Little Prisoner

Not really, but yesterday Ella decided to explore the dogs' crate and try to figure it out...she never went all the way in, but see how cute she is!



Hi Mommy!

Riding on Daddy's shoulders

Ella's new favorite mode of transportation is riding around on Steve's shoulders - she starts giggling from the minute he puts her up there, holds on to his hair, and screams and laughs the whole time. She loves it!

Crazy Hair, part 2

Check out her hair in this one!!

Crazy Hair

Ella's hair has grown a lot lately and now it is irresistable to make into a little mohawk.

Check out this hairdo (and her face is pretty funny too)!




And here's a video clip of Ella doing her favorite thing, eating! She is eating pieces of a bagel here and thoroughly enjoying herself.

All Bundled Up

Here's a picture of Ella in her new winter hat - how cute is she?? This is the view I get to see every day when I put her in her carseat, then once we get to daycare and I open the door to the backseat she gets really excited and kicks her legs and grins and is so happy for another day!

She also has a little pair of mittens and loves to wave while she has them on because they are so fascinating!

Ella picked out her outfit...

Ok, not really, BUT Pam gave it to me for my baby shower and it's size 9/12 months and I've been waiting for Ella to be big enough to wear it and she finally is!

Ella practically begged me to put it on her :0).

9-month professional pics

For Ella's 9-month professional photos, I took her to Tina Loebach again,(www.loebachstudios.com), and she did another fantastic job with the little angel. Here are a few of the pics!











Could she be any more beautiful???

Family Weekend

Steve's dad, Carole, and Teresa came to visit us this weekend and had a great time with Ella. We haven't seen them since July and she's grown so much since then and it was so fun to see them with her.

Here are some pics from the weekend:

Playing with Aunt Teresa and Grandma C






With Grampy

Ella is 10 Months Old

Ella turned 10 months old on November 5. It is so hard to believe that her first 10 months has gone by this fast, but in some ways I can hardly remember life before we had her. She is such a joy and a happy, sweet, lively little girl. She is always grinning and smiling and 'talks' all the time. She is very expressive and will get super excited, flail her arms around while she's telling us something and get very animated.

Ella is always very busy and on the go - she crawls all over and can be very ambitious about getting to what she wants to reach. Some favorites are the dogs' water bowl, the fireplace, and computer cords...so, we've been in the process of undertaking the babyproofing project (easier said than done!). She'll let you know if you ruin her plans of reaching something by letting out a yell or extending her arms and putting her hands into fists.

Ella loves feeding herself, and now eats 3 meals a day in addition to 4 bottles. For breakfast she eats cheerios, oatmeal or multigrain cereal, and then for lunch and dinner has veggies, fruits, meat, pasta, and also eats goldfish crackers and some other finger foods. Although she still is fine with being spoon fed, she prefers to pick up food and feed herself. She drinks from her sippy cups and bottles all by herself.

The dogs and Nomar are definitely some of Ella's favorites to watch and she only has to see one of them walk by to have a little giggle. If one of them comes up and gives her a kiss, she squeals happily and pets them back. Here she is pursuing Cory on the other side of the babygate.







Ella uses the gates to try to figure out how to pull herself up, and she is so close to doing it. She'll get up on her knees very easily and then pulls her right leg out, but then she sits back down. Whenever we prop her up on something she can stand very sturdy and support herself, so I think pulling herself up is right around the corner.

Still no teeth, and really I think they've got to be getting close, but I've thought that for 4 months now so who knows. It's definitely not slowing down her learning to eat though, that's for sure.

Ella loves dancing and starts to dance every time she hears music. She loves hearing us sing to her and likes patty-cake, peek-a-boo and lots of little games and songs. She waves bye-bye and likes to copy us and make a 'clicking' noise with her mouth when we do it.

It has been a wonderful ten months with Ella and she is just the most perfect little angel, truly a blessing that I am thankful for every day.

Ella's First Halloween

I took Ella in to work with me on Friday morning in her tiger costume, it was so fun to have everyone see her all dressed up.

Playing in my office


With my friend Amy


All dressed up!


I brought her to daycare dressed up in her costume and they said that all day long people were coming in to see her...so cute!!!

Then in the afternoon we dressed her up in her monkey costume for trick or treating. Here she is trying to pull off her hat :)


Steve got us flight suits so we dressed up as army pilots for the night. Here I am with my chunky monkey


At a friend's house for trick-or-treating


The 3 of us


Even though Ella didn't collect any candy this year, it was fun bringing her around and was a great first Halloween! Later that night we left Ella with our first non-family babysitter, her teacher from daycare, and it worked out really well. Ella slept the whole time and didn't even know we were gone!

Ella Holding Her Bottle

Steve showed me Ella's latest trick when I got home from work last Thursday - she's now holding her own bottle! She gets really excited when she sees the bottle and moves her arms and legs and then reaches for it, opens her mouth really wide, and drinks the whole thing. It is precious!






She holds her sippy cup to drink, feeds herself lots of different foods, and seems to really have gotten a lot more independent in the last few weeks!