Giving thanks, again, for the first time

Yesterday we were up bright and early to hit the road towards Richmond to spend Thanksgiving (our second - remember?) with my brother and his family...

I brought lots of toys and amusements for the ride and BabyA was all decked out in her elephant hat (that finally fits her). She actually slept for most of the way AND for during my attempt to tell her my "life story." <= Apparently, nobody in the car wanted to hear it as D turned up the music when I announced that I was going to tell it. We were greeted warmly with lots of excitement from our nieces especially and lots of yummy food from Aunt E, Uncle B, and Aunt E's mother who was in town for the festivities.




We also got to meet some neighbors/friends of Uncle B and Aunt E who came over for appetizers before the meal was served in the late afternoon. D was in heaven as they brought with them a gourmet cheese platter that was TO DIE FOR.




Despite the implication (that we don't feed our own child and force her to dine on whatever toy within arm's reach) of this picture, Amelia DID partake in the Thanksgiving meal! But she is still teething and insists on gumming on any and everything around her.




And, finally, all of the ladies together. There was quite a bit of estrogen in the house and we REALLY outnumbered the guys and they had no choice but to be banished out of the dining room when the feasting was over to do such dreadful things such as watching FOOTBALL.

The Thanksgiving before the Thanksgiving

In an effort to make things nice and fair, we alternate holidays so that nobody can fuss about anyone getting more time than anyone else. When one side of the family gets Thanksgiving and New Years, the other side will get Christmas and Easter. The following year each side will swap holidays and so on and so forth.

This year, my side of the family had Thanksgiving and New Years. The plan, was of course, to spend Thanksgiving with Nana and PopPop wherever they were planning on being but when we found out that GG was going to be down at Nana's house and that Thanksgiving was going to be up at the lake in PA, we decided to give Thanksgiving celebrations to another member of my side of the family - Uncle Brandon and his crew down in VA! Uncle Brandon and Aunt Elizabeth were so kind and invited us AND our dog down for dinner and we happily accepted the invitation. Trouble was, Nana really wanted us to be with her! So... we came up with a solution that solved all problems - we planned on TWO Thanksgivings!!!

It worked out nicely.

1. We got a chance to see Nana and PopPop AND GG while she was in town
2. We get to eat TWO delicious Thanksgiving feasts (and we didn't have to cook either one - HA!) (Well, we contributed side dishes but that hardly counts, right?)

Here are some lovely pictures that I took with PopPop's Nikon as I left my little rebel at home (stupidly) thinking that it was unncessary for me to bring it! It's hard to believe that I spend some of my time being a professional photographer. Seriously! I would have missed all of these great moments...

Tomorrow is our second Thanksgiving and despite the fact that we've definitely had our fill of feasting already - all of us Ellwoods are REALLY excited to eat again! We've got so much to be thankful for having enough family to be able to have two entirely separate Thanksgivings. :)

5 months, 2 weeks

Our little lady has discovered her own toes.

She can't seem to keep her hands off of them these days!

She is VERY giggly!

Her attention span has increased dramatically to the point where she actually has some interest in books!

Every time she smacks a different picture, I tell her what it is. Her favorite pictures seems to be that of cars and trucks. :)

To bed, I said, To bed!

Guess who is teething now? Guess won't sleep because of it?

We try very hard to strictly enforce a bedtime but sometimes rules are meant to be broken for more important reasons...

like so we can pretend to be the yellow Jedi....

or so we can lay the "smackdown" on Papa...

and also because singing "She'll be comin' round the mountain" while

pedaling your feet as fast as possible is VERY important...

but not nearly as important as singing a FIERCE rendition of the "Itsy-bitsy Spider"...

but what it really all boils down to is this...




When you are too adorable for words, you can pretty much get your parents to do
whatever you want - No matter what your bedtime actually is!

Our resident noise maker

The title of this posting might lead you to believe that we're talking about the dog but you are sorely mistaken. It's actually AMELIA who is the loudest of us all these days - and it's NOT her crying we are talking about either... (turn up your speakers to get the full effect and pardon the poor lighting)...

If you can believe it, this is completely normal for her these days. And YES, it really is that loud!!! But, no, it's not because she's fussing or angry. Is she talking to her "friends" (as we call them) dangling above her on her mobile? It's hard to say but it certainly does keep us very entertained.