Happy 10 months baby girl!

How time flies! Ella turned ten months old yesterday! Our neighborhood pool opened this weekend so Ella and I went for an hour yesterday and an hour today! She loves the water and loves watching all the kids. Daddy worked so hard all weekend putting up new gutters and did an amazing job!

The pictures below were taken tonight after bath while getting ready for bed. As soon as she sees the light on my phone come on (flash getting ready) she starts cracking up and smiling! You can see her three teeth inthis picture and Im pretty sure she is about to cut a fourth tooth. She has been chewing and sucking on her thumb lately. I really hope she is not going to become a thumb sucker and feel it has more to do with teething. She is saying more and more words each day, the most recent being ELLA. Yes, Ella, she says both syllables and says it perfectly. We have a smart baby on our hands! Also, when saying wheres your belly, now lifts her shirt and touches her belly! Miss smarty pants learned after grandma joyce showing her that literally a few times! She is able to stand on her own for a short amount of time and is even trying to take a few steps!

Autism Speaks Walk

Ella, Grandma Joyce, and I attended the Autism Speaks Walk in Cincinnati yesterday. Several thousand people showed up to rasie several hundred thousands of dollars for Autism research (not sure on the numbers yet). We walked with my team from work, The Kelly O Leary Center. I made Ella a ribbon out of puzzle piece, Autism Awareness ribbon. She LOVED seeing all the people and kept screaming in delight. That is until she got tired and bored of the situation and thankfully slept through the whole walk.

Cloth Diapers

Our cloth diaper sampler has arrived! Cloth diapers are not what they used to be. The options are absolutely endless. Just google cloth diapers and you will be amazed how far they have come and all the options available! We have chosen to go to cloth as it is better for the environment, better for Ella with all the chemicals that are in disposables, better for potty training, cheaper in the long run (huge initial expense), and we will be able to use them on our next child. Last night we tried the all in one diaper, which I have to say is fabulous. It is just like a disposable only reusable with the cover, pad, and lining all sewn right together and the whole thing gets thrown in the wash. Tonight (in picture below) she has the old fashion cloth diaper (although they no longer need to be folded like old fashioned and no longer use pins) with a much higher tech cover on then the old fashioned kind. I have to say so far I am amazed at how capable a cloth diaper is at catching and holding pee! And they're cute :)

On another note Ella never ceases to amaze me with that big baby brain in her small baby head! She is now pointing to, labeling, and verbalizing mama, dog, ball, bird, bug (in ten little lady bugs book), duck, moo for cow, and Im sure Im forgetting some. She also says boom when she slams something down and also recently started getting a HUGE kick out of biting my finger and then SHE says OW when she does. Little miss personality!

I added another video from vacation and then a video of Ella playing ball with winston. She has recently becomed obsessed with saying and playing with a ball. Winston rolls her the ball. She of course wants him to take it out of her hand, which he wont do ( a good thing I guess). You can even here her say ball a few times! Oh my how shes growing up :)

My other child

I had to share a picture of my other baby which was sent to me by Tom since hes working from home :)

My Little Sunshine

The sitter just sent me this picture of Ella enjoying the outdoors and I could not resist sharing it!

vacation videos

Happy Mothers Day!

Ella wanted to tell Grandma Joyce and Joanne Happy Mothers Day! I feel truly blessed on this Mothers Day to have Ella in my life. She has completed the piece that has been missing for all these years. I love her more than I can ever express. Today I will try to express my love to her in a letter that will be sealed away in card until she is able to read it for herself. The card the letter will be placed in reads:

Daughter, today be blessed,

be strong,

be beautiful...

be you.

I love you Ella Rose!

Fabulous birthday at the beach

What a wonderful day at the beach and what a wonderful birthday. Tom and Ella got me a charm Ive been wanting from Becoming Mom that has Ella's name on one side and her birthdate on the other side. We spent the afternoon at the beach. Ella cannot get enough of the ocean and sand. She loves sitting in the waves and digging in the sand and squeals with pure delight. Ella watched daddy blow super big bubbles with the bubble wand. After Ella went to bed daddy and mommy went out to celebrate mommy's birthday. Daddy and mommy ate dinner on the harbor with a table right on the water. What a beautiful evening with great company, food, and live accoustic music. Feeling very sad that we leave tomorrow night to head back to Ohio. This has been a great family vacation.

Sunny days

Last night once the rain stopped, there was an amazing, complete, double rainbow. The pictures from our balcony do not even do it justice. We had a perfect day at the beach today. No winds, no clouds, only sun. At lunch time we were even able to see several huge school of fish (looked like huge black area in water). These school of fish attracted several dolphins that stayed around for a good portion of the day. Ella cannot get enough of the beach, waves, and pool. She loved watching daddy and Alex jump waves and gets so excited watching kids swim in the pool from our balcony. Her second bottom tooth is finally popping through the gum and her first top tooth is definetly there and about to pop. She has started labeling duck, dog, and bird in books and on tv. She points at the picture and labels it (not exact but really great approximation). This week is going way too fast.