2007 Wrap Up

I can't believe it's the last day of 2007. I can't even remember what we did for last New Year's Eve, but I imagine that since I was pregnant it involved no alcohol and lots of sleeping. We spent this new years eve at home again... hitting the town on NYE just doesn't sound as fun as it once did (especially since you're pretty much required to stay up until midnight). For those of you who have been following along, I've been downloading all of my blog entries into a book that I'm going to have printed. So you could look at this post as the last page of my first blog book.

Christmas was a big whirlwind of activity. I'd like to say it was "fun", but I think a better way to describe it would be "hectic". And I don't like saying that. Christmas should be about Jesus, family, and friends and not be a giant headache, but there's just so much stress that it creates. Next year, I'd like to to it totally different, but it will probably be the same. Wears. Me. Out.

Our holiday weekend started off with the arrival of Mimi and Judy, Lee's grandmother and aunt, from Chattanooga. Lee and Ellie picked them up from the airport while I stayed home and wrapped gifts. We had a family Christmas dinner with Lee's family and my family on Sunday after a brief power outage that nearly sent the party packing to our house. For Christmas Eve, we went to 6:00 services with Lee's family and then went back to his parents house to open gifts. This meant that Ellie didn't get to bed until after 10:00 so she was sort of cranky on Christmas. Amidst all of this, Mimi got really, really sick (with Ellie's previous ailment) and had to be taken to the emergency room around midnight on Christmas Eve because she couldn't keep anything down. She's doing much better now. Elizabeth, Tee, and Beth all came down with it on Christmas Day. Luckily, we avoided round two of stomach bug hell.

On Christmas, we woke up, ate blueberry waffles, and then opened gifts. Lee gave me a necklace and a wallet and he got VAN HALEN tickets. Woo hoo! That's right - we're going to rock our socks off at the January 26th show. I also made him a photo book of Ellie and gave him Seasons 1 and 2 of It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia on DVD. If you haven't seen that show, it's completely ridiculous and hilarious. After the celebration at our house, we went to my parents house for more presents and Christmas dinner. That's where Ellie received her favorite gift.

Ellie got a big red wagon. I don't know how she knew it was hers, but she squealed when she saw it and was totally tickled when she got to ride around in it. You can tell by looking at the picture that she loves it. I made my parents calendars on Shutterfly, which seemed to be a big hit.

In Ellie news, she has not eaten solid food since December 12. That's when she first got sick with her sore throat and then came down with the stomach flu. It kills me, because she was really liking solid food and now we're back to square one. I try every night to get her to eat oatmeal or veggies and nothing. She sits there with her lips pursed trying to keep every bit of it out of her mouth. She can actually cry with her mouth closed now (which is what she does when she gets tired of me trying to feed her). The doctor told me to keep trying and she'll eventually like it again. However, the good news is that she takes formula now. You know what this means? Good-bye boob and no more pumping! I'm so excited. I have a little guilt about it, but it's just getting too difficult. I'm still nursing her morning, noon and night so at least she's getting some of the good stuff. Her mid-morning, mid-afternoon, and evening feedings are formula. I think that making it 7 months and 2 weeks without buying any formula is pretty good!

So that's the end of our 2007 story. I wanted to end this post by reminiscing about what I'll remember most about 2007, but after the blur of pregnancy, the only thing I can think of is Ellie. Our family was so blessed this year with the her addition that I can't imagine that anything in 2008 could top it.

Bad Hair Day

Let me just warn everyone - this whole post is TMI.

Disgust. Awe. Shock. Grossness. Those might be a few words to describe the events that transpired this weekend. Ellie was better on Friday afternoon, but just as soon as she got over the sore throat, she came down with a whole new kind of sick. I knew that Ellie was having a little tummy trouble on Saturday because she threw up once and smelled like she'd been drinking Mexican tap water. But she slept through the night on Saturday night with no problems, so on Sunday morning, we packed it up and went to breakfast at one of our usual spots. This is where things went horribly wrong.

As we were sitting waiting for our food, Lee was holding Ellie and said ," I think she's pooping". I looked up and it was coming out the back up her diaper and had gone through to her top. Not a huge problem because I always have a backup outfit with me (ever since the Parkland experience). The bathroom was the one-person kind (thank God) and had a little changing table that folded out from the wall. As I took off her pants, I realized that I was not dealing with a regular bowel movement. This was diarrhea. I opened my package of wipes and saw that I had 6. I needed 25.

I got Ellie's "southern hemisphere" cleaned up and then sat her up to pull her "Bad Hair Day" onesie over her head. So much poop had come out the back of the diaper than when I pulled the shirt over her head, it smeared all over her back, into her armpits, and all over her hair. I have one wipe left. I have a naked shit-covered baby and a wipe the size of a kleenex. I think Ellie sensed that she really was having a bad hair day because she started screaming. At this point, I just froze. Literally, my brain could not process what to do. Do I open the door to the bathroom with screaming naked shit-covered baby and yell for help?

