! I suppose that she realized that crawling would be a more efficient way to get places than rolling.
Now she is a crawlin' machine! I will see her spot something that interests her, and then she just takes off. Although I am incredibly proud of her, I am also a little nervous about this new found mobility. I feel like I am constantly redirecting her. I'm sure it will get better, but for now I am on "Ella Patrol."