Stephen 6 month Update

Likes his "keys"
Loves his family
Plays piano with daddy
Loves his jumper
Just adorable

Ella Cutest Sayings

Ella has said some cute things:
After adding nothing to the toilet: "I have anything"
The thing Grandma has with songs and games: "a piglet"
On left over Thanksgiving ham: "It was good until you turned it into turkey"
When Mommy wants pie for breakfast the morning after Thanksgiving: "Pie is only for Thanksgiving!"

Stephen's first words

There is some debate on Stephen's first word so a tie has been declared.

The tie is between "hey" and "Ella".

Conveniently vowel filled, don't ya think?

If a Tree Falls Down

Guys. Our neighbors tree fell apart out on the blue. The front half just crashed down in the morning of a calm, cool day.

It got worse through the course of the day. Fortunately, the last half didn't crack in the breezes over night or before the tree removal people could show up. (Also fortunate, my flower pots all survived)

Stephen 5 Months

Baby giggles are the cutest!
First time in the jumper this month
"talking" to us more and more
Loves Mommy kisses (and the mirror baby too)
Likes the bouncy seat toys especially the crocodile.

Halloween Costumes

Purple Ballet Cat : let's be real though. She is a purple ballet cat every day. (Even without the ears and tutu)

Pooh Bear: Sometimes an idea so adorable convinces you to make an effort on making your infant a Halloween costume. Sometimes that requires same day craftiness.

Cute October Things

Just a collection of cute things:

Ella singing with Daddy
Stephen wearing a knitted sweater from my Grandma Landers
Cute Ella Hair
Adorable PJs

Stephen at 4 months

Thumb sucker
Rolls on side to sleep, but a catnapper.
Loves to "Fly" on Mommy's knees. He is a drooly flyer.
Handsome as can be.
Smiley Stephen!

Family Pictures

We got back our family pictures! (After much deliberation. Having too many good choices for pictures is a good problem to have)

Ella

Stephen

Daniel and Me

Intense and Curious

Ella's Water Adventures

Mommy may have felt guilty about having another, basically water free summer. So we jammed lots of water adventures into the last of the warm weather.
Splash pad as a family to the big one with buckets!
Splash pad on a whim
Washing the cars (like mother like daughter)

Contraptions

Ella watches a TV show called Creative Galaxy.  In one episode they make a contraption. She saw this very close to an episode of Mr Rogers Neighborhood where where they had a cool domino tip. And from this, Ella's contraptions were born.
Contraption
So. Many. Contraptions.

Stephen at Three Months

Smiley. So smiley
Talkative. Loves to make sounds.
Loves to "Stand " on feet.
A handsome little guy. (Takes after Daddy)
Working on tummy time

Grandma and Grandpa Visit Recap

It's so much fun when Grandma and Grandpa come! They came for Stephen's baby blessing, but they stayed and we had lots of fun.

Ella knows that Grandpa knows how to have fun!

We enjoyed going to the park and then enjoying a delicious dinner at the Salt Lick.

Stephen got lots of grandparent snuggles and attention too

Stephen's Baby Blessing

Stephen was given a name and blessing.  He was adorable in his suit. His dad and grandpa were there to basically make the circle.

And miraculously, he fell asleep 5 minutes before they went up and didn't make a peep. Good job buddy!

Stephen at Two Months

Stephen at 2 months is:
Smiley (and he make lots of silly faces)

Sweet 

Full of spit up

Going to repeat the anomalous roll over some day.
Getting so big! (Mommy should have taken prenatal weight lifting!)
Adorable 

Ella and the Night light

Ella has baby monitor in her room which also sports an orange nightlight (if you want). To be clear, this baby monitor is for us to monitor Ella. Like in the morning (around 6:15) when she cheerfully announces that 'it's day time,' or in the evening when she is in distress because Pooh Bear's blanket has come off, or her blanket is funny, or her book is lost or her book keeps hitting her.

Ella has come to the conclusion that when she turns the orange nightlight on she can hear baby brother's cries easier. Perhaps it is for her to 'monitor the baby.' I'll be honest. If I had her understanding and situation, I would not turn on the nightlight, but she is one dedicated big sister!

