Ella's a big sister in training

We recently found out the great news that we are expecting another baby and that Ella is going to be a big sister. New baby is due to arrive on March 24, 2009. Here is an early ultrasound that we got when I was 13 weeks, 2 days pregnant. Heartbeat has been in the 160s and in less than 5 weeks we will find out the sex.

Here is a picture of Ella in her "Proud Big Sister in Training" t shirt. We talk a lot about a having a baby with her, but she still doesn't quite understand. However, she loves to go look at all the babies in the infant room at her school.

Brookfield Zoo

We woke up this morning and headed straight for breakfast and a visit to the Brookfield Zoo. The Zoo opened at 10 am and we were hoping to get there right at opening and leave by noon so that we wouldn't compromise nap time. Lately, it's just not worth her sleeping in the car or missing a nap. She is a whole different child when she is over tired and that is far too much work :)

First we visited with the Elephants and Ella loved saying hi to them and making elephant noises at them. When we moved on to see more animals, she just kept saying "bye-bye" to them and waving until they were out of sight. The monkey house was really nice and she watched and laughed at them swinging from the ropes and trees for quite a while.

We were able to make it back it time for Ella's nap (which was longer than usual at 2 1/2 hours).

Here are pictures with the elephants:



And another one riding on Papa's shoulders:

Cold turkey....big girl bed

Construction is finally finished on Ella's new bedroom. The loft is now our third bedroom (thanks to Uncle Mike and JP) and we got Ella a new big girl bed over the weekend. Ella's original crib was recalled recently and in order to get a new crib, we had to mail in pieces of the old crib and wait two weeks for a voucher in the mail. Fortunately Oma and Opa let us borrow the crib they have at their house for about a month. We decided today that after the new carpet was done in the entire upstairs, that we would just go cold turkey and have Ella nap in her toddler bed. We returned the crib to Oma and Opa this morning and Papa put together Ella's new bed with new Dora bedding before nap time.

We are so proud of our little girl! The door knob hasn't been put on the door yet, so although we closed the door, we were able to peak in on her to make sure she was napping (or at least resting). After 20 minutes, we went to peak in and make sure that she was sleeping b/c she had been quiet the entire time she was in her room. When we looked in, she was laying in her bed with a mini basketball, Elmo stuffed animal and her new favorite book (Brown Bear, Brown Bear). She did finally end up falling asleep and after about 2 1/2 hours, she started making noise, but stayed in bed and just "read" her book until we came in and got her.
Sorry so long....here are some pictures of her new room.

After waking up....reading in her bed.

The wall opposite of her bed:
A picture of her room looking out into the hallway. There are usually doors in front of the washer and dryer, but they were removed so that the carpet could get installed. Then that's her closet to the far right of the picture:

A picture from her door looking in:

This is the picture I took through the door knob hole when she had just woken up:

Ella's first sentence

Just the other morning, I was getting Ella ready for school in her bedroom. When she was ready to go, we walked out of the room and Ella said "Papa, are you?" Unforunately, Papa was at work already, so we didn't get to find out where he was. But, we are considering that Ella's first official sentence. She uses it quite often now whenever she is looking for her mama or papa.

Colors - video

Ella has been doing really good with learning her colors. She is always showing us things and wanting to know what color they are, so we know that she is definitely eager to learn! She knows blue, pink, orange, purple and black. We are still working on red, yellow, green and white.

More teeth!

Ella has been putting up quite a fight at dinner lately and we finally learned why. I stuck my fingers in her mouth to find that her two lower 2 year old molars have just cut through. It's nice to know that there is a reason for her crabiness and lack of appetite, but I'm hoping that they push all the way through soon so that she can be comfortable again.

Shoe obsession

Lately Ella has become obsessed with shoes. She loves to take her shoes off and try to put them back on. If she sees other shoes in the house, she stops everything to try and put them on. It's very cute and she is definitely getting good at trying on shoes of all sizes! Today I caught her walking about in Mama's work shoes.