Caught blue-handed!

Just chatting

One of Elianna's favorite routines is her daily chat with Daddy. Whenever she's feeling down or really excited about something, she asks, "Can I call Daddy?!?!" There's just something about Daddy's phone calls that always makes everything right.

Baby (birdies) Pictures

Here are some pictures of our guests/baby guests, living comfortably in the "guesthouse" built at the top of Elianna's slide. Elianna treats them like her own children, and hasn't even complained about not being able to use her slide! Her final choices on names? Gillian, Jonathan, Yvette and Cyndi.



Here they are the day the last two hatched




Here they are today. The one thought I was bringing food and opened his little beak! Too cute...

I just realized!!!!

I forgot to blog our Easter pictures!!!! Wow - I guess I'm more behind than I thought. I'll get right on that...

Resurrection Sunday

I know I'm biased, but I thought they looked just too adorable in their dresses! This was also Selah's first time wearing piggy-tails. Elianna begged to wear her bumblebee boots and coat. I compromised with her and let her wear the jacket. Later, I realized that it would have made for cute pics if I had let her wear the boots, too! All Selah cared about was making sure she had her sippy cup and could still ride her bike in the nursery. (How she managed that through all those yards of netting, I'll never know.)

Easter Eggs

We do the whole "basket, egg and bunny" thing on Saturday, and reserve Sunday for the celebration of Christ's Resurrection. So here we are enjoying the more pagan side of things. (hee, hee, sometimes the Baptist in me sneaks out.)

Coloring eggs

(Yes, I waited until Selah was napping. So there goes yet another Mommy of the Year Award.)

Mixing the vinegar

Add the color tablets and voila - bright colors!

Getting artsy

I also got a kit for speckling the eggs, which basiclly involved a little plastic pump/syringe that sneezed paint onto the egg... and all over the kitchen.

Elianna got bored with the pumps and wanted to paint. Then, she ran out of eggs and needed some paper! We had paint everywhere, but it was a lot of fun.

Finished Product (Can you tell which ones are Daddy's?)

Easter Egg Hunt

Getting excited to go hunt for eggs!

Okay, somehow I didn't actually take pictures of them searching for the eggs, but here they are with all the eggs they found! Then they opened them to see which ones had chocolate covered marshamallow bunnies in them. (And that's ALL the candy they got!!! I know, I know, mean ole mommy. My kids are going to be so warped.)

Easter Baskets

They each got a basket with a new pair of shoes, an umbrella and Elianna got some make-up (glitter powder and lip gloss). She has been ALL about make-up lately, so this was a real treat for her.

Elianna's First Haircut

While we were in Alabama, on April 1st G-ma took me and Elianna to the salon for our "birthday" gifts. (Yes, my birthday is in January, but it's more fun to stretch it out!) I had my hair highlighted and Elianna got the cutest "Dora" haircut. Elianna got bored and testy by the end of my procedure, but she was an angel for her haircut. Overall, we had a great time, and headed to an old-fashioned drug store for malted shakes and ice cream afterwards.

Here's the "Before" picture.






Selah hanging out and being sweet - like always!

We forgot to take an "after" picture of me - oops.

Ice Cream Recipe

I added the recipe and pics to the Cinco de Mayo post. (Which most of you probably missed because it posted out of order for some reason...)

New Additions!

The robin eggs are hatching today! I am trying to give them their space, so I don't have any pictures. As soon as I see the mother leave for a bit, though, I'll sneak out and snap a few. This has been great for Elianna. She is so excited about the eggs hatching! She is already naming the babies. So far we have "Gillian." (I hope they're not males, or we're giving them a gender identity crisis. She doesn't like any boy names.)

*Update* Okay, so far only one has hatched, and I managed to get one picture. (I'll upload it when I find my camera.) Also, Elianna has decided to change the names to "Gillian" and "Jonathan" for now. Phew - that saves them from the whole gender confusion issue.

Here's Baby "Gillian"

Here's the mommy giving me the evil eye

I tried to get some pictures of the play structure so you can see where the nest is. Not the ideal location, in MY opinion.

Big Girl Bed!

Yes, Elianna is finally in a big girl bed! We tried just before her third birthday, and she had a conniption. I thought I'd just wait until she was ready, but I soon realized that she would be happy to sleep in her crib until she was ten years old. So, a couple weeks ago, we decided it was time. Daddy has officially changed her crib into a lovely day bed. The only negative side effect thus far has been the appearance of a little munchkin in our bed every morning. This outweighs the inconvenience of trudging down the stairs to lift her out when she has to go potty, though.