Hair, Hair, Hair

Ella has so much hair! It is to the point now where she cannot go without having a barrett in her hair, which of course she pulls out about 20 times a day, and then gets mad that her hair is in her eyes. It is getting hard to manage, yet I cannot bring myself to have it cut, it is just too adorable!

One of her favorite things to do right now is play peek-a-boo with the blanket. She pulls the blanket over her head and then her hair does this



and then she looks at it like this, but won't let me put the barrett back in her hair



Even if I do get to put the barrett back in her hair, 10 minutes later she does the blanket thing again



and then her hair does this



And again with the blanket,



and again with the hair. It is an endless cycle......



She also loves to run back and forth on our couches, which gets her hair all crazy with static electricity, but she is still so flippin cute!!





I know that I am going to have to get it cut eventually, but I am just not ready yet!!!

Still not walking

Ella is almost 15 months, and she still is not walking on a regular basis. She knows how to walk, and is getting pretty good at it,



She loves to walk behind toys,







But her favorite mode of transportation is walking on her knees. I have never seen, or heard of, a child that does this. It is the most bizarre thing, but it is her favorite way to travel. She is so fast too, I find it hard to keep up with her sometimes!





I really would like for her to walk. She knows how, but doesn't really seem to have the patience for it. It is getting to the point now where she is wearing holes in the knees of her pants, and she has callouses on her knees. Am I seriously going to have a 2 year old that walks on her knees???

My Hubby is 30!!!!

So I know this is a blog about Ella, but I need to give a shout out to my hubby. Brandon turned 30 a week ago, and to celebrate, my parents took Ella and we went out to "party". I say "party" because in our 20's we never would have considered this a party. We did, however, make it until after 1 am, and we were quite proud of ourselves!! We got a group of friends together and went to dinner and out for some drinks. 3 of the 4 couples that came out had kids, so it was fun to all get out for some adult time. We absolutley love our daughter, but it was so nice to be able to go out and have some fun with our friends. It is good to know that even though Brandon and I are 30, we can still have a good time with our friends!!

The happy couple enjoying our night of freedom



Brandon's brother and his wife "The other Grabski's" came out too. It was one of their first nights out since our niece Evy was born in December. I think this is one of the only pictures we have of the 4 of us in the past 3 years.



The Enlunds made the trip up from Madison, it was so great to see them!!



And our "young" friends Joel and Mandy came out to show us how it's done. They both ended up dancing on the bar at some point that night.....



Our game of 7, 14, 21 got a little out of hand, and somehow the dice ended up in Chris's beer!



That game then led to shots.....



And then more shots......



We had such a fun night, which means the next morning was little rough, but my fabulous parents let us sleep in and didn't bring Ella back until later in the morning. Ella had such fun with them, and my parents can't wait to have her overnight again. We may need to take advantage of that.....

Christmas - I know, I am a month late

We had 2 Christmas celebrations this year, one with each family. At the Grabski family Christmas, Ella mastered climbing the stairs and made grandma and grandpa sit on the stairs watching her for most of the night!





This is her new face, I am so in love with this face!!! She was very excited about her presents and made this face with every gift she opened.


Ella got all sorts of new toys for Christmas, such as this alphabet train. She loves this, but it only has one setting.....loud!


She did get some walking time in with uncle Dan before the stair climbing began though. She loves her uncle Dan!



We also got together for a Bliven family Christmas. She for to have some fun playing cards with grandpa.







And of course she had so much fun with aunt Kelli. She sure misses her aunt Kelli a lot, but we are going to visit her in a few weeks so she will get some quality aunt Kelli time.










I know this is more than a month late, and I need to update more often so I will try my hardest to get more posts up here!

Our new niece

We have a niece! Ms. Evelynn Leigh Grabski was born 12/12, a few days early. She showed up the morning after the huge snow storm that blew through the area dumped over a foot of snow on us! My poor brother in law Dan had to shovel the car out before they could get to the hospital.

We of course went to visit as soon as we could that day. She is so beautiful, and tiny! I am used to lugging around a 1 year old, holding a 7 pound new born was quite a switch!

Here is the new mama and Evelynn


Ella was so curious about baby Evelynn. She wanted to stay around her and kept trying to touch her. She was close to poking her in the eye a few times, so I kept a close watch on her.




Here is the proud grandma, my mother in law Jan. She is such a proud grandmother!


Auntie Traci - I am so excited to have a niece!


Uncle Brandon - he looks like such a pro at holding babies now


In Ella news.....we get closer and closer to walking every day. She is walking really good just holding our hands and she is walking with only one hand on the furniture. Her new thing right now is walking on her knees. It is slow, but her preferred mode of transport right now. She also is taking bigger and bigger "risks" when moving between toys and furniture, trying to move between bigger gaps! I think she wants to be sure that she can do it before she does it, which is apparently what I did when I started to walk. Like mother like daughter! :)

She recently got 3 more teeth, and all at the same time! The poor girl was quite fussy for a week, and we weren't quite sure what was going on. It was the same week as the reaction to the MMR shot, so with the fever and rash we thought maybe she was just not feeling well, but turns out she was cutting 3 teeth. That would make me cranky too!

We are getting super excited for Christmas, Ella doesn't know what's going on but she is very interested in the presents.....well, mostly the pretty wrapping paper. She won't touch the tree, she loves to look at it, but will not go near it. It is nice that she is not pulling our ornaments off the tree, so I guess that's a good thing!

