Ella is 6!!

Our Ella is SIX!!! Can hardly believe it.  She is such a sweet, thoughtful, creative, super-smart girl.

We started the day off with Daddy's pancakes before school.

And a couple presents from Mom and Dad...

After school we opened a couple more presents and then headed to Family Dinner (or famdin as we affectionately call it).  Chris' mom hosts this every Tuesday and Ella's birthday happened to fall on a Tuesday so she got a 22 person party with all the fam!

An idea of the set up for each Tuesday.  My mother-in-law is a saint for doing this very week! (and dealing with the clean up when we all rush off to put our kids to bed)

Ella enjoys hullabaloo like this.  She's certainly our extrovert.  My parents are in the background-they'd never been to famdin but came to celebrate Ella.

Ella chose Make your own Sundaes as the dessert and enjoyed getting a candle in hers.

 

One more present from Mom before bed...

Part two of her birthday was a little dinner with her school friends and cousin.  She chose breakfast for dinner so we went to Mimi's Cafe and had fun with a small, "big kid" restaurant dinner.

Since we didn't have a big party I offered to make a cake for this dinner. You'll have to check out my next post for how that turned out.  Overall though, GREAT sixth birthday.  I'm LOVING this phase where Ella is a fun kid to chat with and discipline is taking a backseat to being able to reason through things (sometimes).  It's fun to see her interests (dogs, art, and reading right now) emerge and her compassion blossom.  She is so often so sweet and thoughtful with Sadie, me, Chris and her friends.  In love with my Ella Bella.

Sushi Party!!

I'm finally no longer full from our amazing Sushi party and thus, will post about it :-)  Amy and I split a groupon deal for a sushi party for 8 people as a birthday gift to each other.  We each invited three people and booked our date with the sushi chef and provided some drinks and appetizers and that's it! It turned out SO much better than I could have even expected-the chef was personable and skilled and cooked non-stop for us for FOUR hours.  He also taught us to make our own rolls which was fun but didn't taste nearly as good as his-my rice got overworked and gummy and it was pretty nasty.  Thankfully, he just kept the good stuff coming and we were SO full we had trays full of leftovers.  Would definitely recommend The Sushi Go Guy!

Our Gracious Hosts

Matt wasn't so happy with the sushi he made himself ;-)

This was Marissa "moaning in joy" over how good this sushi was!

Dessert Sushi with mango, strawberries and kiwi!!

First non-trim!!

BEFORE

 

 

AFTER!!

 Ella was ready for a change and Aunt Amy was willing to do a haircut so we went for it!  It's only been a few hours and one post-haircut bath and it's already soooo much easier to care for.  Seems like this will be ideal for teaching Ella to do her own hair!  And she looks so cute with a "mature" shorter do!

Halloween 2011

Finally getting around to posting Halloween Pictures!  School has been ROUGH this semester so I'm a bit behind :-)  Must show off our beautiful butterfly and ladybug though! We had a great time with a group of friends trick-or-treating in a little historic area nearby where all the merchants were handing out candy.  Then we went to Nana's for a quick dinner and went around her neighborhood for a little while.  Lots of fun.  I love Halloween!  Getting to be creative and dress up was one of my favorite things growing up and I'm enjoying passing it on to my girls :-)

Ella with her cousin Hannah a very fancy cat

My always expressive Ella makes a very good "scary face"

So glad she can make a pretty smile too

Jen and baby Zoen-Chicken!

Sadie and her ladybug twin, Cree

The barista costumes were a hit!

Lots of fascinating characters were out...

Nana dressed Ella's face up with some eyelashes and sequins on her cheeks!  beautiful!

Keeping it real...

Thanksgiving Morning

 My (beautiful-huge-hearted-works-a-zillion-hours-for-no-money-to-help-at-risk-kids) sister works full time at a homeless outreach center in the City.  So, sometimes we get opportunities to help out.  This year all four of us headed down on Thanksgiving morning and it was wonderful to get to serve there!

Here's my Facebook status from right before we started...

Corinne Heiliger 

"Extremely thankful as I sit in my car and look in the rear view mirror and see Sadie asleep in her carseat and homeless people huddling near the door of the shelter we're about to go into to serve food. Seeing both in the same mirror is sobering"

 Chris got to hang out in the dining room where they were serving food for 4 hours.  He emptied trays for people as they headed out the door.

 Ella and I worked in "The Marketplace."  She sorted through donations while I worked in the free store as a personal shopper.  I SO enjoyed it!  I got to hold a shopping bag and spend 10 minutes with each person helping them find the right sizes for whatever they were looking for.  Since it was a holiday there were no limits on how many items each person could choose which made it extra fun! I was willing to serve in whatever capacity but doing this really confirmed that I LOVE people.  It would have been tough for me to have a job where I didn't get to talk with, love on, hug, touch, help the people!  Love, Love, Loved it.

 There was one other kid there helping with her parents so she and Ella became buddies and worked together the whole time :-)

 Did I mention this was a family affair?  Chris' Dad played the keyboard for the entire dinner service in the dining room!

Certainly hope to make this a tradition on Thanksgiving and help out down there at other times as well.  Ella's heart is so open to serving and giving right now so we're enjoying giving her (and our whole family) opportunities to live it out!