Ahh.....Bonneville

This Fall has been crazy! With Ella here and Ben's schedule exploding we have been all over the place all the time. Ben decided a few weeks ago that we were going to get away for at least one night. After looking at a number of places we decided to go to Bonneville Hot Springs because it was close and we had heard good things about it from a number of people. I am hear to say that it was great. We had a room with a hot tub on the balcony and I had a mineral bath and wrap. The time away was great. It was good to see my husband and it was good to be together as a family. Ella was perfect. We were able to spend a lot of time in the hot tub even with a baby. We would put her on her bouncy chair in front of the sliding door and watch her from the hot tub. She slept through the night and hardly fussed. I love how great she is.

Before we left we hung out in the lobby. Ella got real comfortable. She is such a laid back kid.

For the Love of Toys

Can you see Ella?

She is under all her toys. She loves her toys now. We have Fergie the Frog, Harriet the Horse, Lenard the Lion, and her taggie blanket. As you can see we are into alliteration in the Moll house! Ella enjoys laying on the floor and playing with these toys. She spends up to an hour just playing with the toys and moving around the blanket. Some time she spins around the blanket so that she points a new direction. She almost rolls over. She can get on her side but not make it to her stomach yet. But she is working on it.

We have to make sure to take the toys with us when we leave the house. I have found that toys help in the car. Ella is a great baby. She sleeps well, plays well, and eats well, but she does not ride well. Many times in the car I have driven home or other places with a screaming baby. I don't really know why she cries but I think it has something to do with not being able to see me or that she is bored. The toys are helping. We have fewer screaming drives now with the toys. So thank you Fergie, Harriet, and Lenard.

Ella's Friends

Even though Ella is only 3 and 1/2 months old she already has many friends around her age.

This is Joel. Joel loves Ella. He talks about Ella at home and even knows her car. A while back he saw a green Element while driving with his mom, Brooke, and pointed at the Element and said, "Ella, Ella." When Brooke asked him who he wanted to invite to his birthday party, Ella was on the short list. In the picture Joel is buckling Ella's car seat. Joel loves to buckle all buckles he comes into contact with. Whenever Joel is around I can be sure to find Ella's car seat all buckled up.

This is Zack. Joel's younger brother. Zack and Ella both had the same due date. His mom, Brooke, and I were college roommates so to have the same due date was a big surprise and a lot of fun. Zack was born a week before Ella. We have all decided that they will become great friends.

This is Zoe. Zoe was born in early April. Her parents are Peter and Diane. Ben and Peter play music together often and we all go to church together at Imago Dei. Peter and Diane choose not to find out if they were having a girl or boy so when Zoe was born a girl we were all very excited because at that point we knew Ella was girl and we decided they would both be great friends. In this picture Diane and I had the girls and were taking them to the Beaverton Farmer's Market to see Ben and Peter play music with their group Pocketnopocket. Notice they both have the same car seat. After Zoe was born we were over at her house and Ben was checking out her car seat and stroller. He decided then and there that that would be the system we would get and so Zoe and Ella match whenever we take them out together.

This is Joy. No Joy is not around Ella's age but she is carrying Ella's friend who will be born in about 5 weeks. Joy is having a girl but she and Bill have not settled on a name for their little girl. Since I didn't like calling the baby "baby" I gave her a gag name. We are calling her Tiffany Coco Channel until she is born and we know her real name. I am sure Joy and Bill will give her a much better name than this.

Aigee, Aigoo

Apparently Ella takes after her daddy and loves to talk. Yes I said daddy. Ben is the real talker of the family and Ella is obviously following in daddy's footsteps. She is beginning to find her "voice" in the past week or so. Aigee is one of her favorite sayings. The other day Ben and Ella had an exchange of aigees and aigoos. Ella would say aigee over and over and Ben would say aigoo back to her.

With her voice Ella is also discovering volume. Just about every morning when Ella wakes up she wakes up growling very loudly. She opens her mouth wide and growls as loud as she can. She has this amazingly cute face as she does. I am sure she is trying to say something to us as she growls. Last night we had our home community meeting at our house. Ella was in her Bumbo seat on the kitchen table when people started arriving. She must have gotten really excited with the people arriving because she began to growl and smile at everyone that walked through the door. She got really loud as she did it. It was hard to hear over her. Some times when I am on the phone she does the same thing and the person on the phone will comment on it.