I told myself to settle down, took her over to the sink, and started giving her a bath. She didn't like that and started screaming more. I hate hearing her cry so I picked her up and tried to comfort her when I realized that she wasn't done going to the bathroom. Evidence of this was all over me. Oh God. I took her back over the the changing area, got a diaper on her and put her in the backup outfit which I've had in the bag for 4 months so it was a three-month size and wouldn't snap between Ellie's legs. But it had to do. I cleaned myself up and walked back to the table.

"How'd it go in there?", Lee asked. "Well, let's see. She has diarrhea, I have crap on me, I only had six wipes but I needed 80, and her backup outfit is way too small". "Wow. Sounds like we came a little unprepared". Remain calm. Seriously - how do you prepare for that? HOW? I needed a fire hose and a bucket of soap. But the fun didn't stop there. I was holding her waiting for my food and handed her off to Lee only to see that the back of her outfit had poop all over it again. AGAIN. Just as much as before it that's possible. Check please.

As the adage goes, "There's more where that came from." And there was - only this time it was from me. Around 6:30 P.M., I started to feel a little uneasy in my stomach and sure enough - I was having Ellie's problem. Around 7PM, I started to feel really, really, really bad and knew that I was going to have to throw up. So I went into the bathroom, got ready and the next thing I knew, I heard Lee screaming, "I'm calling 911!! Tiffany! Tiffany!". Good Lord. What the hell is going on? I then realized that I had passed out on our bathroom floor. Out cold. I'm pretty sure I just fainted, but if you ask Lee, he'll tell you that I "slipped into a coma". That is the worst stomach flu I've ever had in my life. Ever. I couldn't even stand up in the shower. And Lee gets husband of the year for his cleanup skills.

So that was our Sunday. Just a regular old Sunday. Needless to say, I've had my hands a little full. Ellie and I stayed home on Monday and I took her to the doctor again. In 5 days, she lost one pound so she's back down to 16 pounds. We're both doing a lot better and Ellie is keeping most everything down, but is still a little queasy. The doctor said it can take 3-5 days for a baby to fully recover from a stomach virus. Poor Lee. I'm surprised that he came home from work on Monday. I think he's still shell shocked from all of the bodily fluids that he saw on Sunday.

As for the rest of the weekend, we met our friends Cooper, Stephanie, and Danny on Friday night for dinner and went to the Calyx party on Saturday night (see picture of Lee and I below that could have been so wonderful if he hadn't been sticking his tongue in my ear). I can't remember what I did the rest of the weekend because I am so scarred by the events of Sunday. I can tell you what I didn't do though - finish Christmas shopping or wrap a single gift. So it seems that I will be at the mall with the millions of other shoppers this weekend.

I probably won't post again until after Christmas, I hope everyone is filled with the Spirit and has a wonderful holiday (and if you're visiting the Bright Spot for the first time because you just received a Christmas card with our web address, I swear not all of the posts are like this). Merry Christmas!

Ellie and Santa

I was so excited when I got home last night because Ellie's pictures with Santa came in the mail! Most Santas creep me out because they've got that big, fake, white beard, but this one looked really good. Apparently Ellie thought so too. And I got 75% of my Christmas cards addressed last night. Take that back - I slapped labels on 75% of my cards last night. For those of you out there still hand addressing Christmas cards... there is an easier way and it's called Avery Labels size 8160. Just search "Labels" in Microsoft Word and it'll show you how. I know it's sort of impersonal, but it saves me like 8 hours. Anyway, getting the cards out is huge because I was seriously starting to think that people weren't going to receive them until Valentine's Day. Now I just have to finish shopping and wrap everything. Uuuuggggghhhh....

Party, Party, Party

I'm finally able to blog again because I'm home from work today with a sick kiddo. Last night, Ellie didn't have much interest in eating and was uncharacteristically cranky so I took her temperature and it was 100.8. This morning it was 101.8 so we went to the doctor as early as possible. She has a sore throat. Apparently she has some virus that is going around so the doctor told me to give her Tylenol for the pain and pedialyte if she's not eating. She's been sleeping most of the day.

Poor thing probably got sick because she had quite a busy social schedule this weekend. So of course Ellie started of the weekend with a bang - literally - by falling forward onto the floor at daycare and bopping her head. When I picked her up, she had a big purple knot just above her left eye on her forehead. So I called her "bruiser" the whole weekend. It doesn't look that bad, but I think there will be more falls in the future for her since she's getting to that point where she's trying to crawl and pull up, but she's still very clumsy. She's really fine... I just wanted my baby to be bruise free when everyone saw her this weekend.

We finally got all of the Christmas decorations on Friday night. No longer a Christmas bush, our tree is lit and fully festive. And yes, it leans. I should have leaned when I took the picture to make it look like it was straight. But then I guess the ceiling would have looked crooked. Lee is not a big fan of Christmas tunes, but he humored me and turned on the Christmas XM station while we decorated. Ellie was right there with us. This conversation occurred while trimming the tree:

Lee: Smell my finger.

