Happy 2nd Birthday Ella!

Holy flip flops, Batman...Ella is two today! At this point 2 years ago at this time (when I started writing this post yesterday about 3:30 pm), I was comfortably lying in a hospital bed sleeping while the inducer medication and the epidural all worked its magic to bring my first born closer to me. Little did we know that even after all of that, we would still have to evict that baby from the womb with a C-section. That should have been our first clue that Ella Katherine Williams was going to be an independent, hard-headed, strong-willed child...but I had refused to believe it just yet. I have been proven wrong. Let the Terrible Twos commence!

Ella has had a lot happen in the last year...took her first steps, was weaned off of a daily mediciation, was confirmed that she did not have a neurological disorder, gained a baby sister, developed a wide vocabulary, and learned that flip-flops are the most awesome thing ever invented!

Recently Ella's language skills have shot through the roof with 5 word phrases or sentences, which just a week ago were 4 words, and the week before that were 3 words. (For example, it progressed from, "Ella jump water" to "Ella jump in water" all the way to "Ella jump in the water/Ella jump in the bed". You get the picture! Most of the time, Lee and I don't realize that she is paying attention to everything, but we soon learn when things we say get repeated. My favorite things are when she asks questions and says things when she is not prompted, like "Achoo baby" when Virginia sneezes or "You okay Mommy?" when I stump my toe and yell Ow. Her pronouns are slowly coming into play and she is working on everyone's names that she knows. Here is a run-down of names of people in her life, according to Ella:

Mine - Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy (you get it, she can't say it just once)

Daddy - Da da, Da da, Da da, Da da (do we not pay attention?)

Aunt Becca - Aun Ca Ca

Eric - Airrrric

Virginia - Gin yuh, but mostly Baby

Nannie - Na Na

Grandad - Gan na na (or something like that, haven't gotten that one figured out)

Granddaddy - Gan da da (you would think it would be the same, but its different)

Grandmama - Gan ma ma ma (extra syllable)

Savannah - Vay Vay

Colby - Bolbi

Maggie - For a while it was "Mammie" and then "Mommie" (hard to know who she was talking to...me or the dog), but has since progessed to what it should be "Maggie" Yay!

Since Ella started walking at 16 months, she hasn't stopped and with a casual, "I walk", you know she doesn't want to be held anymore. Her climbing skills have increased greatly, but she still likes to take things on the cautious side. Not until she sees her dare devil cousin Savi do things, does she try it out. She just recently wanted to start walking up stairs by herself (not climbing) and loves to run!!! Jumping is a new favorite pastime. When I picked her up out of the nursery at church this past Sunday, the teacher was laughing saying that all she had done for the past hour was jump..."Ella jump" she says!

E is still a great sleeper with about 2 hour or more naps in the afternoon and still sleeping from about 8pm until 6:30 - 7:00 am. I am putting her to bed still around 7:15 - 7:30, but she stays up and talks for a while sometimes...sometimes she is out before I leave the room. Books are still her favorite bedtime routine and we probably read about 6 books a night! Sometimes I skip pages...sometimes she notices. She will catch on sooner or later! Ha!

According to a recent sick doctor visit, she weighed 30 pounds, which she has been holding at for a while now. For her clothes, we bumped up to 3T, because they were so much more comfortable on her...hopefully that will last for a while. It seemed like all 2Ts were shrinking fast after I washed them, so 3T it is! Size 4 diapers still fit her and she has moved up to size 6s in shoes.

Speaking of shoes, the love that my daughter has for shoes at this young age is sometimes overbearing. That and her love for bracelets and necklaces sometimes gets the best of me. I used to think I could coordinate an outfit with accessories with a pretty good eye, but now I realize what I pick out must be crap, because Miss Ella doesn't approve unless she picks it out! So cute and so frustrating all at the same time! The "experts" say that distraction is key, but E never forgets. When I explain that she can't wear her flip-flops to school, that she must wear her tennis shoes and that she can wear her flip flops when she gets home, you better believe that those flip flops better be ready when she walks in the door!

