Dave, Julie, & Olivia

Our friends Dave & Julie came over last night and brought their little girl Olivia. I'm not sure who had more fun, Olivia or Ellie. It was about 30 minutes shy of Ellie's bed time when they got here and she warmed up right about the time she probably should have gone to bed (my hindsight is 20/20). At this point, she became wired and began showing Olivia how a spastic over-tired 2 year old acts (have I ever told you that Ellie gets hyper when she's tired?). 10 month old Olivia was fascinated by Ellie and her behavior and gave it her absolute best effort to follow her around, even up and down the steps. Ellie was equally fascinated that someone was so interested in her which fueled more squeals, laps around the dining room table, opening/shutting the kitchen door, and her running entirely too much before bed. Whew! Eventually I got her to bed and we all had a nice dinner.

Oh yes, and Ellie had been playing in the sprinkler just prior to Olivia's arrival. Hence, the swimsuit.

God's Country... aka, the South.

Ellie and I have been in Louisiana since Wednesday now and Ellie is having a blast (it's Sunday as I am writing this). Our flights were both nice and smooth. Kudos to God, for perfect flying weather. He knows that turbulence makes me want to strap on a parachute, exit the plane immediately, and walk the rest of the way. Ellie was pretty entertained on our first 2 and a half hour flight with all of the goodies I brought along. This includes the almost holy and entirely necessary bribe food... gummies. I wanted her to sleep SO badly on that flight because we were up at 4:45 to get ready and loaded (that's 3:45 for you Louisiana folk). But noooooo, sleep was not on her agenda. She behaved herself quite nicely and I am proud of her plane behavior. We stopped in Dallas for a 2 hour layover at which point Ellie ran and ran and ran around. We arrived in Louisiana after a quick 30 minute flight. At this point, Ellie was exhausted. She fell asleep in the car after about 5 minutes and even slept while I got her out of the car, put her in her uncomfortable umbrella stroller, and while Mom, Dad, and I ate lunch at Newks. Now, THIS is a first for her, she's never slept in her stroller before... ever.

Since our arrival, Ellie has been playing with Pop and Tudi doing whatever she darn well pleases. Which is the right of a grandchild, I hear. She's been playing with my old toys, swinging, snapping beans, blowing bubbles, napping, eating, cooking, playing in the sprinkler, staying away from crawfish, chasing Sasha (our old dog, now my parent's dog), having tea parties, repeatedly washing her hands in the sink, and doing all the things little girls like to do whenever they have complete free reign.

Newbie and I have actually been busy going back and forth to Shreveport. I've gotten my hair cut, seen several of my Shreveport buddies (Arielle, Steph, Dave, Julie, Aaron), and am looking forward to seeing a whole bunch more this week. I've also been to Ruston hanging out with my brother, niece, & sister-in-laws (Luke, Katy, Joan, Avery), eating Johnny's (!!!), had some of the best crawfish I think anyone has ever cooked (thanks Dad!), and almost picking blueberries. It's been a full trip so far... 

I've posted some fun pictures of our adventures, enjoy!

Anna

And all that sass...

Sporting her sunglasses, holding her blanket and purse with Sarah, holding her hand "out" the window. Who's little girl is this anyway?

Sarah

Sometimes I wish the birthday celebration wasn't all in one day. It seems like it's overwhelming for the really little one's. After all, they hardly understand yet anyway, right? Well, Ellie was more than a little happy to stretch the birthday celebration into this week when she got a belated package from her Aunt Katy, Uncle Luke, and Avery. She tore into it like no tomorrow to discover... my, oh my, it was a doll! And not just any doll, one that has blond hair like Ellie, shoes, a matching blanket & pillow [Side note: now would be a good time to mention that Katy is capable of many complicated feats of sewing that I would never have the patience to complete. Quilting, for example. Now you can add doll-making to the list]! An Ellie doll! Ellie was thrilled with her new doll. Thrilled! She immediately began shushing Dan and I and hugging her to sleep. Then she walked over and put her in the middle of the floor with her head on her pillow and her blanket to cover her up. About two seconds later she picked her up again and shushed us again. Then she put the doll in her stroller and began parading around the house. At this point I had to leave to go to an outing, but Dan said the two of them took her for a walk around the block (did I mention it was bed time?). Ellie had more fun pushing her around in her stroller, then willingly (???) came inside and got ready for bed. When she got in her bed, she wanted her new doll to sleep with her too. Dan asked her where she wanted her to sleep and Ellie replied, "Guss, move!"

