Christmas Day

Pics from Christmas Day. Thank you Ellie for letting us sleep until 7:00 AM!

Ellie carbo-loading before presents with some monkey bread.

Off to a fantastic start with a school bus. Ellie loves 'em!

Had to take a break to enjoy a new book.

Monkey bread wearing off, but there are still 6 presents to go!

Dora table and chairs! Now there's room for a tea party, coloring, and working on her thesis.

A Dora kitchen to work on her masterpieces. She already has a full sink.

The blender was a big hit on the Dora kitchen.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Christmas #1

This was Christmas #1 on December 20 with Tita before she left for Florida

We let Ellie open her scooter first since it was the easiest to unwrap. In obvious hindsight, we shouldn't have started with this gift because we could only move to the next gifts through tears.

Tita picked out a great new outfit for Ellie for when she goes cruisin'.

Thank you Tita for all the new Little People toys!

The new Dora book was a hit. Anything with Dora on it is a pretty safe bet.

Ellie felt she needed to tweek and tune her new ride before hittin' the streets.

All grown up...

Ellie has an extreme fascination with anything with wheels - especially bicycles. Here she is at REI soooo happy that she got to sit on a bike. Later Titi (what Ellie calls my mom) pushed Ellie around the store (at which point she was made to put on a helmet by the store employees).
Ellie looks so grown up! I can't believe she'll be two soon!

We also just scored big and got her a bicycle with training wheels at a garage sale for $5 (great shape too!). SShhh! It's a secret for years later (who could pass up that deal?)!

Ellie found my eyelash curler AND knew what to do with it.

She now may know more about makeup than Steve... ;-)

For some reason if you tell Ellie to say "cheese," she puts her arms in the air.
If you say "smile," she'll smile with her head tilted way up, like she's looking at the ceiling.
If you take a picture of her singing/ screaming, it's perfect.

Santa Santa, don't ya wanna?

I only had to wait until Ellie's second visit to Santa so I could get a picture of her crying on his lap. I'm not being mean, I think it's adorable.

Clearly, she doesn't wanna.

Having some quesadilla on mommy's lap while Santa sings Christmas songs.

Santa had a plan. Sneak up behind Ellie and smile. I like the crying picture better.