Ella girl hasn't been a huge TV watcher as of yet, but recently has started requesting me to turn the "TP" on every so often while she hands me the "mote". Usually she requests "Mick Mouse", but one day out of the blue, she asked for Cars, which was right before the time when Cars 2 was to come out. I didn't really know where she knew Cars from, but I explained that I could turn the TV on, but that Cars may not be on there. Much to my amazement, I turn to the Disney channel and the movie Cars is coming on at that very moment. Crazy...how did she know??

Lee and I have prided ourselves on making her baby food and feeding her healthy items once she was able to eat with us. We made sure we had a protein, a vegetable, a fruit, a whole grain item, etc for most all of her meals. The best part was that she loved it all and would eat so well. I don't know when it happened, but it all of a sudden stopped sometime in the last year and now she barely eats at all. I'm sure that is just a toddler thing, but if you think your toddler can't thrive on crackers, goldfish, and apple juice, think again. Ours does...I'm not really happy about it, but I guess she will eat when she is hungry! Occassionaly she will lap up some green beans or cauliflower, but those times are rare now! Where did my healthy eater go?

 

As of today, Ella knows her ABCs up to "E" and occasasionaly I hear a "P" sometimes and last week, I heard a "Y", but she loves to sing what she knows over and over! She is super good with her colors and knows Red, Blue, Purple, Black, White, Orange, Yellow, Brown, & Green. Driving down the road with her is never boring, because she will point out all of the big trucks or cars and tell you what color they are...over and over again! Doesn't matter to me though...I love it! Her counting is progressing...if I help her count, she can usually tell me 5, 6, 7, 8, and even 9, but if she counts on her own, it goes something like this...."1, 2, 4...oooh, flip flops".

Hemangioma Update: Ella's hemangiomas on her face, neck, and ears are all still pretty much the same color, size, and texture as they were a year ago. They may have actually grown just a tiny bit or become just a bit darker, but she came off of her mediciation for it and it probably was responding to that. The medication was not going to work after a certain point and it had reached that point last August. The good news is that they aren't growing and all we have to do now is wait for them to fade, which could take 5-7 years.

Her right eyelid is still droopy and always will be, I imagine, since it was stretched out so much at 2 months old from the growing mass under it. I don't think it can bounce back at this point, so she is regularly getting her eyes checked every 6 months. Just this week, she saw her pediatric opthamalogist in Memphis who dilated her eyes to check the structures and everything was perfect! Her last visit to the hemangioma doctor was in March and he wants to do a check-up yearly now, so his concern level is very low. That is a good thing! He has mentioned that it might come to a point where we will want to do plastic surgery on her eyelid to fix the droop, but there is no hurry and we can wait a few years for that, if at all. My beautiful girl can handle it and probably doesn't even notice it and won't for a while!

Those are all the things that Ella has been doing over the last year...what has Mom learned? Well, here goes...

You can't reason with a toddler. I need to learn patience. Things can't be perfect. You can try to reason with a toddler, but may not be successful. I need more patience. Giggly laughs and high squeals are the highlight of my day. Incessant whining tirades are the low point of my day. Reasoning with a toddler sounds reasonable, until you start doing it. Patience is a virtue...that I need. I never knew that I could be so proud as when my child said thank you without being prompted for the first time. Explaining things to a toddler helps...sometimes. Deep, slow breaths are things I need to learn. Time-outs are good. Yelling is bad. Reasoning does not help. Where did my patience go? And finally, it is okay to let your child go to sleep in her flip-flops and bracelets, as long as you get them off and hide them before she wakes up!

Ella Katherine, we love you more and more with each passing day. You are a beautiful caring child that even though you can get ill-tempered fast and are strong willed, you show compassion and independence that I crave! Watching you learn so many new things each day is such a blessing and it makes your Daddy and I sit down at the end of each day in wonderment at all the things you can do. We can't wait to see what this next year unfolds! Happy 2nd Birthday!