The next morning, over breakfast while looking at the doll, I asked her what she wanted to name the doll. She looked quizzically at me and said "Chewy" (which is the name of the neighbors cat... that hates Dan, every time we have to feed it, he hisses and bites at Dan. But not me!). So I began rattling off a few names and Ellie seemed to like the name Sarah. So... it stuck. Ellie calls her "Saura" and hasn't forgot the name once. Although, now that I think of it, we should have named her Mini Me... oh well.

Take a peek at Katy's blog for a better picture of Sarah.

E 24 mos

Car Washing, cheap!

Want a clean car? Must deliver car to Kentucky for a custom Ellie-washing. Real cheap, we promise.

Look How Close We Got!!!

We got this close!

My attempt at taking our picture together...

This is what Ellie did when I asked her what the baby ducks were doing (sleeping, silly!).

A few days ago Ellie and I went up to our favorite bookstore for their Kids Bargain Blowout (big yearly book sale). Behind the bookstore is a duck pond that we frequent. When we went out to see the ducks, we discovered that there were some "Be Bee Ducks" (as Ellie calls them). They actually swam right over to us and hopped up in the grass for a siesta. Ellie was thrilled and wanted to pet them sooooo badly. Maybe next time...

Pink Chapstick

My friend Sarah as two boys and when she got to shop for Ellie's birthday present she went all girl. She gave Ellie a hot pink sequined flapper dress, some sparkly pink high heel flip flops (that she almost broke her ankle in and now we have to hide them), and a little makeup kit. I had NO clue that the lip gloss was going to be, er, psycho hot pink. But Ellie thoroughly enjoyed putting it on and used up the entire tub in one sitting. Nice.

What's In Ellie's Bed

Ellie is quite fond of having things in her bed while she sleeps. I suspect it's because she needs something to play with when she would rather not sleep. We hear her talking and singing to her stuffed animals all the time when she's supposed to be sleeping. There have been times when about 10 or 20 minutes after I've laid her down for a nap that I have to go back in her room and tell her to lay down and take her nap (which, surprisingly, she does!). Anyway, here's what's in Ellie's bed:

Gus - the brown dog, which is her favorite. We have to cover Gus up each night with the little green blanket (just like Ellie's)
Harley - This is Ellie's husky that my Aunt Claire sent her for Christmas. We named her Harley because she looks like my first husky (Harley, who sadly passed away in October).
Bee Bee Harley - A little TY husky that my friend Heather sent to me years ago, Ellie has claimed it as her own and dubbed it Baby Harley.
Another dog - this last one does not have a name, and it's considered second rate by E, but for now has to be in the bed.
Green blanket - The beloved blanket! This is the one we can't leave home without if we travel. I made her two little one's for her birthday last year because she favored the big one so much.
Little green blanket - The baby version of her big blanket. It goes everywhere with us... there's one that lives in the car.
Purple & green blanket - Oma made this for Ellie before she was born and it's been in her bed every since. Ellie gets covered up with it almost every night.
Pink & green blanket - I made this as a swadling blanket for Ellie before she was born. We used it a lot, but since Ellie was so long she outgrew it quickly. She reclaimed it when I was going through baby stuff recently and now sleeps with it every night.
Valentine fleece - I've tried to keep this one out of her bed because it seems like there's too much stuff in there, but Ellie wants it IN the bed. It was a Valentine gift to her (from moi) and she ends up putting her head on it at some point during her slumber.