Happy Holidays to everyone!

Ella is one!

So I realize that it has been a month since I last posted, but we had a lot going on over here! My little Ella is one! I'm not sure how that is possible already, but she turned one on 12/1. December has been a big month of firsts already, and we are only 1/2 way though! Her first birthday, first cake, first birthday presents, first outing to get a Christmas tree, and her first step!!! Yes, I said it, her first step! She is getting so good at walking along furniture and toys, and the other day while we were getting ready to get into the bath, she let go of the tub and took a step towards me. It was only a step and then she fell into me, but it was a step and it counts! I think she may be walking by Christmas.....

Lets start this off with Ella's first birthday....Brandon and I took off work for the day and spent the whole day with Ella. We did some shopping for her party, had her 1 year pictures taken, and had a doctor's appointment. I know, I know, I am the worst mother in the world making my daughter go to the doctor and get shots on her actual birthday. We had it scheduled a week later, but the doctor had to change it, so I got stuck with it being on her birthday. She is in the 10%-25% for weight (19 pounds), 25% for height (28.5 inches) and of course 95% for head circumference. She is developing well and the doctor was pleased. So, YAY!!! She did have to have 5 vaccinations that day, which was rough, but we powered through and let her have cake after dinner to make up for it! However, one week later, she developed a rash and fever over 101. Surprise, my daughter is one of the 5% of kids who react to the MMR vaccine. Poor girl is still a bit off, but getting back to herself more and more each day.

Here are some pics from her actual first birthday, 12/1.





And with a first birthday comes a first cake. Ella, lucky girl that she is, got to have cake 3 times that week! We gave her cake on her birthday in an attempt to get her to forget that we made her see the doctor and get shots....



And then she got to have more cake at her party 12/4



And then again at a family party for the Bliven clan on 12/5



She loved loved loved the cake each time, and did a great job of digging in and making a mess, I was so proud!

We had her first birthday party at our house on 12/4. We had about 30 people come by to celebrate. Ella was a bit overwhelemed at first, but did great and had a good time playing with her cousin Darren and gal pals Sam, Avery, Astrid and Katelyn.

I baked a cake for the occassion....I am not much of a baker, nor am I a cake decorator, but I thought I did pretty good!



Here is Ella getting all fired up for the party and waiting for the guests to arrive. She was playing with her candle, making sure everyone knew she was 1.



After opeining her presents, she was crawling around with a little bow on her butt, too cute!



She got to show her new toys to grandpa



And to the grandmas, who look very entertained by this doll house she got....



Ella's Godparents Steph and Nick came by to celebrate



And Aunt Kelli drove all the way here from Iowa to party with Ella



Ella had all sorts of gifts to open and was quite helpful ripping paper off and removing tissue paper from the bags. After this performance, I am looking forward to watching her open her Christmas gifts!!



Today she helped us look for a chop down a Christmas tree for the first time. This involved getting super bundled up in her new snow suit and braving the storm. We got absolutely dumped on with snow today and it is still not done.





We have had quite the busy month, and we still have 1/2 of it to go! We are looking forward to another addition to the family, my sister in law Darcy is pregnant and will be having a baby girl 12/15. I am so excited to have a neice and I cannot wait to meet her!

I am not sure that I will be back here before the holidays, so Merry Christmas to all and a Happy New Year!

This was a rough week in the Grabski house

Where to start.....I guess that would be when Ella threw up Wed morning after taking her bottle. I was at work already and got that lovely news via text message from my husband (who when asked to clarify said she spit up, not threw up, so I thought she was fine). He cleaned her up and stripped the sheets off our bed (of course she was in our bed when she did that) and left her with Grandma for the day as usual. About 2 hours later, Grandma sent a text message that Ella threw up her breakfast. Time to admit she was sick. She threw up all day Wed, not keeping anything down until about 8pm that night when she kept down 4 crackers and 10 cheerios. Grandma came over and watched her on Thurs, we kept her on a toast and cheerios diet, and she kept everything down so we thought she was on the rebound. We were wrong.....around 7:30 Thurs night I checked on her as I was headed to the gym. I walked in and all I could smell was puke, she had thrown up all over her crib, herself and her stuffed animals. We woke her up, stripped her down, stripped down the crib, threw away her favorite monkey and tried to get her back to bed. We went through every single pair of pajamas and all her crib sheets in 2 days.

While this is all going on, we get word that my pregnant sister-in-law was in the hospital with dehydration and contractions. She is not due until 12/22, so that was of course cause for worry. She was released after a few days, but is now on bed rest. We are so happy that she and our neice are ok.

Then, to top off the week....I was playing on the floor with Ella over my lunch hour on Friday, and when I stood up to go back to work, I felt a snap in my knee followed by the inability to put any weight on it or walk. The doctor told me I only dislocated my knee cap and I should rest over the weekend. Rest over the weekend, really? That is the only time I have to clean, do laundry and of course play with Ella. My husband has been amazing all weekend, but it is so hard not to be able to pick Ella up and play on the floor with her. She has been sitting in my lap and reading books more than usual, so I think that she realizes I can't move. I feel so old! I was doing the smallest movement and hurt myself. I have been laid up all weekend with my leg up and icing it, not able to walk. This sucks.

Oh, and it's snowing today. First snow of the year. Yuck.