Preschool Halloween Party

Halloween Festivity #2: the classroom party. I've always wanted to be a fly on the wall in that room - they are all so darn cute at this age. I'm sure the teachers don't feel the same way by now. When I arrived they were all in a little circle singing festive little songs with motions. I couldn't believe Ellison stayed in her spot as I walked in. I did get a sweet little smile, though, followed by her embarrassed I'm-trying-really-hard-not-to-smile smile.

Grace, Ellison, Nevin, don't know the pirate's name...

Nevin and Valerie Peters with Megan and Baity

Miss Baity

Snack time. Or, if you're Ellison, starve time. She wouldn't touch 3 out of the 4 snacks given to her on her plate.

Got her to wear her wig for 1 pic.

Excitement over the pumpkin cookie

Playing around after snack time.

Ellison with Mrs. Kale

And Mrs. Medley

[October 29, 2009]

Pumpkin Carving

Papi missed out on the festivities this year since he was in the UK again (we saw him off at the airport the day before). This was Ellison's first pumpkin carving experience - I think we forgot to do it last year. Anyway, we went out on the front porch, er, slab, and roasted our hininis (read: hy-nee-nees - that's what we call butts) off. Such a warm, sunny afternoon.

Here's Ellison doing the honors of removing the top.

Can you tell she was a little grossed out? Hee, hee. She would say, "Eww, what is that?" She did help scrape out insides for about, oh, 20 seconds.

"Um, yeah, I've had enough of this."

All she wanted to do was draw on the pumpkin.

She helped push out the eyes, nose, and mouth, but as I was busy slaving away with sweat upon my brow (which probably doesn't come as a shock to some of you who know me to be a sweaty being), she totally jumped ship and said cheerily, "I'm going to go play with Alyssa". I was busy digging out the beloved seeds from all the pumpkin guts as I kept getting hit with a giant beach ball in the head, nearly ran over by the Barbie jeep, all the while getting repeated requests from both girls to wash off their hands. Trick-or-treat.

[October 28, 2009]

Neckie Kissies

OMG is Ellison loving her some Daddy lately! I know, who am I kidding, it's always been that way, right? She had wained off a little, but since Daddy's been traveling more, she is ALL ABOUT him. She was giggling here, giving him "neckie kissies". Neckie kissies are a thing between me and her - I always tease her and try to give them to her while she squeals and squirms. It works great to put a smile on her face when she's being a little whiner.

Notice the dress? I've had to hide them away in the summer stuff, while I told her for several days in a row that it (along with her other fave, the yellow one) was dirty. It softened the blow before telling her they're put away until summer time.

[October 26, 2009]

Harvest Festival

Christ Community Preschool (Ellison's school) hosted its Harvest Festival recently. We had a nice time - they had bouncies, pony rides, a ton of games, food and snacks, a costumes contest, etc. It was the first of FIVE events Ellison got to use her Halloween costume for this year - talk about getting our money's worth! Here was Ellison's big debut as Dorothy. Apparently a not-too-thrilled-looking Dorothy.

"Seriously, you couldn't find a better looking basket for Toto?!"

She would keep the wig on long enough for pics and the costume contest, but as soon as the opportunity came, she took it right off.

Something about this photo reminds me of Tuesday from the Munsters...

At the craft station decorating her little pumpkin

"Wig? What wig?," when cotton candy is present.

Up in front for the costume contest, which she won for her age group! Yea! She got a Cold Stone gift card, and kept asking to get her ice cream throughout the evening.

Our little friend, and Ellison's little classmate, Baity (as an adorable little Annie). I love that the two of them are in the same classroom - it's been nice for me and Megan to hang our more!

Pony ride time. Ellison was so excited about the pony rides when we were telling her about the upcoming festival. When we arrived at the festival, and she spotted the live ponies, she kept telling us that she didn't want to ride the ponies. Ok - no big deal. But something changed her mind, because toward the end of the evening she was asking to ride them. She did it, though she clung to me for dear life for most of it. She got her signature "embarrassed smile" on, which meant she liked it, but was still a little apprehensive.

First up was "Rocky" the pony.

Baity's turn. She wanted to ride the purple horse (the one with the purple blanket thingy on it). :-)

Ellison even asked to have a second ride. This time it was on "Lil Man".

Fun evening!

[October 25, 2009]

Storytime in the Crib

Ell specifically asks me to make her bed a certain way on occasion, meaning I have to neatly lay out her blankets in a particular fashion. After doing so one day, she threw a gaggle of her animals in there, asked me to put her in with her books, and proceeded to have storytime with the little gang. She remembers bits and pieces of the stories as she looks at the pics (sometimes frighteningly well), and I loved overhearing her version as she read aloud to the animals. One of those moments I cursed ourselves for not having the video camera loaded and ready to go.