Me: No.

Lee: Seriously - smell my finger.

Me. No. I don't want to smell your finger.

Lee: Don't you trust me?

Me: thinking ... this must be another one of his Jedi mind tricks.

His finger smelled of lush evergreen. Apparently Mr. Smellmyfinger had come across some sap. Who knows what it'll smell like next time.

On Saturday, the whole family headed to the Meyerson to see "Deck the Hall", a children's Christmas concert. They had a local high school symphony play and then Joe McDermott sang. He had songs about riding on elevators and roller coasters and being a cowboy so all of the kids were jumping around and dancing. Ellie was a little young to do that, but she watched the activity on the stage the whole time. She also had her picture take with Santa and loved it. She sat on his lap and smiled a huge smile while they took the pictures. They're going to send it to us within 10 days so I'll scan it when I get it and post it.

That night, Lee and I went to a party hat one of his friends was having and then out for some sushi. Beth (B.B) took care of Ellie for us and I think that Ellie was pretty good. While we were at the party, one of the ladies we met gave us her daughter's babysitting business card (she's 14 and she has a business card) so I may call her in the future if I need someone for a few hours.

Katy had her annual ladies Christmas luncheon on Sunday so Ellie attended. Her sister's son, Jaydon, was there along with Leslie's daughter, Grace. Unknown to them, they provided exceptional entertainment by sitting together on the sofa while we took their pictures. That night, we had the last of our weekend parties with the play group of our church's mother's association. All very fun. I need to get on the ball this upcoming weekend and wrap some gifts... I can't believe that Christmas is only 12 days away. Next year my plan is to get everything bought and wrapped by Dec.1 so I can make December about family instead of stressing about gifts. We'll see how that works out...

She's in print too!

Ellie made my company newsletter. Top right. But I really didn't need to point her out to you because you could just look for the best looking baby and you'd easily find her. That one right in the middle is making me laugh because he looks like a linebacker.

I hope that we'll be able to finally trim the tree tonight. No - we have to trim the tree tonight because we have four parties this weekend. We got the tree on Tuesday night and it's just been sitting there in our living room like a sad little bush. I'm so behind... we still have the "fall" decorations outside. You wouldn't think it would be hard for me to switch out wreaths and throw up some garland, but for some reason, it is. Hopefully I'll have pictures of our lit and decorated tree in next week's post.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!

While dad is away...

Ellie and I had another weekend all to ourselves while Lee hunted. Two of his friends, Ronnie and Matt, flew in from Chattanooga to hunt and I felt really bad for Lee because the day before he left, he came down with a stomach virus that lasted the entire weekend. Things got so bad that his dad had to call in a prescription. But it sounds like everyone had fun and they delivered 44 pounds of deer meat for processing on Sunday at Kuby's. He's feeling better, but now I have a cold again.


So what did Ellie and I do this weekend? Whenever Lee is gone, I take advantage of our Netflix subscription to order a girl movie. So I rented High School Musical. That's right - High School Musical. Because apparently Katy and Leslie were unavailable to go to the mall, make mix tapes, highlight each others hair, and prank call Cory Lapinski until 2AM in the morning. I had to rent to to see what all of the fuss was about. And you know what? I loved it. It was so dorky that I loved it. Not crazy about Zac Efron because I think he's a little girly so I couldn't believe he was a basketball stud, but other than that it was great.



On Saturday, Ellie and I met my parents at Southlake Town Square to shop. I had never been there before and it's very pretty all lit up for the holidays. It's still sort of a whip to shop though because even though I have like 5 pounds to loose, that equates to about 2 inches in my waist because my muscles are all stretched out. So I feel like a big cow when I shop. Anyway, I am still now where I need to be on my Christmas shopping for anyone so I really need to step up my shopping game this weekend and next.

After Southlake, we headed back to their house for dinner. I love going to their house at Christmas because it's always perfectly decorated like it was when I was growing up. All of the same ornaments and everything. That was the life - when my mom and dad would do 95% of the decorations and then I could just hang the ornaments on the tree. Because that is the best part. Now it takes us the better part of the weekend and it's work. As you can see, they had some reindeer antlers for Ellie, which I found out later were actually made for dogs, but who knows the difference.



Ellie and I made it to church on Sunday and she's getting to be quite a handful. You can't leave her in her carrier anymore, but she can't just sit there in the pew, so you have to hold her the whole time. Luckily, we had a luncheon to attend afterwards so everyone wanted to hold her there. It was tough not having my hubby around to hand her off to! As you can see, Ellie was all dressed up in a green velvet dress with plaid bow and silver bracelet. That's my fancy little girl. The dress has quite a few layers under it so she was not amused when I first put her in it. The good news is that I got our Christmas card photo made and ordered it on Sunday night. This means that everyone will get their cards before Christmas. I was debating if it should be just Ellie or all three of us. But then I figured that everyone knows what we look like and would probably rather see Ellie.

