Cute Ella Thing

Okay we were in the garage tonight and out of no where Ella says, "I love our family." Makes you know you are doing something right when they say that. The true test will be if she still says that when she is 16.

Summer could be a little miserable...

Thanks to the fact that Ella is obsessively afraid of the wind. UGH!!! Tried to go outside today and like usual she screamed and cried about all her stuff going to blow away the whole time. I tried to trick her by telling her that it was either stay out and play or go in and nap...to my surprise she screamed, "I want to go to bed!" So guess where she is now. It always sucks when my attempts to trick her into doing something by giving an undesirable alternative backfires. You know it was so nice out today and Addie loves playing outside and I want sun on these pasty legs, but instead of leisure time I have to listen to whining and complaining. It is just not normal to have to force a 3 year-old kid to go outside and stay outside. She has been like this on every attempt to go to the park or just in the yard. But, for some reason when daddy gets home she is usually willing to go out with him and ride bike..go figure. This is definitely a real fear, but I just don't know how to convince her she is not going to blow away like her balloon did last summer...that is how all this started. She even throws herself over the grocery or Target bags in the cart when we are in the parking lot. She screams and cries about how they are going to blow away until they are safely shut in the trunk. Payback for what I did to my mom as a weird child is a real you know what.

Went to swim lessons tonight

Ella is doing great! A little stubborn at times, but for a 3 year-old who hasn't been in the water much I am so proud. At the end she went up and gave Ms. Anna a kiss on the cheek and Ms. Anna told her she loved her and Ella said, "I love you." I thought that was so sweet and the fact that Ella has warmed up to her this much says alot. There are those little moments in life where you can see glimpses of what your children will be in the future and I think that was one of them. She will be very warm and loving! Matt is such a good daddy! I love watching him with the girls...gives me the gooeys :)

Finally spring in KY!

Oh what joy! I never realize how down in the dumps I get in the winter until the first warm sunny day in spring hits and I suddenly have more of a pep in my step...Guess that sounds old person like and lame, but you know I am alot more lame now that I am a parent myself....Gosh and I am only 26. What will happen when I am 30...lol. Anywho, we are finally able to break free from the chains of this pathetically dirty house and play outside...yay!!!...oh and if you are Addie you finally get to eat potting soil!! Yeah, she did last night. The container was right by the sand table. We turned our back for one second and the next thing we know her mouth looks like she has eaten a bag of Oreos. Well here are a few pics of the girlies and Matt's beautiful lawn made possible by Chemlawn...what you didn't really think we would do that ourselves. Although now Matt has to mow twice a week thanks to all that fertilizer.

Found new obsession

Okay I am a sucker for anything new and creative and I found a great product. Went to an Uppercase Living party the other day and that stuff rocks. The company has only been around for a few years, but has taken off like wildfire. I got one of the catalogs to search through at home cause I couldn't make up my mind at the party...I was glued to it for a day cause I am horrible at making decisions. It is all just so cute who could stop at just one. Check it out...uppercaseliving.com. I could decorate my whole house in it, but I won't for the fear of looking to obsessive :) My favorite saying I have to get is, "My house was clean last week...sorry you missed it!" That sums up my situation perfectly!

3 year old cut her own hair...yikes!

So Ella walked in the kitchen with safety scissors in her right hand and a mischievous look on her face...when she said, "Do I look pretty?" I knew there was something up. Oh yes, she did...gave herself a haircut. As I ran my fingers through her hair I pulled a huge clump right out. I could hardly yell at the kid...we play beauty shop all the time with her princess styling tools. How was she to know it is okay to use the princess scissors, but not the craft scissors. Really I blame myself. We had a very serious talk about scissors after that and I pray that this never happens again. She could tell I was still not happy though even after our talk. Sweet little thing just hates conflict...so she sat at the kitchen table and made me a picture..when I smiled and said thank you she said, "That make you happy?" And all was fair again.

Ella Started Swim Lessons

Matt took Ella to her first swim lesson tonight. It is great father, daughter time. She was excited about it when she got home and it sounds like she was very cooperative. They learned how to 'Spiderman crawl' along the side of the pool and how to get in and out of the pool. They are supposed to practice blowing bubbles in the bath for Thursday.

Ella's Eye Visit

Took Ella to the eye doctor today in Nashville. Dr. Donahue is a really good pediatric opthamologist at Vandy. Ella officially has intermittent exotropia...although we pretty much knew that anyway cause my friend Tracey said she had all the same symptoms that her own son had and that was his diagnosis. Basically, both eyes can wander outward occasionally. It is a communication problem between the brain and the eyes. She has to start wearing a patch on one eye everyday for 2 hrs alternating between both eyes. If that doesn't seem to help within 2 mos. he gave us a prescription for eye glasses. They are extra strong eye glasses so they will make her eyes work extra hard to have to focus so it will help to bring the eyes in and hopefully keep them from floating out like they do. Can't do both treatments at once cause if something seemed to help we wouldn't know exactly which treatment it was. If neither of these treatments work she will probably have to have surgery to tighten the muscle. That is what ends up happening alot of his patients. He said there is no cure, so they consider it successful treatment when they can limit the occurance of the wandering to much less than before treatment. He said hopefully it will almost go away, but throughout her life she will probably have times where it happens...especially when she is tired. I started seeing her eyes do the 'crazy eyes' thing as I call it when she was 15 mos. old...for a long time I was the only one who saw it so I felt crazy, but eventually others started seeing it and I started catching it on camera. I am glad that Dr. Donahue is being more progressive with the treatment. Dr. Paul was being very laid back about this, but it is something that needs to be fixed before time runs out to fix it. After a certain time thebrain stops fighting to keep the eyes focusing and chooses one eye to use and leaves the other one...which precedes to lose all vision. Pretty scary. It is sad to know your child has to go through something like this, but then again I feel lucky that it is treatable and not threatning to her health. How parents with children with terrible illnesses can find the strength to go through that I don't know and pray I never have to find out.

Yay me!

I am finally in the 21st century! I have a blog. Wow! Very proud moment...now I am able to write stuff no one but me will ever care about.