That's 4 dogs and 5 blankets. Hm... Now that I've given every item in her bed a description, I think she might have too much stuff in there....

What's in YOUR bed?
The Raz's

Colors colors!

Thanks to a little book I picked up in the dollar aisle of Target about a year ago (called Love Bugs), Ellie now knows all of the colors in the book and then some. Basically, there's a different color featured on each page of the book. About two weeks ago she added to her favorites - blue, pink, purple - and learned the rest in about two days. It was crazy. So, now she knows: blue, pink, purple, yellow, green, white, black, brown, orange, red.... and I think that's it. Yesterday I tried to teach her the difference between blue and teal, but she would have nothing of the sort. That teal was BLUE, darn it!

Doctor Details

Ellie went to the doctor this morning for her 2 year check up and behaved like an angel! Now, you must understand that the Doctor's office is hard for Ellie. We drive up and park in the same garage that we use when we go to see Dan at work... so each time she expects to go see her Daddy, and we end up going to the doctor is a terrible turn of events for such a little one. Terrible. Up until today she has screeched at the doctor so badly that Dan and I have both been shocked. The last time we were there she had an ear infection and wouldn't let the doctor look in her ears. I had to sandwich her legs in between mine just to keep her from kicking the doctor! NOT typical Ellie behavior. So, you probably understand why I was so excited when Ellie didn't even shed a tear today at the office. Not one tear! Seriously. She just talked and talked to the nurse, got weighed while still talking, tried to tip-toe while her height was being measured, and allowed her head to be measured with no protests. She even got a shot with only a grimace. One tough cookie!

E 2 years

26 Weeks

Newbie Raz is now 26 weeks along! Nothing new or exciting to report, which is great! I am still feeling fantastic (other than being completely worn out by the end of the day from keeping up with Ellie). I'm definitely larger at this point than I was with Ellie. Now, at 26 weeks, I look like I did when I was 30 weeks with Ellie. Either this baby is bigger (I'd like to think so!) or I'm bigger... Oh well!

Party Like You're 2!

Oh my goodness what a weekend we had in the Raz household! Ellie turned 2 and we did too (Dan and I, that is)! Hah. It seems like kids birthdays are also parent birthdays... they were born, but it was our "parent" birthday as well. Anyway.

Saturday
Party Day!

Ellie's 2nd birthday party was a "How does your garden grow" party. I sent out invitations (pictured) with a little poem inviting her guests to plant flowers and eat dirt cake.

Well, we invited about 6 of Ellie's friends for the party and only 2 were going to be in town. I was actually relieved, given that they were all going to be planting flowers and I wasn't sure how that was going to go over with mostly 2 year olds. Just as one of her friend Susannah was walking in the door, Caleb's mom called and said he was vomiting and wouldn't make the party. Yeesh! So, it was Ellie and Susannah partying hardy for the big b-day #2.

They planted their flower out on the patio in about 8 minutes (with mom's assistance) and probably had more fun with their watering cans than anything. After soaking themselves, we moved indoors for dirt cake and snacks. I didn't even think about the fact that their individual teracotta pots of dirt cake actually looked like dirt... both girls refused to eat it! It was hilarious! They ate gummy worms, m&m's, and jelly beans along with a few carrots and apples. Quite a healty snack, hah. Eventually both of them sampled the dirt cake after watching us moms gobble some down. I think they liked it, but neither finished. Oh well, next year we'll have an actual cake!

Sunday
Mother's Day & Ellie's actual birthday!

Sunday was a double-celebration day, Ellie's "official" birthday and Mother's Day! Ellie spotted her trike (that I picked up at a consignment sale a while back) first thing and wouldn't even eat breakfast until she played on it. Eventually, we ate a breakfast of champions (cereal & green smoothies), and kept right on playing. So much playing, in fact, that we completely missed church! Oops.

