Ella's Birthday @ The Crayola Factory

We had a great day today at the Crayola Factory. I feel very lucky that we live close to so many wonderful children activities.

The morning started with some presents and one pink cupcake. I always dye the frosting but I decided to actually dye the cupcake itself so the whole thing was pink. Ella was in absolute heaven considering her favorite book right now is "Pinkalicious". We read this book at least 3 times a day and she even sleeps with it.

Pinkalicious, along with Purplicious and a couple Fancy Nancy books were a birthday present to Ella from her friends Jordy and Aydan. She loves them! Thanks girls!

Ohhh, princess crowns and shoes!

Pinkalicious Cupcakes (I even heard her beg for another cupcake before bed because she wanted to turn pink just like Pinkalicious)
Pyscho smile (we're still working on the whole smile for the camera thing)
After everyone got dressed and ready, we headed out to The Crayola Factory
Mom, I really want to smile, but I just don't trust this large red crayon over here...
Tunnel Fun

There were so many great activity stations; hat making, brown bag puppets, regular coloring, painting and putting together a wind sock, using magic mold, wax dripping (5 years and up), shirt decorating, sidewalk chalk and much more. There was even a play area specifically for children under 5.

Ella tried out everything!

The crayon station
Working/Playing hard

Of course even though we had a nonstop day, Ella still refused to go to sleep tonight(maybe it had something to do with all those cupcakes), so I was able to lie in bed with her right at 8:46 pm (when she was born) and we talked about it.

Deep thoughts by Ella:

"I broke your water mommy and you said, Hey, wait a second, baby Ella broke my water!"

"I cried and cried and cried and said, Waaa, I don't want to be born yet!" Ya, well that makes sense considering she was so colicky.

"I was in mommy's belly and I came out her belly button." I wonder how long I can keep her believing that!

"Awww, little baby Ella was so tiny!"

It was a great way to spend her birthday.

Happy 3rd Birthday Gabriella Anne!

As cliche as it is, I can hardly believe my little baby is 3 years old today! It seems almost impossible, but alas, here we are.

Yesterday Ella celebrated at school with blueberry muffins, a crown and birthday songs. Today Ricardo took the day off of work and we're all (including Abuela who flew in Wed. night) heading to The Crayola Factory in PA. We were actually planning on going apple picking but it's raining cats and dogs so indoors it will be. Luckily, The Crayola Factory is only 1 1/2 hours away, so it's not too bad of a trip.

Sunday is Ella's big princess party! She's so excited to wear her princess dress from Gaga and to eat her 4 Princesses cake that she picked out. We'll be celebrating with about 25 of her friends from school and playgroups.

So Happy Birthday to my BIG GIRL. I love you to the moon and back!

9/26/05-born 8:46 pm 7lbs 2oz 20in
(That adorable woman holding Ella is our Dr. She was the best!)

2 weeks
1st Birthday

2nd Birthday

Almost 3!!

Temple Beth El Nursery School Jubilee

Ok, so it's called a Jubilee, not a Jamboree..but whatever you call it, it was fun.

They had a trackless train, a huge bouncy slide which Ella went down no less than 20 times, a bounce house, a bouncy race course (which ella got stuck in), an elephant carnival ride, arts and crafts, a DJ, games and more.

We had a great time despite that the fact that it was supposed to be in the low 70's today and was in reality 85 degrees! Hello Fall?!

Bounce House Fun

Sofia and Ricardo walking-Ricardo's so proud!

Sofia and Seth (Hannah's little brother-10 months old)

Ella on the elephant carnival ride

One of the many times down the Treehouse slide

Train ride with Sofia and Natalie (one of Ella's classmates)

The younger siblings chatting about their big sisters. Sofia, Seth (Hannah), and Jeremy (Natalie) in the stroller.

Later, Ella and Natalie decided to ride the train together WITHOUT their mommies because you know, we're sooo lame.

Walking together

On the train

It was really a nice time and it was fun to see Ella's friends from school.

Dinner with The Bryants and The Macfees

It's funny how there are three families from the San Diego office who now work out here on the East Coast. Ed, Kevin, and Ricardo all worked together in audit in San Diego and now Ed works in DPP in NYC, Kevin works in the main office in NYC, and Ricardo works at the Global Service Centre. So unfortunately, they don't get to see each other every day (in fact we all live in different states-CT, NJ, NY) but we did get to see everyone last night at the Bryant's house in CT.

It was a great evening and Ella had a BLAST playing with Stephanie, Ed and Gabriela Bryant's 7 year old.