We got our tree tonight and we'll be decorating so we'll be decorating this week. I can't wait for Ellie to see it all lit up. She was interested in the decorations at the luncheon and grabbing all of the trees in the lot tonight so I'll have to keep an eye on her. In other Ellie news, she started peas this weekend and likes them quite a bit. We're starting to add sweet potatoes too. And she's rolling all over the place front to back. Last week, one of the ladies at day care said, "She's always so joyful". And I think that's the best way to describe her. Joyful.

Thanksgiving 2007

What a great Thanksgiving weekend! We got to spend time with family, watch a lot of football, and relax. It was a good time to do it since the Arctic Circle moved through the Metroplex on Wednesday afternoon. Burrr! We spent Thanksgiving Day at the Bright's house in Dallas. It's so nice that my parents are close enough so that both of our families can celebrate together. The Brights, the Rogers, and David and Lissa were all there for the feast. We had the traditional Greenburg turkey with all of the trimmings and watched the Cowboys go 10-1. While I was watching the game, I noticed it was snowing at the game and all of the sudden I realized that the Cowboys were playing a home game. I looked outside and sure enough, it was snowing. Not much, but a little. Ellie was so good all day. Even with her routine totally disrupted, she didn't cry of even get fussy once.

On Friday, Mike came over to watch his alma matter, Arkansas, beat #1 LSU and also to watch my Aggies beat Texas for the second year in a row. It got pretty rowdy at the Bright residence - partly because of all of the outstanding football and partly because a couple of wine bottles were opened. Then on Friday, Lee watched the Vols beat Kentucky in triple overtime and HP won their playoff game and my high school won their playoff game to go to the state finals. So we were very happy football fans this weekend.

I said I wasn't going go go shopping, but I wound up hitting Grapevine Mills with Beth on Saturday afternoon along with the rest of Dallas. Ellie already has two Christmas outfits, but Beth found two more party dresses that Ellie had to have. So now Ellie has four Christmas dresses. I'm going to have to find more parties to take her to so she can wear them all. We have our first party this weekend... now I just need to find something to wear! After the big shopping day, my parents baby sat so Lee and I could meet Elizabeth and Ned for dinner and watch No Country for Old Men. If you're looking for an uplifting magical holiday movie, this was pretty much the opposite of that. Lots of blood, but it was good. Javier Bardem wins the award for creepiest creepy guy.

Ellie has come a long way since last week when she adamantly opposed to the introduction of rice cereal. I fed her tonight and she actually opened her mouth every time she saw the spoon coming. I'd say she ate about 1/3 cup of cereal. I'm going to stick with the rice cereal for a few more days and then try out the peas I bought this weekend. I think all of these solid foods have done a number on her stomach because she's a little backed up right now. On the bright side, she didn't blow through an outfit at day care today. I won't go so far as to say that Ellie has said her first word, but she's started saying "ma-ma". Right now I think it's just babble but it's a start. And she so squirmy now. I really have to be careful because she jerks around to look at what a noise was or to grab something on her changing table. She's gotten very active and my prediction is that she'll be crawling by Christmas. Guess we need to start baby proofing!

Getting into the Spirit

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I'm still working on my latest blog from the long weekend. If you're a fan of Christmas music and you're stuck at a computer all day (like me), you may like the following site:

Mix 102.9 Christmas Music

It's free streaming Christmas music and they're playing some pretty good songs with no interruptions. Enjoy!

Rice Cereal and the 6 month checkup

If Ellie's first experience with rice cereal could best be expressed by one picture, it would be this:

She almost looks ticked off. As you can see, she's not a big fan of eating solid foods. We had quite the production on Saturday night. Lee was videotaping her first bites and simultaneously taking pictures while I tried to get Ellie to open her mouth so I could shove in a bite of cereal. She didn't eat that much and wound up throwing up at 4am. The next night she ate a little more, but woke up every hour. On Monday night, I switched to an organic rice cereal and she only woke up once so maybe she didn't like the Gerber. Tonight she ate the most that she's eaten so far, so we'll see what happens. She's started to figure out that after I put the food in her mouth, if she makes a raspberry sound, it'll fly out of her mouth and all over me. I can't wait until we start the green foods.

We went to the doctor today for her six month shots and Ellie received another good report card. Her growth is starting to slow a little, which is fine because for a while she was consistently in the 95th percentile for height and I thought she was going to wind up a WNBA player. Tall is good, but really tall makes you taller than all of the boys in eighth grade and nobody wants to ask you to dance because you make all of the guys feel like midgets so you're stuck dancing with that semi-tall guy from math class who who draws mythical creatures in the margins his paper all period. Not that that's ever happened to me. I'm just saying it could and I don't want it to happen to Ellie. Now Ellie is 15 pounds and 11 ounces (50th percentile) and 26.5 inches (75th percentile). She got all of the normal shots plus her flu shot. She's getting so much better when they give her the shots now. She only cried for about 10 seconds and then stopped. I only cried for about 3 seconds.