Ella's 3rd Birthday

For Ella's 3rd birthday she requested a rainbow Millie cake. Millie is a charcter on a children's math show. Fortunately for Ella, Daniel is a creative and willing cake maker. She even got to top it with rainbow sprinkles.

She got resusable stickers from Grandma and Grandpa Call, which is great because she had been very saddened over the fact that most stickers are one time use lots of times.

She got a new board game, and a fun magnetic fishing game.

Finally, her big present from mom and dad was a new balance bike. (Grandma Larsen gave her a helmet!)

Diabetes Test

If you have gestational diabetes they make you go take another glucose tolerance test. This takes 3 hours. I'm not sure what they think you'll do with a newborn. I decided to bring him and set up camp for the morning at the lab.

Note to self: I need to tell the lab to stock good flavors like orange or lemon lime instead of the really yucky fruit punch

Stephen and I not only survived the 3 hours and I passed the test!

Big Sister Ella!

Ella may have been little unimpressed by the new baby in the hospital bassinet, but she knew who he was even if she had no interest in holding him.

When we came home, she was interested enough to peak over the edge of the pack and play and into the bouncy seat.

Her 'Mama Baby Pooh' has taken some cues from Baby Stephen. Pooh now likes seats, Mama milk, and has to do tummy time.

Ella is growing into an excellent big sister!

Stephen at One Month

Likes:
Snuggly naps
Rocking in the rocking chair
Getting his back patted

Dislikes:
Gas
Spit up
Not getting all the snuggles

Grandma Larsen Visits

Grandma Larsen came next to take care of us. We loved getting to see her and I think she was happy to see us too.

She brought a surprise for Ella for every day! Ella loved them. She is still using her special pencils and heart sticky notes.

Thanks to Grandma for taking such good care of us!

Grandma Call Visits

Grandma Call came to help us get our bearings with two children.

Stephen got lots of snuggles.

Grandma and Ella went to get Pooh Bear a check up at story time.

Grandma kept us all fed and happy!

Baby Stephen!

Stephen Jay Larsen 
born at 8:56 AM 
7 lb 8 oz
20 inches 

We were the talk of labor and delivery with our one hour in the ward and delivered on a slow Sunday morning. 

The poor nurse had no idea that she would be grabbing the hospital's on call doctor and nurses out of the hall to catch a baby within 5 minutes of getting me settled in the delivery room after my first contraction there. (I was talking through the contraction) 

Stephen's birth certificate even had a little blood spot on it. According the nurse handling the paperwork that is how you know that things were fast and furious in the delivery room. 

Even after all that crazy, Stephen came into the world healthy and calm. 

Elissa's birthday

I had a low key birthday, but it was a good day. It is hard when you are super pregnant and have gestational diabetes to really celebrate, but the family made me feel loved.

Daniel is a very observant and noticed that I only had one cloth for straining yogurt, and that it was a pain. So he got me a very tight weave strainer to use instead.
As long as you know to ladle in your yogurt instead of dumping the batch in, it works great. It is super easy to clean and can hold a whole gallon batch of yogurt!

I'm glad that he loves me even though I can be a little super pragmatic sometimes.

Baby Boy's Room

We finally kind of decorated Baby Boy's room. Thanks to Daniel being crafty and handy. He had some big colorful origami balls which we hung on the walls
And:

An awesome circuit board rocket ship! Daniel agreed to construct something from circuit board for baby's room. We settled on a rocket ship.

Ella Letters

Ella has started to have us help her write notes. She learned this from our friend Daniel Tiger. All of her notes (which we have dozens) go like this:

Dear                :
This heart is for you
(Heart picture)
Love, (recipient's name here)

Big Girl Bed

Ella had joined the ranks of big kids who work in big kid beds! She spent days pretending to nap just so she could climb in and out.

She loved helping Daddy convert her crib into a bed. Ella loves to be a helper.

Water table

Pinterest strikes again. I'm surprised that Daniel hasn't deleted the app from my phone this pregnancy with the number of projects I've come up with to do.

This time it was a water table. He did a great job executing it! Ella thinks it is awesome!

Cute Ella!

