Ella The Artist

Ella is getting more creative in her artistic expression. Just in the last few days, I have found her crayon drawings on the following: the kitchen table, her plastic cups, her highchair tray, my newest Parenting magazine AND the cover jacket of a book borrowed from a student. Thank heavens for the Magic Eraser as it took the crayon off of these items -- including the book jacket -- with no damage to them.

But, I discovered her pièce de résistance just yesterday afternoon -- a drawing in PEN on our leather couch! Needless to say, I was not happy about that one. A quick internet search provided several options to remove pen from leather. A bit of perfume on a q-tip seemed to help although it did lighten the leather slightly in that area. Then Brett spent a couple of hours cleaning and treating the entire leather couch with a special leather soap/cream. The couch looks better than it has in years -- it's all clean and shiny. So, I think I am going to have to be diligent in keeping crayons AND pens out of her reach unless she is under close supervision!

Busted Lip

It's become a bit of a tradition on weekend mornings to bring Ella into our bed when she wakes up early...at least earlier than I want her to. Sometimes, she will nurse and then sleep cuddled in between us. Othertimes, she doesn't want to cooperate and will crawl off the bed and start exploring our room as we watch her from our bed.

Well, yesterday she was playing with things from my nightstand. My vitamins are a particular favorite of hers -- she shakes the bottle and makes music. I'm not sure what she tripped on, but it may just have been her own two feet. She fell and bit her bottom lip right between her teeth. Both the outside and inside of the lip were cut open and bleeding. What a way to start off the morning! The bleeding subsided within a few minutes but her lip swelled a bit. Now a day later, it still looks pretty sad. Hopefully, it will heal quickly. Ah, the dangers of walking...

A Valentine's Surprise

I figured that it would be nearly impossible to get anyone to watch Ella so Brett and I could go out for Valentine's Day. So instead of planning a date night out, I decided to cook a nice meal for my man. I'm going to make broiled flank steak (so Brett doesn't have to grill it), rice pilaf, and veggies. For dessert, I thought I'd try making "Chocolate Lava Cakes". So, since Ella was napping I thought it would be the perfect time to prepare them. I prepared the batter while the oven was preheating. Just as I was about to put the cakes in the oven, I noticed that there was a strange smell emanating from the oven...a sort of plastic-like smell. Now, from early on, Ella has had a fascination with the broiler and learned long ago how to open the broiler drawer. She is equally fascinated by our tupperware cabinet and likes to empty it on a daily basis and distribute tupperware around the house. As I noticed the smell, I knew what she had done. With a quick pull on the drawer, I discover, yes indeed, Ella had put a disposable Ziploc container lid in the broiler and yes, it was now a pile of blue goo. It wouldn't be such a bummer but I planned to use the broiler for the first time in my life tonight for dinner. Now, I just have to figure out how to get now-hardened blue goo off of the broiler tray. Fun times....