As for the rest of the weekend, my office had our annual Thanksgiving party on Friday so all of my co-workers got to see Ellie. I don't think they'd seen her since late August, so she had changed quite a bit. We went to another Highland Park game on Friday night. It was a little chilly so we had Ellie all bundled up. HP won against Frisco so they play again this weekend in Tyler. I think it must be the regional championship? We haven't decided it we'll go to that one. On Saturday, Ellie made our usual run to Target, watched the Vols almost loose to Vandy, and then hit a wine bar. Because that's how she rolls. On Sunday it was church, mall and then Cowboys game. I also finally got Ellie's closet in order.

I am SO excited that I have a four day weekend this weekend. We really don't have anything planned, but I can tell you right now, I'm not going to be at the mall. When we were there this past weekend, it wasn't that bad, but if I can do it and if I need to, I'm going to try to hit the mall after work instead of on the weekends. Christmas shopping is such a whip. I've already ordered some stuff on-line... maybe I'll get the rest there too. After all - free shipping. Who knows what the rest of the weekend holds, but I'm guessing I'll eat way too much on Thanksgiving. Last year was nice because I had my maternity pants on so there was a lot of give. Speaking of elastic waist bands... I had been slacking off on the Weight Watchers so I went back tonight. I thought I'd gained, but I had lost and I'm actually only 6 pounds away from my "WW" goal and nine pounds from my overall goal. I don't think I'm going to get there by Christmas, but I think I can get there by mid-February. I'm bringing the heat in the new year. Hope everyone has a great Turkey Day. Gobble till you wobble!

Happy six month birthday, Ellie!

Our little Ellie Belly is six months today! I can't believe it. Here she is today at daycare. It's been cold lately so I sent her to daycare in long pants and a long shirt. As you can see, she wasn't wearing that when I went to visit at lunch. She blew through that so they put her in a long-sleeved one piece outfit. But she's not wearing that either. She's in the backup backup outfit. Some days I don't even know why I put a diaper on her.

Holy Crap

This is getting ridiculous. People in my neighborhood have Christmas light up now. And it's not just that they're up... they're on. I am officially boycotting Christmas until the day after Thanksgiving. No more talk of it until then.

I had my first out-of-town trip today. I went to Tulsa and it went really well. I had to take my pump with me and to my surprise, the liquids ban is not in effect for nursing mothers. They didn't look at my pump or any of the liquids I had with me. I thought that was strange, but that's fine. I was a little nervous about leaving Ellie for the first time (even though it was a day trip), so to let me know she was okay with the whole situation, she threw up first thing in the morning. Of course. Because why wouldn't she vomit on the first day I have to go out of town? She went to daycare anyway and she was fine. Lee was such a help by taking her and picking her up. I pulled a Foldger's commercial on her today and secretly switched half of her breast milk with half formula and she would have none of it. Refused to eat. Great - now I have a breast milk junkie on my hands. Ellie - I'm giving you fair warning. this bar isn't staying open forever.

More on the title of this post at the end of the blog... in short, we had an Eileen-style "Code Brown" situation on Sunday night. But first - the weekend recap. We had quite a busy schedule. Lee took Ellie and me to our first Highland Park football game on Friday night. It was the last game of the season and the Scots kept their undefeated record intact by defeating West Mesquite and winning the district title. Ellie went to bed about an hour later than normal, but she was so great the entire game. So great, I thought the grandparents sitting in front of us were going to sneak out of the game with her. She loved watching the band, the drill team, and all of the people.

On Saturday morning, Ellie and I met some co-workers to help clean up the White Rock Lake shoreline and then we met up with a mother's group from our church and my friend Stephanie for a play date. Ellie was the youngest one there so she didn't really interact that much with the other children, but she had fun playing with all of their toys. It was really nice to meet some other mothers with similarly aged children.

When I got home, our friend Mike was there to watch the Tennessee-Arkansas game with Lee. After it ended, he and Lee went to the SMU game. I can't believe they've gone the whole season without winning one game. While they did that, I went to the mall to look for a Christmas outfit for Ellie because she had her Christmas portrait made on Sunday. It took me four hours to find something. Because according to many of the shop workers, you have to come in October to get the really good outfits. On Sunday, we went to the Christmas bazaar at my parent's church and took Ellie for her portrait.

After the long weekend, Ellie was really tired by bedtime on Sunday. We have started putting her in the high chair while we eat because she seems pretty happy there and neither of us has to try and eat while holding a baby. She started getting pretty fussy at 8:10, so I got her out of the high chair to get her ready for bed. I was carrying her with her butt in the crook of my left arm when all at one time, I heard something hitting the hardwood floor and realized there was something all over my arm. I looked down and my beautiful, sweet child had crapped all over herself and there was a line of poop from my armpit to my knee and down onto the floor. Let's just say if she was Chinese, her name would be Who Flung Poo. I stood there holding her out in disgust and shock and Lee ran over to help. He wiped up the floor and then started wiping me off, which pushed the poo deeper into my clothing. So. Freaking. Gross. She peed on Lee as he was getting her ready for her bath on Saturday night so I guess she thought it was my turn.