[October 16, 2009]

Birthday Cake Preview

From late spring, all the way up through now, Ellison has been wanting a "princess birthday cake" - the kind where the Barbie doll is the center, and the cake is the Barbie's dress. Every week we go to 2 different grocery stores, each that carry those cakes, and every week we have to stop and look at them so that she can tell me that's what she wants for her birthday. Creative Daddy made one for Ell out of floam. You don't have to wait much longer for the real thing, Mookie!

[October 12, 2009]

A Rare Family Day

Saturdays when we are all together with no specific agenda are VERY rare in our family. Either Mama's working, Daddy's got yardwork, or we have places we have to be. God knew exactly what we needed - a rainy day so that Daddy wouldn't have to work outside. The day started off at Krispy Kreme (Daddy's been treating E to KK a lot lately... ahem...) where Ellison went from one doughnut to the next. Just look at that happy face. :-)

Little miss does not particularly enjoy "sticky hands", so Daddy does hers up shish-kabob style.

After our high-calorie breakfast, we headed over to the Four Seasons Mall. I think it has been over a year since we last went there! Daddy took Ellison into the little pet store, much to Mom's dismay (those places make me SO sad, so I usually won't even look in them). She thought it was cool to try to feed the bunnies.

And no shopping outing would be complete with out a ride on one of those little, well, rides.

Out of the 6 little rides, this is the one Ell wanted to do.

After returning home, and after Ellison's nap, she and Daddy cooked a fabulous home-cooked meal (even biscuits from scratch) for us, to give me a break. Delish!

After dinner, we had some "family time" working on a mosaic sticker project that Gramma had brought for Ellison way back in May. We had a great time doing it, and Ellison did really well!

Such a great family day - one that we all needed!

[October 10, 2009]

How Does Your Garden Grow

Ellison has been taking such good care of our herb-hopefuls, and quickly reminds me if I forget to set them out in the sun or water them. She was so happy the day we actually had some sprouts coming up.

(Yes, another dress that's to her liking. Her Dad hasn't seen her in 90% of her cute fall clothes yet, because the second she's home from school or church, she wants to change into a dress.)

[October 8, 2009]

Chik-Fil-A

Ellison high-tailed it out of the play area faster than you can say "cow" when she saw the Chik-Fil-A cow wandering around the dining area.

Daddy met us for lunch that day, since Ellison was begging to go to Daddy's work for lunch. She was slightly disappointed that we didn't actually go to Daddy's work, where she gets all kinds of attention, but quickly got over it when she saw her Papi.

[October 8, 2009]

Chores

Here's Ellison doing her chores to earn her keep around this joint. Only kidding! Thought this was a cute little pic - it actually looks a little old-fashioned (could it be the lovely green formica?). She's in her second fave dress (if the red one is dirty). Ellison's been quite helpful with the dishes lately - before, she'd just rinse some of them and then play, but now she requests her own dishrag and wants to wash her own dishes, and have me do the rinsing. Oooh, she's getting so independent!

[October 6, 2009]

Picture Day

Thought I'd post a couple of the pics with E's hair curled in "curly curlies" as she calls them. It was picture day at school, and though you can't see them well here, I was glad I took a couple of pics before taking her. By the time we got there and stood out in the drizzle for a couple of minutes, I knew they'd be long turned into frizz or something by the time she actually had her pic snapped. It'll be interesting to see how those turned out. ;-)

Posing with one of two choices she wanted to take for Show And Tell that day.

[October 6, 2009]

Ellison's Green Thumb

After getting really tired of buying "fresh" herbs at the store, I finally decided to grow my own again. Ellison was very excited to help me plant the seeds, especially after she spotted her new little Dora gardening gloves. I didn't dare try to get her out of her fave red dress to do the job - she's in it almost daily anyways. She was all about putting the soil in the pots, "All by myself", a common theme in this household.

Checking out the seeds ever so carefully :-)

After we were all done planting, Ellison wanted to stick around and stare at the pots to "watch them grow". :-)

[October 4, 2009]

Another Daddy Hiatus

Daddy was on another hiatus for a few days when he had to go to Washington DC. Ellison did well with the absence, surprisingly. On this particular day below, Ellison asked me to put piggy tails in her hair when I was getting her ready for school. She looked so darn cute we had to take a few pics to send Daddy on his cell phone so he could eat his heart out.

On the way home from school, Ellison usually tells me random little stories from school (which I adore). When I asked her if anyone said anything about her piggytails, she said, "Davis was touching my piggytails, and I told her 'Make sure you don't take my piggytails off my hair because my Mommy loves them' ". Hee, hee... God I love her!

For dinner that night, Elli and I went out for a "Girls' Night Out" to Red Robin. It was fun, just the two of us. As soon as she saw, well, Red Robin, that girl was LIT UP! She totally has this thing for giant mascots. She was jumping up and down on the booth, where I was holding on for dear life, until the big bird came over to give Ellison a high-5. She was so thrilled, and had a hard time focusing on finishing our meal - she couldn't figure out why Red Robin was standing at the door, why he went in the kitchen, why he wasn't coming back over to our table, etc, etc. :-)

[October 1, 2009]