Ellia Right Now

More vintage! Aunt Carol sent a lot of great outfits from the attic that I had worn as a child. The minute I saw this one I knew Ellia would love it. And she really did. I had to take this shot before she left for Montessori. Why do kids love pockets sooo much?? And the fact that these ones are totally tailored for one specific thing, forget about it! Ellia was gonna complete that mission of filling those required slots. You'd never think carrying around colored pencils on your chest would make you feel so special - but I KNEW she would feel extra special at her school wearing it. When I dropped her off & waved our customary goodbye in the window I could see Charlie standing 2 milimeters from her outfit already asking questions about it.

Ellia is learning Spanish & really likes to try to use the words. She's drawing stick people a lot & I'm collecting examples along the way to show their evolution. If I ask "Who's that?" when pointing to a stick person it's almost always Jackson & sometimes it's me. She really loves to cook & so I recently turned a $5 Goodwill nightstand into a mini kitchen island for her so I can finally let her 'help'. She is making new friends at her new school & it's a new 'social' phase for us. I keep my ears open when Ellia watches the Nick Jr. cartoon "Franklin" since that poor little turtle deals with a lot of social awkwardness and trials & tribulations with all his friends. Alas, there's a message at the end & I put it in my back pocket if I need to pull it out when Ellia expresses some new 4 year old emotions.

The entire clan took a great trip to the UCR Botanical Gardens & we couldn't have picked a more beautiful day. At the beginning Ellia was really pumped up, in her sweetly methodical manner, to use her 'bonoclers' to find as many of the birds that were in her little nature pamphlet. Then she got kinda tired of the whole walking thing, having not found 1 single bird to check off her list. (I know, I know, it might've helped if she was looking through the correct end of the bonoclers.) Eventually she picked out the perfect walking stick and led the clan to the end of our journey. After that she got to go mini golfing for the second time in her life. (And let it be known that I beat Jimmy.)