Ellie is turning six months on Friday (can you believe it?!) and we're going to try the rice cereal with her this weekend. I am sure next time you check, we will have some great picture of her "eating" her cereal for the first time. Let the solid food fun begin.

Happy Birthday, Aunt Elizabeth!

Halloween has come and gone and now it’s Christmastime? When did the holiday commercials start the day after Halloween? Poor Thanksgiving. It’s like everyone forgot about it. Sadly, all of this Christmas marketing is working on me because I’m already buying… or at least thinking about what I want to buy. I'm glad it’s starting to feel a little bit more like the season since a cold front blew through last night.

Ellie had a great first Halloween. She wasn’t scared of any of the costumes at all. Since it was so nice outside, Lee and I parked two chairs in the front yard, had a glass of wine, and passed out candy. One little boy about four years old came up and stared at Ellie for a minute and then said, “Can I touch it?”. I told him sure and he poked her jack-o-lantern on the front of her outfit. Maybe he thought she was part of our decorations? It was funny to watch the boys and girls trick-or-treating because they’re so different. Boys run up, grab as much candy as they can and then run off while girls will examine the candy bowl, make a decision, take one piece, and say thank you. We ran out of candy around 8:30 – about the same time the non-neighborhood kids started making the rounds so we called it a night and turned off the light.

Aunt Elizabeth turned 25 on Friday so Beth and Tee hosted a little get together for her at the Corner Bar. A lot of family friends who had never met Ellie were going to be there so we took her. That’s right – we took Ellie to a bar. And Lee wore her. It wasn’t smoky or anything because we had a private room and it was early so I really don’t think Ellie minded. For the record, everyone wants to talk to you if you’re wearing a baby so I think Lee was kicking himself all night for not wearing one to bars when he was in college. Maybe he’ll start wearing her to poker.

On Saturday, Mom, Ellie, and I went to the Chi-O Christmas Market for the first time. This is the Christmas market to end all Christmas markets. It’s so huge that they have it at the Dallas Convention Center. I think we wound up spending about 5 hours walking around and looking at everything we didn’t need. Mom actually did get some Christmas gifts and bought Ellie a little outfit. I bought an ornament with our names and the date on it and some other items. I am a sucker for those packaged soup mixes that you have to add water and a few other ingredients - so easy for weeknights. I think we’re going to have one I bought this week. Afterwards, Lee, Ellie and I met Beth at Patrizio’s for an early dinner and then went home to watch A&M loose. All I can do is hold onto memories of our glory days when I was still in school there. In seven years (keep in mind I stayed for grad school), I never missed a home game, but now I think I’d just stay home if I went there. Sad.

Lee had his last soccer game of the season on Sunday. That’s where my allergy problems all started and by that night, my sneezing was out of control. But now I don’t know if it’s allergy problems because I feel like it’s a head cold. I need to spend a week in a bubble and get well.


Ellie has a new toy. Actually, she got it a few weeks after she was born, but she's just now getting to the point where she can use it. Lee assembled it for her tonight and she seemed to enjoy it. I think it's like the jumperoo - she has to get used to it. It makes all sorts of different sounds and plays music. The top of it has the entire alphabet on it and when you push a letter, it says that letter so you can spell things. If you're my husband, that means you spell dirty words with it. When you're a guy, that's funny no matter if you're 7 or 37.

Sugar Plum tuckered out

I really need to remember my camera every day. When I went at lunch, she was back in her pile of toys and as you can see she was totally asleep. What a rough life Miss Bright leads. The words on her t-shirt say it all - "Sugar Plum".

Mine all mine!

It's another day of fun and laughs for Ellie! I like to take a picture on my camera phone while I'm there at lunch and send it to her daddy and grandmothers. She's sitting in the middle of a padded toy box and as you can see, she's really happy to have those toys all to herself. She should be fairly used to that by now. Are you starting to notice a trend with the past few pictures? I think this kiddo knows when a camera is on her. Little ham.

I am on hour 25 of an allergy attack. I have sneezed more in the past day than I have in the past 5 years. Not kidding. Hopefully more blogging tonight...

She's at it again

Here's a shot from daycare. It's off my camera phone so it's not very clear, but you get the point.

And after lunch:

Ellie had a fun first Halloween. More pictures to come.

Ellie's first Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Seriously - how cute is my kid? She could not be any cuter. She's a Bee! She's our little Ellie Bee. Look at those feet - they crack me up. I had some greeting cards made for Halloween with the above picture and sent them out to family. Hope everyone got it! Have a safe and Happy Halloween, everyone! More picture soon of Ellie's first time to hand out candy.