Before we left, hair all braided and all smiles!

The girls eating dessert together (Alexander was already done with the woman!)

Sofia reprising her birthday cake eating act (oh yea, I never uploaded those pictures-sorry)

Ricardo, Gabriela, Ed, Kevin, and Jenny

Playing!

We had such a great time and hope we get to see them more often. Thanks for hosting us, Ed, Gabriela, Stephanie, and Alexander!

Today we're off to Ella's school Jamboree and then dinner with the Greer's who are moving to Atlanta at the end of the week. :(

Oh, here's another picture of other painting the other day. She loves to paint pictures now and told me this one was of Su-su's (our next door neighbor) LOOOOONNNG legs. Heh!

Sofia's Walking!!!!!

Today I was standing in the kitchen making my shopping list and Sofia was standing next to me holding on the cabinet and then just let go and walked to the back door! It almost didn't register at first what was happening. It was just so sudden and she took at least 10 steps before sitting down. It was crazy!

So I brought her into the living room and bribed her with food (it works like a charm) and caught her walking again.

Ignore my annoying voice and horrible camera angles. I was sitting too close. I can't believe it...finally! Not finally as in she's so old (just turned 13 months) but finally as in she's been cruising since 10 months and we were sure she'd be walking by 1. The joke was on us! I love how she ends with her typical Sofia scrunchy face laugh.

Not as much walking in this one, but who doesn't like a little frankenstein action?

So, I know I've been absolutely horrible about updating the blog. I still haven't finished recaping CA. I have pics from the Bronx Zoo last weekend and the Dave Matthews concert on my birthday (9-10) but

#1-We've been so busy, which is a great think but doesn't make for a good blogger. Since we've been home we had the Dave concert on my birthday, friends over for a goodbye party for Shireen, Andrew and Ava who move next week, the Bronx Zoo, I had a fantasy football wives dinner, and tomorrow night I'm hosting a Tastefully Simple party. Friday we have a birthday party right after school and then tot-shabbat. Saturday we're going to CT for dinner with some of our San Diego friends who live in CT and NYC now and finally Sunday we have Ella's nursery school Jamboree! PHEW!

#2-I'm losing patience with blogspot. It's a pain to upload photos and get them to format correctly. So I admit, I put it off.

But, I promise. I will upload the rest of the pictures.

Our Trip to California

I'm feeling quite guilty that I haven't posted pics from our trip to CA but honestly, blogger is a pain to upload pictures to so I've been avoiding it, but I really should start to recap our trip.

We had a really wonderful time. We flew in on Tuesday the 26th of August. We had a 7am flight out of JFK so we had to be up and out of our house 4:30am. At the time, it was very painful getting the girls up and in the car but looking back, it wasn't so bad and it was nice arriving in CA at 10:30 am local time and having the whole day to do things.

Wednesday the 27th was Tissie's 90th birthday, so we headed over with the girl and chinese food for a little dinner celebration.

Tissie, a slippery Sofia, and Alexis

Our fancy dining arrangements in Tissie's room-hey, it worked and the girls were in heaven being with their GG and Gaga so that's all that mattered!

Singing Happy Birthday to Tissie

On Thursday Ricardo and I left Ella with Gaga (my mom) and Sofia with Abuela and Papa (his parents) and headed up to Napa for the night in my mom's Prius. Driving in the Prius was fun/funny. It's really cool since it doesn't have an ignition or an actual stick shift plus the steering wheel is so small if felt like we were driving go-cart. But it was certainly nice getting 45 mpg!

It was especially nice having two full days and one night as just a couple. We haven't had a night without a kid since before Ella was born (almost 3 years for those who are counting). Of course we feel fast asleep by 10:30 pm and at 7:30 am the next day we couldn't sleep any longer. I was really looking forward to sleeping in but not being woken up throughout the night really makes for restful sleep so 7:30 am it was.

Our first stop was Frog's Leap Winery . Love, love, love Frog's Leap. Not just because the wine is amazing but so is the tour, the people and their principles. We could have spent all day there and in fact we spent 3+ hours there.





We then went to Rutherford Hill (great wine, boring winery) and another favorite, Cakebread. That night we went to Go Fish in St. Helena for dinner. Yummy sushi!

The next day we went to PlumpJack Winery which is co-owned by Gavin Newsom (mayor of SF) and Artesa (awesome winery not so awesome wine) and then headed home.

PlumpJack

Artesa Winery

to be continued...