30 Days of Bliss With Our New Little Miss...

One Month Old!

It's hard to believe a whole month has already passed since little Ella arrived in our lives. Knowing from experience (with Sycely) how fast time seems to fly with little ones I've been trying to savor all those special moments with Ella as she grows, but apparently, times passes even faster when you have a 3 year old that requires your attention as well-big surprise, eh? Nonetheless I'm enjoying every minute with my two girls and feel so very blessed to get to spend my days (and nights for now) with them. Praise God from whom all blessings flow...

Here are some pics from Ella's one month "photoshoot"

All Smiles
(sorry it's really blurry-it's hard to catch those first smiles on camera.)

For those of you who are curious, yes, Ella is still looking pretty similar to her big sister at the same age. Ella has more hair, and it's a little darker, but now that her face is filling out she's looking more and more like Sycely...

More Firsts...

This last week Ella got to meet her Aunti Eris who's here from Arizona for a two week visit. She even was polite enough to give her one of her gummy little smiles as a welcome :) Aunti Eris was pretty stoked about the fact that both her nieces greeted her sporting their "I (heart) my Aunti" shirts. Eris' reaction to Ella was about the same as Sycely's-a lot of "She's so tiny" comments. I'm sure Ella will grow up loving her Aunti just as much as Sycely does. It's just so hard NOT to have fun with Aunti Eris around!

Also this week, Ella went on her first "date" with her new friend Summit. Our friends Mike and Julie (parents of Sycely's best friend Scarlet) had their son Summit exactly a week after Ella was born. As I've mentioned before we are so very blessed that God has given us such wonderful friends to share all our family adventures with. I'm so glad that Sycely (and now Ella!) has a special little friend to grow up with. Julie and I took our new little ones along shopping after church on Sunday-okay it's not a super romantic first date, but it'll be great to reminisce about at their wedding reception someday ;)

Fair Fun 2008

"Our state fair is a great state fair..."

We took our annual trek out to the good ol' State Fair this Saturday. Nanny and Papa and Aunti Eris joined us for some Fair fun as well. Despite the generally overcast skies we only encountered about 30 minutes of downpour and managed to stay dry the rest of the day.

Sycely was excited to visit the animals and thoroughly enjoyed the petting zoo again this year. After much experience with sheep thanks to Boots and Buster during our trip to Arizona she was quite a professional with the whole feeding and petting business.



She remembered the baby chicks from last year and was anxious to get over to the big barn to get some time in with them. From the picture, you can see she's mastered the gentleness of the "one finger touches" (this is the same gentle touch she uses with her baby sister.)



After one fairly tentative ride on the carousel, Sycely caught the Fair spirit and enjoyed some carnival rides. Her and Daddy rode the little train again this year and once the rain let up they took a turn on the giant super slide. Nanny, Papa and I all got to do a round on the carousel with her as well. Even Baby Ella got to go for a ride while snuggled in Mommy's front pack.




Lem was content once he got his annual dosage of cheese curds and Aunti Eris trip to the Fair improved 100% after she got a giant lollipop courtesy of Target.



Ella slept through her first trip to the fair. She woke up twice to eat and otherwise slept spending a total of about one hour awake. She enjoyed the snugly comfort of riding on Mommy's front for 2 and a half hours thanks to my friend Amanda and her mom whose craftiness made our front packing possible. The rest of the time we made great use of our new tandem stroller-and we even managed not to cause any injuries to pedestrians the whole time!



All in all, a day of more great Fair memories!

Three Weeks and Counting...

I know everyone's anxious for an Ella update...so, here it is:

The last three weeks have passed in a pleasant, furious, comfortable blur. We've gotten to enjoy lots of time as a family of four, thanks to Lem being home the last few weeks. We've figured out how things are going to work around here now that we have a second little princess with her own demands and Sycely continues to lavish attention and love on her new sister. We haven't had any meltdowns or ill sentiments so far so we're praying that the transition to sisterhood has been as smooth as it appears to have been for her. Even I've been amazed by how well adjusted she's been. We worked really hard to help her prepare for Ella's arrival and the changes that would follow and so far it seems to have paid off and been well worth the effort. The results have been far better than I ever could have even imagined! Praise God for that blessing!