Pig for Pigg

WARNING: The following post contains graphic images that may offend vegetarians.

Yes, that is what it looks like. Meg Pigg next to an enormous barbecued pig. I tried to get her to bite the apple for this picture, but she declined. Meg and Ruben are getting married in two weekends so we threw a little shin dig at Bonnie's house for them to celebrate. I'm not sure the exact number of people that attended but I'd bet it was between 50-60. Good times. A lot of people came in town for it including the Piggs from Lubbock (had to give you guys a shout out on the blog). Ellie couldn't attend the party because it ran late so my parents babysat again. I keep wondering when they're going to make me start paying them.

Having everyone back together makes me miss all of my old college buddies, so I'm planning a "family reunion" trip for this summer. I think we're going to try to rent a beach house or lake house someplace in Texas. I cannot wait until all of our little kiddos are running around together. Since everyone wants to go, it looks like we're going to have to find 3 houses next to each other to rent. Either that or one big one that has ten bedrooms.

Ellie has a new way that she likes to sleep:

How strange is that? She sort of looks like a hostage. I went to her daycare at lunch last week and she had her lovey over her face like this. Tanisha, her teacher, said that they routinely pull it off her face when she's sleeping, but when they go back to check on her, it's right back over her head. Maybe I should get her a tiny little eye mask to wear at daycare? My girl needs her beauty rest.

And here she is sitting up like a big girl. It was the strangest thing... last Saturday, she wasn't sitting up and then on Sunday, she could suddenly sit up like she'd been doing it for months. When I took her into day care on Monday morning, I said, "Look what Ellie learned to do" as I place her on the ground. She sat there looking around and Tinisha said, "She can sit? She learned that this weekend?" Apparently so. I wonder what other tricks she's got up her sleeve that she hasn't let me know about yet. She can also roll her tongue now. So when I'm driving around, it sounds like I have a baby Chewbacca in my backseat.

I was trying to get this post out last night, but my night owl wanted to stay up until midnight. I was going to let her cry it out, but Lee had a felony one trial that started this morning so the timing wasn't great. She's usually pretty good about going to sleep, but I can't figure out what it is lately. She's starting to wake up in the middle of the night or at 5:00. She may be teething or hungry. I guess the only way to fine out if she's teething is to wait and see if she gets teeth soon!

Girls' Weekend

I haven't been really great with the picture taking lately. This is a picture from the arboretum last weekend. Poor Ellie (and poor me too). I feel like we'll never be well again. She's been fighting a cold and when she got home on Wednesday night, she was not in a great mood so I took her temperature and it was 100.2. I called the pediatrician and the nurse told met that they don't consider a child as having a fever until the temperature reaches 100.4. After a sleepless night, I took her temp on Thursday morning and it was 101.5. I knew she felt really bad because she usually eats and then wants to play, but all she wanted to do was eat and then go back to bed. So I packed her up and headed to the doctor's office. Luckily, I was able to get in with her regular pediatrician. He checked her out and did an x-ray of her chest to confirm she wasn't getting anything really nasty. And let me tell you how excited she was to be stripped down for that. I had to told her arms over her head so she couldn't move while they took the x-ray. She just looked at me and screamed - not even crying - just screaming. She was so mad.

She pretty much slept the rest of the morning and when she finally woke up in the afternoon, she was ready to play. I stayed home with her and we had fun visiting my stylist in the afternoon for a cut and color and then we took a walk because it's finally starting to feel like fall. They weighed her during the check up, and with all of her clothes and diaper on, she's 15 pounds 4 ounces. I'm guessing she'll be about 16.5 when she goes for her 6 month checkup. I also spoke with the doctor yesterday about the possibility of adding rice cereal to her diet. After talking to him (one other doctor, a nurse, a lactation consultant, 10 other mothers, and researching what the American Academy of Pediatrics says), I decided to hold off on letting Ellie try her first bite of cereal until 6 months. She's happy and she's not starving, so why rush it?

By Friday, she was a lot better. Lee went out of town to the dove hunt with his father and a large group at the Herradura Ranch. It's owned by Josh Beckett, Red Sox pitcher, and run by his father. This place sounds pretty posh - it came complete with a swimming pool and fine dining - so I don't think either of them were roughing it. My dad was out of town at a singing competition so it was a girls' weekend all the way around. On Saturday morning, Ellie and I went for a long walk and then visited my friend, Jill, the Kappa house mom at SMU. When I think of house moms, I usually think of our Zeta house mom, Poopsie, who was 101 years old. But Jill is not your typical house mom. She's an aerobics instructor and she keeps the Kappa kitchen stocked with candy and homemade bread. The Kappas just built a new house and - wow - I'm willing to bet that this is the nicest sorority house in the nation. From the art room overlooking downtown to the conference room with high speed internet hookups to the sun deck with lounge chairs... I may go back to school so I can be in a sorority again!