It will be interesting to what her first real words will be!

It's In Her Blood

With a grandma that is a teacher, a grandma who has been a librarian, and a dad that reads 10 books at the same time, it is only natural that Ella would be drawn to books. While she was hanging out in her swing, I got a book out to read to Ella. She automatically grabbed the book and wanted to investigate it. She even began to turn the pages. I have a feeling we will be reading many books together in our future.

It was a touch and feel book with baby animals. These are great books because they have different materials that feel like the animals' skin or fur. That way the kids can "touch and feel" how the animal would really feel.

Our Little Pea Pod

For Halloween the perfect costume for Ella was a pea pod. Before she was born her Grandma Whitney gave her a stuffed pea pod toy. It is so cute that I was determined to find her a pea pod costume for Halloween. I didn't have to look too far. At Target they had all kinds of cute infant costumes for a great deal. The pea pod was there so I bought it for Ella. It is supposed to for babies 0-9 months. I think they should check their sizing again though. Ella was exactly 3 months old when she first wore it and she barely fit into it. He feet were right at the bottom of the costume. I do believe she will be tall like her daddy.

Unfortunately, Ella didn't love being in her costume!

Two happy moms with their pea pod and lion! This is Zack. His older brother turned 2 on Halloween. He had a costume party for his birthday and Ella was on his short list of people to invite. She attended her first costume party on Oct. 25th. Happy birthday Joel!

On Halloween Joel, Zack, Brooke, and Chris came trick-or-treating.

We tried to get a picture of all three kids, but unfortunately, Ella was not going to let it happen. She was far too tired. You can see how she was throwing herself back over the arm chair. She did not love this costume!

Pumpkins Abound

FALL:

Fall means pumpkins, leaves, lots of warm colors, and many festivities. I love Fall and Fall with Ella is even better. For many years Ben and I have talked about how great all the pumpkin patches will be when we have a kid. So many of the activities at the pumpkin patches are meant for kids. Now that we have a kid we go to the pumpkin patches with a new purpose. Even though Ella is only 3 months old we took her to the Bi-Zi Farms to celebrate Fall. It was a wonderful time with great memories. Too bad she won't remember it. :)

Last spring we went yard saling to buy some things for Ella before she was born. I found this adorable outfit on one of our excursions. When I found this outfit I envisioned the day we would take Ella to the pumpkin patch and the pictures that would be taken. The pictures did not disappoint. We got a lot of looks with this outfit. Many people stopped us to comment on how cute it was and I saw even more people pointing at us and jabbing the person next to them to look at Ella. She was a hit in her pumpkin outfit.

At Bi-Zi Farm there was a petting zoo where we showed Ella more farm animals. I am not sure how impressed she was with the animals. Even so I showed her all the animals.

The animals seemed interested in Ella.

The donkey was very friendly.

Pumpkin head.

Someone was very tired after picking out our pumpkins. It is amazing how she can just sleep anywhere. Here she is hanging off of mommy in the baby bjorn sound asleep.

After we got back from picking out our pumpkins, Ben washed them at the pumps they had provided. The pumpkins were very dirty right out of the field.

Here is the farming family. We were tractoring! (That was for you Amy)

Family photos are great! I love that we are a family of three now. Really it is four. Hudson couldn't go to the farm with us.

The back of the pumpkin outfit had the jack o' lantern on it. That was the best part.

Every year we have a Pumpkin Carving Party. It is a blast. We eat yummy foods and then pull out the big blue tarp and carve pumpkins. It is great to see all the amazing pumpkins people create. This year was another great party.

I wonder what Ben will create this year!!!

Ella enjoyed the party from her bouncy seat. She was the cheer leader that encouraged everyone. If anyone needed an idea for their pumpkin they could use Ella's bum for inspiration!

Here are all the pumpkins after they were carved. It was a great show this year. Ben's is the second from the left. Any ideas what it could be. Think Arrested Development. It should remind you of one of the key things from the show. Watch out for hop-ons.

All the happy carvers!