All about Bella

Seems these days it has been all about Bella. Actually maybe not all about her, but I've got some great pictures of her lately. Love this series of pictures of her. My parents brought back this "dress" from Cabo on one of their annual trips. She can now wear it with her jeans! I love this look...now to keep convincing her that she can wear jeans; that every outfit that she wears does NOT have to be a dress!

So this past week Bella said she wanted her ears pierced! Well I heard it and ran with it! I wasn't going to let it pass me by this time. Friday after she got out of preschool we headed to the mall. We (the Claire's employee and I) decided that it would be best to do both ears at the same time so we had a little time to kill before the other employee showed up. I had wore my heels and my feet were killing me. (I spent my morning taking photos of all the kids at school (well 85% of them, another mom took some too). Here are the ones I took of E and Bella.

Okay back to the ear piercing. So we were killing time and since my feet were killing me I sat down on a bench in the mall and this is what Bella did.....I guess every girl dreams! Bella is just starting early!

So once the other Claire's employee showed up we got the show on the road. She did GREAT until they actually pierced her ears. Even then the tears welled up and a few might have escaped, but there was NO screaming and no real crying. Just saddness!

So here is Bella right before the piercing...she doesn't even realize what is coming and YES we did tell her it was going to hurt...only for a minute though!

As they get ready to count to 3 for the actual piercing.

See the hand coming up... the piercing has started!

The aftermath....As soon as they were done and out of the way, she was in my arms with tears in her eyes, never a real cry, but the poor baby....it hurt her! I took her to look at her ears and well she just wanted her comforts...her thumb and blanky!

Now she was all smiles when we walked out of the mall with in 10 minutes of "it happening"  ....

Now the poor thing, we have to clean her ears at least 2 times a day (the directions say 3, but I can't subject her to that). I was cleaning them the Saturday night and she says to me betweens cries and tears, "This is NOT the best part!" Bless her heart. She just has to get past this and it will become another obsession for her....Earrings of every kind!

A close up of her earrings for the next at least 6 to 8 weeks! I can't wait until she can change them and put all of the Disney princesses in and tiny circles as she calls them.... Soon enough!

Wish me luck... I'm off to clean her ears! Nothing like starting her morning off on a bad note!

Face Crash# 2

So it is never a good thing when the school calls you. I was walking through Target today and my cell phone starts ringing! So Ethan had his second run in between his face and the pavement! The pavement won this round too. Maybe I'm a softy, but as his teacher got him out of music class so I could see him (I said I would stop by since I was out n about), he walked out of the music room with a iced sponge held up to his head. It looked soo sad and I was squatting down to see him when he came out and he walked right into my arms, laid his head on my shoulder and just said how bad it hurt. I asked him if he was OK and got a mumbled yeah, but he said he wanted to come home....so what was I to do? Call me a softy...I brought him home with me!

Not sure if you can really see it here.... but it scraped up his forward pretty good and his nose too (our right side). Check out those eyes... he is soo tired!

Here is Ethan from the first pavement fight:

After this one I did take him to the Dr. to have him looked over (and he did get a pretty thorough once over), but the Dr. said with the front of the head it is pretty tough and to watch him for the first 24-48 hours... Watch for odd behavior (way out of the norm), vomiting etc.... Thankfully then and now there has been none of that!

Snack Mix

Ethan has his moments of anger and frustrations, but part of the real Ethan loves to be helpful, loves to be close to us and loves when he has a sense of accomplishment! I have been looking at some cookbooks and those little 5"x8" themed cookbooks. I found a bunch of snack mix recipes and thought this one would be perfect for Ethan

It is technically called Santa's Snack Mix, but um well it is pretty perfect for anytime. Here is the recipe:

2C Honey Nut Cheerios
2C Chow Mein Noodles
1C Honey Roasted Peanuts
1/2C Raisens
1/2C M&M's (we added another 1/4C or 1/2C, not sure which one Ethan put in)
1/2C Peanut Butter Chips
1/2C Vanilla or White Chocolate Chips (we used white Chocolate Chips)
1/2C Chocolate Chips
-----and Mix all together.

Here are a couple pictures of Ethan making the mix

and the snack mix (before Ethan stirred it all up)

Here is what the picture looked like in the cookbook (and pretty much what it looked like once Ethan stirred it all up!)

Ethan was pretty excited to set some aside in a bag for his snack at school tomorrow and some for his teacher! Guess what Ethan will be making for the holidays LOL (okay maybe we will pick a new one to bring for the holidays!)