That night, Ellie stayed with my mom while I headed out with Bonnie, Kristine, and Chelsea for Meg's bachlorette party. We started off with wine and opening some gifties for Meg at Bonnie's beautiful new house and then dinner at Cantina Laredo. I know times have definitely changed when I'm the designated driver and we're headed out for a big night in my station wagon while Kristine holds my car seat base in her lap. Ohmygod. Did I really just write that sentence? We had a really great time and I can't wait for the big wedding shower this weekend!

On Sunday, Ellie, mom and I went to church and then I went to get a flu shot. This is where it all went wrong for me. I felt like I had been coming down with a cold and you're not supposed to get a flu shot when you're sick. When they asked me if I thought I was sick, I said no because I really don't have a lot of free time to be running back and forth to the grocery store pharmacy to get a shot. Word to the wise - do not get a flu shot if you're sick because it does make you sicker. Then Ellie decided that sleep was not something necessary on Sunday night so on Monday, I was a total disaster. All I want to do is curl up in bed and sleep, but life goes on.

Ellie has a new trick she's going to show everyone next blog... she can sit up now!! And it's not the halfway sit up where she has to use her arms for support. She's all the way up and she's so excited she can do it. I don't think she's close to crawling though. I feel like she's closer to walking than she is crawling, but we'll see. She can also put her paci back in her mouth now. Praise Jesus. Sometimes it takes her five minutes, but she works on it until she succeeds. That's my girl!

Little Pumpkin

First of all, we are SO EXCITED for the Erwins because they found out they are expecting a GIRL in February!! I have been sending girl vibes to Knoxville since I found out Nicole was pregnant, so it must have worked. Now Ellie has someone to go to Camp Marymount with. If Ellie goes, she will be the third generation Marymounter. My mom went one summer and never went back (Mom loves not camping), and I went for four summers with Nicole. But who knows - Ellie will probably want to go someplace in Texas with her school friends. When we die, Lee and I want to be cremated and Lee says he wants his ashes scattered on the 50 yard line of Neyland Stadium. I have no clue where I'd like to be scattered so I usually default to saying just dump me in the lake at Marymount. I'm afraid that if they did that, I'd become one of the scary stories they tell the campers like "Enoch and Erma" or "Cheryl". According to camp legend, Cheryl was the crazy girl who used work in the kitchen and started digging up dead bodies to use for meat in the spaghetti sauce. She now lives in the cave by the spring. If they dumped my ashes in the lake, they'd probably tell the campers if you chant my name three times and look in the lake at midnight, you can still see my face. And nobody wants to be remembered by a story like that.

I'm going to have to squeeze two weekends into one blog. We had a fantastic football weekend last weekend because all four of the football teams we were rooting for won: Texas A&M, Tennessee, the Cowboys, and the team playing Texas. This weekend we went 1-3 because only Tennessee won. I felt really old for the first time last weekend. It was the annual Texas-OU game at the Cotton Bowl. We've never gone to the game, but every year the Friday night before the game, we go to a party hosted by a club that Lee belongs to. When I got the invitation this year, I was shocked to see that the party that the party started at 9pm. Are you kidding me? I'm usually on my way to the Land of Nod by that time. Then I remembered that it's been at 9pm every year we've gone and I realized I just can't hang anymore. So sad.

During all of the football madness, Lee decided that Ellie needed a Jack in the Box so he went to pick her up one at a local toy store. While he was there, he thought that she needed a two-foot tall Cookie Monster too. He was so excited about giving her Cookie Monster, but when he pulled it out of the sack, this was the scene that unfolded:

If you can't tell, Ellie is not a Cookie Monster fan. Every time we showed it to her, she started crying. We took it back the next day and got her a much smaller Elmo doll. She loves it. I think I'm going to have to find a Tickle Me Elmo for Christmas.

On Friday night, Lee and I went to the Dallas Stars game. We got to view the game from a suite because one of the labs we use at work invited me. Job perk. My mom spent the night that night to take care of Ellie. The next day, Ellie, mom and I went to a market the mother's association was putting on at our church. Both of us proceeded to buy way too much stuff. Mostly for Ellie, of course.

On Sunday, we did what every parent with a small child does at Halloween - dressed her up and took her to a pumpkin patch. After church, we went to the Dallas Arboretum for a photo op. Right in the middle of church, I realized we didn't have Ellie's stroller because we had taken Lee's car instead of mine. We had Ellie's Bumbo so we could sit her up for pictures, so we rented a wagon and put the Bumbo in it so she could look around. She loved it. We took her Halloween costume so she could take pictures in it, but I'm not going to put those up on the blog yet. I have to keep some things under wraps. Check back on October 31 for her costume debut!

Now that Ellie is well from the stomach flu, I think she's getting sick again with chest congestion. I can hear her in bed coughing now. It's the same thing I'm just now getting over. Uuuggghhh. Poor kiddo. I get everything she gets at daycare and she gets everything I get.

Last but not least - Happy Anniversary to my parents. Thirty-five big ones today!