45 Weeks

Ella made herself a little tent last weekend. She was very entertained in there.

We went to our first story time at the library this week. Ella loved it, although she didn't quite get the concept of sitting still and listening. The first part of story time is singing songs and reading stories with the babies in laps. Ella didn't really go for the in the lap part. She kept crawling away from me, trying to take the book the lady was reading or the teddy bear in her lap, tackling the other babies and moms, "talking" loudly, etc... After the story part was over, all the moms held onto a big parachute thing while the babies got underneath it. We sang Old McDonald and bounced little stuffed animals on the parachute. Ella liked that part a lot, she kept trying to grab the parachute. After that, they dumped a bunch of soft blocks on the floor and let the babies play. Ella kept kissing all the other babies. I can't get a kiss from her to save my life, but she was giving them to any little baby she could get her hands on!

Aunt Cindy is visiting from Albuquerque this weekend. She brought Ella a cute little outfit and some soft, colorful books which Ella loves.

I know it's my job to think my kid is a genius, but I really am in awe of how much Ella is learning. She's like a little sponge all the sudden. She's really into mimicking gestures. I was brushing her hair earlier this week and she took the brush out of my hand and started brushing her own hair. She also started initiating little games. She was sitting in the highchair next to me while I was on the treadmill and she took her hands and kind of patted her head behind her ears. I laughed and did it back and she did it again. Now she does it all the time. She also learns things that I don't purposely teach her. One day we were playing and Happy and You Know It came on. When it got to the part about "clap your hands" she clapped her hands. I guess she knows the word clap and just put it together. I can't even remember all the little things she has learned lately. It's many new things every day.

One big thing she figured out is "no". She started shaking her head no when I say no a few weeks ago, but now she really know what no means. Not that she always listens to me when I tell her no, but she knows what it means. Even if I don't say no, but use a no voice, she looks at me and shakes her head no. She also shakes her head no when I try to do something she doesn't want me to do, like brush her teeth.

Ella has been playing peek-a-boo for a while, but she just figured out how to cover her own face. When I'm changing her diaper I always give her a clean diaper to play with. Usually I throw it over her face and when she pulls it off, I say peek-a-boo and all that. So this week she figured out how to put the diaper back over her eyes so we do it over and over again.

Ella has eagle eyes and she loves finding little tiny things on the floor to pick up and of course, everything goes in the mouth. I vacuum every day pretty much, but she still manages to find stuff, mostly little pieces of LaRoo's dog food. I guess there are worse things she could eat...

Her random pointing has started to take some direction. If you ask her where the puppy or Daddy or kitty is she'll point to it. She also points when she wants something. She likes to look at pictures of her family and she'll point to Mommy or Daddy (usually correctly) if you ask her to.

I've been Mommy-the-jungle-gym for a while now. She climbs all over me, uses my legs to give her a boost so she can crawl up onto the couch. She also likes to crawls back and forth over my legs if I have them stretched out in front of me. This week she started backing into my lap. She'll walk over by me, turn around and sit down in my lap. She especially does it if she wants me to help her with a book or something like that.