Ella had become that inquisitive toddler. She is always asking "what is that?" or her favorite "what does that word mean? Tell me about it." (Incidentally, Daniel got a dictionary app on his phone recently. This is not a coincidence.)

She is also starting to make astute connections. One day Daniel was wiggling his fingers to go tickle her, and she said,"No Spider, I'm not a spout!"

She also loves to be silly and insert one of her favorite nonsense words in place of words in stories or songs. One of her favorite replacements is "ham"

One day we were talking about being a helper and she piped in,"I'm a helper, mostly!" We smiled because that is a pretty apt description.

Our favorite is, what we've dubbed, her super hero/tv catch phrase: "I can do it. No problem."

Flower Pot Project

I got a great idea, and for once it wasn't from Pinterest! A house on the way to church had a brilliant idea. House numbers on flower pots! My poor friend heard about my "pot project" for much longer than they'd have liked, but our pots turned out looking great.

Now, to keep the plants in them alive...

New (to us) dresser

Sometimes when you are pregnant you get obsessed with crazy details. This month's crazy thing was a dresser or changing table. I'd been scouring Craigslist, Goodwill, and even Ikea trying to find something that would work.
Finally a $25 gem was located on Craigslist. It needed a shelf and new knobs, but that was doable.

Finished product

Side note: if I had a reality show, there would have to be a montage of me swearing something will totally fit in my hatchback and then Daniel finding a way to get it home.
Other side note: This reality show would also have lots of episodes of me coming up with ridiculous but awesome ideas and Daniel to executing them. Like buying $25 dressers and putting a shelf in where broken drawer used to be.

Bluebonnets 2016

I think we went three our four different times hoping to get good blue bonnet pictures of Ella this year.

Take your pick!
Picture 1
Picture 2
Picture 3 
Picture 4

Easter 2016

This year Daniel made sure that we kept some actual Easter traditions. It's a good thing because Ella still remembers them!

We died eggs, had bird nests (which weren't as successful, but still were tasty), and did an easter egg hunt. Ella loved hiding and finding the eggs.

Grandma bought Ella an Easter dress. Ella decided that it was just like Cinderella! She loved being a princess for the day.

Miscellaneous March Ella Adventures

Ella Helper:
Here is a very candid shot of Ella helping Daddy. She was helping fix the lawn mower. Ella likes to help get tools, and hold pieces for later.

Texan at Heart
You know your child is a Texan when it is 72 degrees in the house and she would like 3 blankets to keep warm. Oh well, it made for an adorable picture.

Drawing and "Make a Video"
Ella has finally started to draw "pictures" on her own. For a long time she would insist a grown up draw the thing she wanted. She has a lot of commissioned pictures of Pooh Bear, kitties and families. She has finally started to draw things and then tell me about what she has drawn! So much fun!

She had a few weeks where she would insist on making videos on the phone. We would turn on the recording and she would do, nothing. Oh well, she is just very excited to see the pictures and videos.

Blue Baker Adventure

A friend set up a toddler/preschooler adventure to go see our local bakery. The bakery does tour for littles. We got to see different ingredients, mixers, ovens, and bakers at work. At the end of the tour, the kids got to put ingredients into dough which was baked and then picked up later.

Ella had a good time seeing the equipment and the bakers at work. She worked very diligently on her bread project. The results were delicious!

More of Princess Eleanor

Ella loves to wear princess "tutus" to church on Sunday. She loves to be escorted to church by her handsome Daddy Prince.

We decided to have a lesson on Ella being a princess for family home evening. We talked about being children of God, made a chart of how a princess acts, and then had a dress up ball to dance.

Chair Redo

Sometimes I get crazy ideas. Sometimes those crazy ideas turn out okay. We got some chairs from a friend who was moving. I've been wanted comfortable chairs for our library room for a long time. It was really a win/win for everybody. They were both hand me downs that were hand me downs. One was green, and the other had a beige slip cover.

I enjoyed the chair, and would have been quite content until, while wandering through the Goodwill, I saw a big roll of upholstery fabric. Upon finding out this whole roll was only $5, I knew that I would bring the fabric home and do something. Looking at the projects I needed to do that took fabric, I realized that this fabric would be perfect to redo the chair in the slip cover! I had at least a dozen pinterest pin on the topic, so I could totally do this, right?

