Early morning

Listening to iTunes before reveille this morning. Some things change, some stay the same!

Improvised bath tub

She's going to be too big for this pretty soon. Water got all over the cabin as soon as she remembered how to splash!

More camp life

More pictures from our yogurt snack. We have a cute little two-room (kind of) cabin and are almost moved in. Mike's busy training the counselors, and campers will start coming in on Sunday. Tomorrow the senior citizens come for the day, so it'll be fun to have them around. The weather has been beautiful!

Camp Life

Here's the view from the front porch of our cabin, where Ella and I picnicked yesterday and I got my first bites of the season (she seemed fine).

Sippy time

Ella took to a sippy cup with no problem. She's also taken to every food imaginable. Yesterday she had some of my pasta with Gorgonzola... the other day, chickpeas... she loves cherries too. It's great fun seeing her go after food! We're leaving on Saturday and will be stuck with camp food all summer so we'll see who suffers more, Ella or myself!

Hats, hats and more hats. We spent a lot of time outside this weekend, with and without Ella. Canoed down the creek that runs through Minneapolis, which was beautiful. Luckily we didn't take her, since both canoes ended up dumping at one point! The creek was running high and fast after a cold spring and a lot of rain.
After that we had a tornado warning and Mike saw some incredible hail in the west Metro, almost losing the canoes off the top of the Jeep!

Ella hangs out in the backyard very happily, watching me attack weeds or hang her diapers. She definitely knows to smile at the camera by now (she sees enough of it!) We've noticed that she's a lefty, like her Daddy. Other highlights... yesterday we put her in the crib for a nap on her back and returned to see she had flipped over on her stomach and had a foot stuck through the crib bars. She's getting stronger!

The Bald and the Beautiful

I love my bald baby!
Here's Ella showing off how well she eats finger food, sits up, and reads.
She can turn the page on command! It's so cool to realize that she understands what we're saying now.
We have just two weeks till we go to Michigan, and then we can all slow down a bit and enjoy camp.

New hats

Mike took Ella to Orange City for the Tulip Festival for the day yesterday, so I stuck this little Dutch baby hat on her. Now I'm in love with these hats and found another at a garage sale. Looked all day for a Burley bike trailer, but I think you have to get up pretty early in the morning to snag one of those. Besides, we still have to wait till she's a year old. Might not quite make it that long.... we miss biking together! Here's some pictures of her in the hat and in Orange City sporting her sunglasses for the first time.

The Falls

What a busy day. For my first Mother's Day, we had Paul and Chandra over for brunch. Ella played with Paul Eli, and we took a walk while the babies slept in the stroller. Tonight Brian and Kim came by for a BBQ and we took pictures at the Minnehaha Falls, finally completing the series of pre- and post-baby pics I have in a frame. She's having trouble sleeping tonight after all the catnaps!

Graduation!

We had a busy weekend with my parents in town. I offically graduated, got the doctoral hood, the whole spiel. A full-time job would be a great ending to this story but it's still being written, I suppose. Meanwhile we got lots of good family time and visited some interesting places together--the Weisman art museum, the construction of the new 35W bridge, etc.

Mummu visits

An impromptu BBQ with the family. It's finally spring!

Hanging out

Cabbage Patch Comeback

Ella's starting to like her stuffed animals a lot more--even my old Cabbage Patch Kid.

Sitting up

Wow, what a difference a couple of weeks makes. She went from wobbly to completely sitting up seemingly overnight. Now the world has a whole new perspective. We're still working on hair and teeth but otherwise this girl is growing fast. It's been great being able to get her outside (and to take a 15 mile bike ride myself, after a long year off). Naturally, it's supposed to SNOW on my birthday. Oh well, that's Minnesota for you.

Spring!

And we've been busy! Ella's eating real food now. Here are her first bites--butternut squash, which is still her favorite. We've added oatmeal, sweet potatoes, carrots, pears, even a sip of apple juice on the plane to Chicago. She couldn't stop smacking her lips after that one.

Going home

Ella was a champ on the flights, especially on the way home. She got lots of compliments from fellow passengers. Phew!

Dancing in the Kitchen

My parents... staying young...

Me and My Dad

Flying with Papa

The combination of quality family and friend time and incredible skiing made for a very fun week.

New friends

It takes a village to raise this baby, and we're happy to share her with good friends! Todd and Alicia joined us at my parents' house in Montana for an awesome spring break.

Max and Jake!

Having a good time swimming.

Mumu

Warming up with Mumu after her swim

First swim

Ella loved her first swim-- she kicked like a little frog!

All Quiet Again

A couple days of catching up and then we're off to Montana!
Here's Ella and her boyfriend Paul, both crying during tummy time. She had her 6-month appointment today and it's confirmed--she's a little shrimp! However, nobody seems too concerned so we'll just keep on keeping on!

All dressed up

Don and Ella!

While Laura and I made dinner, Mike played 3 hours of Monopoly upstairs with the boys and Don and Ella chilled on the couch. She was very content with him!

Aunt Laura and Ella!

Aunt Laura has been awesome, holding and cuddling Ella as well as helping me cook for all our guests. We've had manicotti, pork roast, potatoes, apple pancakes, whoopie pies--it's been an eating fest here! We also went ice skating, did Star Wars trivia, watched the Ten Commandments, and they're going mini-golfing and swimming today. Uncle Don has shoveled snow for us and gone on grocery runs. It's been pretty fun!

Jake and Ella

Jake, 6 years old, is very popular with Ella. She loves to grab his face and fingers and just stare at him! The boys are so good about holding her and talking to her. She loves all the attention!

Max and Ella!

Cousin Max, 11 years old, is a pro at baby-holding. The family is in town for their "Spring Break". Haha, spring break--and it snowed for the last three days. Go figure, it hasn't snowed here in months!

Visitor #1!

Linda Ludwig is here in Minneapolis, taking a solo road trip to shop and hang out. We went to Town Talk Diner, our favorite neighborhood spot where they actually know who we are, and ate cheese curds, milkshakes and french fries while Ella slept in her seat. What a good baby. Tomorrow Laura and family are coming to visit so we're going to be Grand Central Station for a while here!

More sleep

But she's starting to have problems falling asleep at night. Maybe it's too light in the evenings now. We'll have to look into better shades in her room! Today it was warm enough for a walk outside. We're getting ready for a big weekend of friends and family visiting (and hopefully some free babysitting so we can go see our first movie in... forever!)

More hats

Love this picture!

Uncle Craig!

We had a big day yesterday. Uncle Craig came down to visit. We bragged to him about how Ella is done spitting up... she proceeded to yak for the next 30 minutes. Guess she's still spitting up. Later one of Mike's students came over to visit, and we went out with Brian and Kim to a pub (it was packed!) and Nye's Polonaise Room, the kookiest bar in Minneapolis. Even though we were back home by 10 it was great to get out!

Mmmm...toes...

Ella's getting a little more mobile in spite of plateauing at about 14 lbs for 2 months! She waves her hands around and bonks herself in the head frequently, but takes it all in stride.

Riding high

Up on Daddy's shoulders--yes, I know I cut her head off but they were dancing. She loves watching us be silly and got a real kick out of watching me do a workout video this morning. I would laugh at me too!

Story time

Eating books is the first step towards reading them... right?

And the secret to our success is...

Sleeping baby=happy mommy=happy family!

Pretty happy!

We've been extremely lucky to have such a happy kid. I'd love to know what goes through her mind when she's in her crib singing to herself in the mornings. We'll probably start solids in the next week or so and see how that goes, but to be honest, I don't want to change anything since she seems so content the way life is now!