With Lem back at school the last week or so the girls and I have started settling into a daily routine. So far everyone has gotten their meals and naps when they need them-and I've gotten to shower every day-the true testament to successfully balancing everything involved in parenting multiple children! Ella's established a pretty predictable schedule which involves 5-6 hour (or longer!) stretches of sleep at night. She also started smiling last week. At first I was suspicious it may just be gas, but I've since been convinced otherwise as she grins in response, not only to me, but to Lem, and recently Nanny.

Ell had her first appointment with Dr. Willow, our pediatrician last week. She's grown an inch and gained over a pound. The bulking up she's been doing is starting to show in her face which is filling out more now. She now weighs 8 lbs 4 oz and measures 21 inches. Once again both the midwives and Dr. Willow have diagnosed me with "super milk." Regardless of my "super milk" and Ella's growing, dressing her still remains a daily challenge. Despite an unending selection of clothes, options that actually FIT are limited. She's still in all newborn size (smaller than 0-3) and many of those options are even too big. Pants, like her older sister, continue to be WAY too big in the waist and often fall off her tiny waist when I pick her up.

Despite how little she is (we been refering to her for months as "Tiny") I know that before I know it those newborn pants will fit, and before too long she'll be wearing a 2T like her sister and not long after that she'll be heading off to her first day of school. I remind myself daily (and during those nightly feedings!) that they don't stay this little for long and I have to savor every moment I can and cherish the memories we'll be making along the way.

In the Mood for a Hot Dog Party...

As our earlier post indicates, we had Sycely's big birthday celebration on the weekend when all her friends (and my mom, still visiting) could be there. We still wanted to do something special with her on her actual birthday. We gave her several options for special activities that day-going to the pottery painting place, having a special lunch out somewhere, going to a movie, but she said she just wanted to stay home and play-go figure! So, that's what we did. Her and Daddy spent some time constructing with her new marbleworks-a toy Daddy seems to be enjoying immensely! We took a family trip to the grocery store and grabbed some tasty lunch for a picnic. We came home and all piled into Sycely's room to have our picnic lunch in her new pop-up princess castle. That evening we had a "hot dog party" in the backyard with Nanny, Papa and Uncle Ian. We've been trying to take advantage of our fire pit/grill out back this summer and our "hot dog party" gave us a good opportunity. We roasted a variety of hot dogs and marshmallows, and had baked beans and potato salad then headed inside for ice cream sundaes and presents. All in all it was a fun, low-key day to celebrate our special first-born and the joy she is in our lives.

Grillin' and Chillin'

"I'm 3 on my birthday!"

Birthday Sundae-complete with candles!

Sycely's new Angelina Ballerina dress

A Perfect Princess Tea Party

A week to the day after Ella joined our family we had Sycely's 3rd birthday party-a princess tea party. All of Sycely's closest friends were there (all 3 of which also have welcomed new siblings in the last few months-it was baby central around here!) and this year we had the added joy of my mom and her husband being here for our party fun. My dad and Kate were able to come to town late that night and spend the next day with us, celebrating Sycely's birthday and meeting Baby Ella. Not only were we excited Far Nanny got to celebrate with us, but it was such a tremendous help having her here as my assistant for all the party preparations. Fortunately, I had done alot of the planning, shopping and preparations in the weeks before Ella arrived knowing that I'd most likely be throwing this shin-dig with a brand new baby, so mostly we just had food prep and decorating to do. The day before I made and decorated some princess cookies shaped like glass slippers, carriages, princesses, crowns, etc and fruit kabobs with heart shaped melon. I topped it all off with a teapot shaped chocolate cake with pink frosting and edible glitter. There was, of course, tea and princess colored M & Ms as well as princess shaped sandwiches and pink and purple star shaped ice cubes. While Sycely napped on party day we put up the decorations and made the dining room look princess and party ready with tulle, streamers and balloons (kudos to Papa Scott for surviving his first balloon assignment). Sycely was awestruck when she got up from nap and immediately requested a special princess Cinderella dress to wear for her princess tea party. Conversation and reenactments from the celebration are ongoing, even two weeks later :) I'm so thankful that I was able to get most of the party prepping done ahead of time so that Sycely could have a super special party to celebrate her birthday, just one short week after getting a new baby sister. It was great that Ella's arrival didn't diminish the "specialness" of celebrating Sycely's birthday.

Our Birthday Princess

Ready to Party

Fit for a Princess

Party Friends: Brock, Makena and Scarlett

The Cake

Happy Birthday Sycely- the big 3!