I pulled off the cover and found this stained yellow fabric. (The picture has the back of the chair in the new fabric, and the rest is the original.) I had a very satisfying time getting started pulling out staples. After finishing the back, I had a very sleepless night realizing that perhaps the $5 roll would not be enough fabric. Oops. After measuring and realizing I needed more, and several different trips to several different fabric stores, I found a coordinating fabric to supplement.

After thinking about giving up in the middle several times and help from Daniel with hard parts, we had a finished project.

Kite flying

We had a beautiful breezy spring day on a Monday so we decided to try out the kite Grandpa bought us. Unfortunately, the wind died down as we packed up to go fly our kite! We had fun catching a random breeze here and there though. (Even if we weren't the best kite flyers)

Ella Says the Cutest Things

Ella had a couple really cute things she said recently:

Ella's "Little Buddy":
Ella has been learning about underwear. Her favorite stuffed friend, Pooh Bear, wanted to wear underwear after nap time. She sat down with Pooh and reassured him that diapers were perfect for watching a show and that he would be so comfortable. She comforted him by patting him and saying "It'll be okay Little Buddy." She is going to be a great big sister to the Little Buddy coming in June.

What is that sound?
Ella was playing outside and heard something. She put her hand up to her ear and said "What's that sound?" She hasn't quite figured out how to put her hand behind her ear though. Which makes me smile a little every time.

Mailbox Surprises

Ella decided to send a note to cousin Ellie! (She selected the card herself.)

Ella also got a card from Grandma and Grandpa. She loved it so much she put it up on her shelf in her room.

Since watching a Daniel Tiger episode she has taken to decorating envelopes for people she loves. They all say the same thing. "Dear _____ This heart is for you. Love _______" (Insert the name of recipient on the lines)

And Baby Larsen is...

Closet Redo

After our pile of coats and jackets at the bottom of the stairs multiplied (6 pairs of shoes and as many coats? There are only 3 of us!), I decided that we needed to make our coat closet more functional so we would use it.

We put a shoe rack in the bottom, and bought some coat hook racks to hang our coats on instead of the standard bar and hanger method.

It seems so spacious! We have room on our shelves above! We could put a hanging stuff holder on the back! It is amazing!

Mommy Goes Away (For the Weekend)

In a first, Mommy went away for the weekend. I needed to go to my Grandma's funeral, and it seemed impossible to pull off pregnant with a toddler in tow. The plan was hatched that I would leave early on Friday and come back in the afternoon on Sunday.

I tried to plan lots of fun surprises for Ella and Daddy while I was away. After leaving on an early flight, I was excited to see this cute video on my layover! Nothing makes you miss your toddler more than seeing them being cute and not having them nearby to do something un-cute to spoil the image.

I may have forgotten to do the laundry before I left...  but she picked out the outfit herself. 

One of Ella's favorite surprises was her new "cat house." The day before I left a neighbor posted on the neighborhood facebook page: "I'm leaving tons of toddler/preschool toys on the curb. I want them gone before my kids are home from school. What is left is going to get donated." We brought home bags of things, (Mari Kondo is cringing at the thought of me picking up bags of things on the curb. :P) The winner was definitely the tent/cat house. 

We prepared Ella the best we could for Mom going away. She seemed particularly excited at the thought of seeing the Thinkery! I understand that it was a hit! They also enjoyed the warm weather to visit the park. 

I had a quick, productive trip. It was good to see my family, and it was even good to have a little time away from my full time job.;) It was also good to get back to my happy family. 

Surprises for Ella

January came with lots of fun surprises for Ella! Better than Christmas? Maybe.
When Grandma and Grandpa came and visited they brought a fun kid sized table. Ella enjoys playing with it and tells us that "Grandpa  made this table. Grandpa worked hard."

Grandma left her shoes after visiting. Ella promptly claimed these princess shoes for her own. Sorry Grandma.

Ella also got new boots from our friend Joanie. Ella said "They are perfect! I'll wear them everyday." Joanie also gave us a fun toy stroller and our very own pink pony.

Ella's Resolutions