We decided to go downtown to May Fest and see what kind of arts/crafts/booths were there. We beat the crowd and walked in and out of the booths of local artisans. My favorite stuff was too darn expensive (a pumpkin made out of mirrors... completely awesome, but $1500). Ellie's favorite stuff was free: a petting zoo. There were sheep, lamas, goats, and a cow. I say it was her favorite, she actually just wanted to look instead of pet. I suppose I don't blame her because they were smelly. Fun times.

I got to pick our lunch destination (opting against the fair food... don't need it around my middle) and decided on Cosi. I usually bring along Ellie's lunch when we go places because #1. It's cheaper and #2. I never know if she'll eat that $5 sandwich (and if she doesn't it usually ticks me off because I spent $5 on it). So she happily ate her mac & cheese, and boy did she EAT.

We came home and started iChatting with family so they could see Ellie open her birthday gifts. She chatted with Oma, Opa, Aunt Joan, Aunt Carol before her nap, and chatted with Pop, Tudi, Uncle Luke, Aunt Katy, and Avery after her nap & dinner.

During her nap, I got to go out shopping by myself and it was wonderful! I had a frappucchino and spent waaaay too much time at Target before heading to Old Navy. I think Dan took a nap, but I'm not entirely sure.

The evening was polished off by playing in the new sprinkler and icing cupcakes. It was an action-packed day!

We hope all of our Mom friends had a great Mother's Day!

Love,
The Raz's

E 2 yrs
Newbie 26 weeks

The Glorious Kleenex Box

We've been re-purposing kleenex boxes in the Raz household for quite some time now. Ellie's first kleenex box was full of random and miscellaneous objects (a spoon, golf ball, ribbon, and other goodies that I can't remember). Now we've graduated to cloths (that I whipped up). They go out and back in, out and back in... over and over. However, it only lasts about 10 minutes. But I figure that's an eternity for Ellie! She'd still rather push her "bee-bee" around in her stroller. Actually, she's doing that very thing the moment I am typing this up!

Ellie's other recent activities include:
- Washing dishes with me in the "big"sink. she learned that all of the bubbles have to be rinsed off of the dishes before she can put them on the towel/drying rack.
- Modge Podge, which was a terrible mistake. This was my very first experience using Modge Podge, and though it's wonderful, it's NOT for little kiddos. It dries on the hands really fast and then you have to rub them together to get it all off. Not exactly Ellie-friendly
- Marking up the sale paper as "instructed:" drawing on the pink shirt, coloring the face with the brown hair, find the ball, color on the blue flowers... She was using a magic marker with paranoid supervision on my part. It's all I had handy!
- Walking her Bee Bee around the block (and getting reallllyy tired, which I love)
- Swinging and sliding on her swingset outside
- Cooking in her kitchen, mostly soup (per Ellie)
- Changing Bee Bee or Gus's (her fav. stuffed dog) diaper
Oh, and there's so much more... not enough time to type it all up!

E 23 mos

Are Cheerios Healthy?

I came across this article tonight while looking for homemade cereal recipes. Did you know that there aren't any other homemade cereal recipes out other than a million versions of granola? Who knew? I have always loved cereal and I once read (somewhere in all of my reading) that eating a bowl of cereal in the morning can be as bad as eating candy for breakfast. This, of course, depends on what kind of cereal you're eating. But I've pretty much tried all of them over the years, so I'm sure I've consumed my fair share of candy for breakfast.

Our little family is just trying to "clean up" our eating and avoid processed foods, refined sugars, and pretty much anything fun. This might mean I have to give up pizza and coke... dang it. We haven't been doing so well lately. Maybe we'll have to do this in steps. Is there a 12 step program for clean eating? (Kristen, I'm sure you know the answer to that one! haha).

But anyway, back to the original article I found on Cheerios (which we all know are staples in child diets everywhere). The Raz's primarily eat the Multi Grain one's, so I'm wondering how those are made.

Here it is, Are Cheerios Healthy:
http://www.answerfitness.com/348/are-cheerios-healthy-cereal/#more-348