Look!

Luke is sitting up on his own! He still make us a bit nervous, but it's pretty crazy how he seems to have just decided he could do it, and now he's doing it. There's definitely still some teetering and a few spills backward or sideways, but we are excited for our guy.

Luke Pics - 7 months!

Christmas 2010

This year's Christmas is in the books. We were home this year, with Gabe, Nancy & Jameson visiting. We spent Christmas Eve cooking, eating, opening gifts, going to church and hanging out. Then we headed to Zac & Kristen's - they were brave, and nice enough to host our huge group. It was the whole Storment clan, and the Conklin family too. Tons of great food and fun people. It was Luke's and cousin Jameson's first Christmas, which is probably more fun for the parents then it is for them. Ella loved the whole Christmas season - The Grinch (book and cartoon), nativity scenes (especially baby Jesus), cookies for Santa, you name it. It goes without saying she was a fan of opening presents. Santa brought her a pink scooter on Christmas morning, hich she loves. Now we just need an addition built on the house to have space for all these new toys.....

buds

no need to unwrap

scooter!!!!

Jameson, Ella & Luke on Christmas morning

a gorgeous Christmas morning

Ella is now a Candyland fanatic

Papa Tom and Papa Jim

Abby & Ella

Our hosts - thanks Zac & Kristen!

Ella reading a story to Grammy & Luke

More pics from the birthday weekend

Ella loves to love on her brother......

what we call "The Holiday Headlock"

One of Ella's favorite gifts - an easel and paint

so happy

getting down to business - the artist at work

3rd Birthday Bash

It was a princess extravaganza. Ella's 3rd birthday party was on Saturday and she'd asked for a purple cake. The theme requested was princess or Tinkerbell. When I first found out I was having a baby girl, I was a little hesitant about all things pink and princess-y. I truly believe I was given Ella as a way for me to learn to get over myself! Kids are going to be who they are and Ella is my little girly girl. With me as her Mom, she won't be too over the top. Anyway - Ella had a blast with her new princess dress-up clothes, her princess dolls and eating her princess cake!

dressed like a princess - holding her princesses

my girl!

Zac & Kristen enjoying the toddler bday party!

opening some gifts, with JJ and Chrissy looking on

purple princess cake - of course

Uncle Ollie bought a gift to support our budding photographer

Grammy & Papa looking on with Luke

Abby - the most patient girl ever - playing princess

3!

Ella turns 3 today! Man did things change in our lives 3 years ago....and continue to change every day. Love, love, love this girl!

Hooray for sleep

To make a note: Luke went down for the night just before nine last night and didn't wake up until 4:45 for a change and something to eat. While he's been a great napper for us and is overall an easy kid to put down, he has been unwilling to sleep more than 3 to 4 hours at a time at night for some reason, so this was a major feat! Keep up the good work little man (although I am not one to get my hopes up)! If I had only gone to bed when he did I would haviute had an amazing night of sleep. Guess what I was doing? Shopping at Toys R Us! They're open til midnight and late at night seems to be one of the only times I have to get things done right now.... So sad.

Way back when

Ella says lots of funny, priceless things these days but my favorite right now is: "I used to do _____ when I was a little girl." She says it a lot about all sorts of things. You can fill in the blank with whatever activity. Now that she's almost reached that distinguished age of 3, I guess she likes to reflect back on when she was a youngster in her 1's and 2's.

Luke Pics - 6 months

6 month have flown by! Our little guy is already 1/2 a year old. He is the most adorable thing right now...... so many laughs and smiles. He's eating some oatmeal now, and we're going to be branching out to some new things soon. You can see by the pic below just how much he loves the oatmeal so I think he'd appreciate a little variety. We had him in for his 6 month check up with the doctor and he's weighing in at 17.2 pounds and is 27 1/2 inches long. Happy and healthy!

I'll add more pictures soon. I left our camera charger/cord to charge in South Dakota!

Mmmm!

time for a bigger tub

Home

We made it to and from South Dakota without many troubles to speak of. The weather kept things interesting but wasn't much interference with our trip. The nasty cold bug that we all had was another story! Thanks so much to the whole McKinstry clan for putting up with our coughs, runny noses and sneezing while we visited you this past week. It was wonderful being with you, as always, and we promise next time to not bring our cold germs to share. Pictures to come soon!

Where did fall go?

No telling whether or not we'll have a white Christmas yet or not, but it's pretty evident that we'll have snow for Thanksgiving. We are sitting in the middle of a true blizzard at the moment..... snow falling and wind blowing. Seth made it out to work this morning. I'm so glad to be married to a man who was raised in S Dakota and went to school in Fargo, N Dakota. He knows how to get around when the snow flies. Me, I get a little white-knuckled. I am all for snow.... especially when I don't have to go anywhere. BUT, we have a trip planned very early tomorrow morning for Thanksgiving. This could be interesting. We fly to Rapid City, SD to see the McKinstry clan. Can't wait and are praying Mother Nature will tone things down a bit for us tomorrow......

I have a good feeling about this

I am not getting my hopes up, but I think we may soon have a potty trained little girl in our house. On Monday night Ella and I were playing with her dollies and we started giving them turns on the potty. It was about this time last year that we had some success with Ella in the bathroom, but after putting it off for the holidays and traveling, we didn't have any cooperation from her when we were ready to start up again. A whole year has gone by..... Seth and I have been suggestive, but not much more, about the topic since she decided she didn't want to go along with our plan. I've been so hopeful that when she was ready she'd let us know and we'd be off to the races. Looks like it might be the time! After working with her dolls, I asked Ella if she wanted to try and she said YES! It's 2 days later and we've had 2 successes today already. Keep your fingers crossed! Thank goodness we still have some halloween candy around....it's great motivation! Cavities, shmavities..... what's a little sugar? Grabbing just one box of diapers at Costco from now on - we're so close!

Other Fall Pics

trip to Greenbluff

meow

someone needs a haircut (and has now had one)

the perfect pumpkin in Greenbluff

at the pumpkin patch with Grammy Sharon

sunny fall day with Grammy & Papa

Halloween

Halloween was tons of fun this year now that Ella's old enough to enjoy what the holiday is really all about - CANDY! We did trick-or-treating both at Seth's office and up and down our street. Ella was ready to keep going after we'd hit the last house on the block. Let's fill my bucket, she said. Check it out in the picture below.... it's a big bucket, a big princess bucket, courtesy of Auntie Maia. Even though the bucket didn't get filled, we still ended up with way too much candy in the house. I was really worried that Ella was going to want to eat her candy any chance she got, but I have to say that she doesn't seem to even remember it's here. So we got to enjoy the fun of her participating in Halloween, but don't have to worry about cavities from all those treats. Nice. Luke got into his spider costume for a couple pictures and that was about the limit of his Halloween festivities. Our neighbors had us over for adult refreshments, where we got to hang out and chat with a few different people on our street. A great night!

Cinderella and the spider who sat down beside her....

outta my way

ready to go

Luke Pics - 5 Months