Happy Birthday, Elle!

 

Can you believe how big she’s getting?!  We put balloons on her door last night (with much difficulty) so that when she opened  it, the balloons would all fall on her!  It worked

 

Since it was General Conference, we had our semi-annual “conference breakfast” of cinnamon rolls, eggs, and orange julius.  It worked out perfectly for Elle’s birthday breakfast!

It’s so nice that we get to watch conference via internet, and then plug it into our GIANT bigger-than-life TV!  It’s like we are practically at the Conference center itself! 

Elle took full advantage of  watching at home, and stayed in her PJ’s until about six o’clock when we told her she had to put on something cute for her birthday pictures.

After conference, we taught Elle how to play Settlers of Catan.  She caught on really well!

 

We had macaroni and cheese, and broccoli for dinner—her favorite!  She got to eat on the “You Are Special” plate and everything today

She chose the theme “rocks and minerals” for her birthday.  THAT was a challenge!  I decided to make a cake that looked like the layers of the earth.  Then, I put some rock-looking jelly bellies in the top graham cracker “sand” layer, and she had to excavate them with a pastry brush.   I also shoved some gushers fruit snacks into some cupcakes and put them on the cake too.  She had to use her little “pic axe” to dig them out.  It sounds great on paper, but I’m afraid it didn’t hold  together very well.  It tasted good though! (Especially with mint brownie ice cream [which, next to peppermint, has to be one of the finest ice creams out there] )

 

There’s Polly Pocket the geologist in her sun visor, bag of gems, brush, and pick.

You can see how Elle had to find the “rocks”

 

Elle is imagining the flames that will come from having so many candles

 

As always, we have a “pin the (something) on the (something)”  This year Chris decided it would be “pin the flame on the explosive you will use to blow up a rock”

(she was back in her PJ’s by the time we played!)

 

She got some awesome presents and some big hugs from us!

I read her the “long version” letter I wrote her for school (she was the ‘star of the week’)  It turns out that the smaller version was even too long!  They had to take three days to get through i!  I had nine years worth of stories about her complete with pictures.

Then, it was time for bed.  She said it was a good birthday—considering it was on “boring Conference Sunday”

We’re sure glad you came to our family, little princess!

Happy Birthday!

Sunday dress and hair and stuff

We thought Elle looked so cute and grown up today--
she put on her wedge sandals and dangly earrings, and then she REALLY looked all grown up.

Easy hair style today! No tears!

AND

We went to dinner at some friends' house and Elle lost a tooth on the pork roast :)

Fashion

Here's what Elle wore to school today

And

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HERE's what she wore for 80's day in Kindergarten.

She owns "silly bands" now instead of jelly bracelets, but basically same thing, huh?

I thought it was pretty ironic.

I even thought about giving Elle a side pony on top of making her pose funny today :)

Elle's Personal Narrative

Elle shared her Writing Journal with us this evening.
It's a personal narrative about her project with Grandma.

First, they got to do a comic-style version of it.

Now,
Here's the Actual Story:

"It just won't stay!" said Grandma as her rock started to slip off the other rock she was trying to glue it to.
I said, "That's alright." I was slowly and carefully painting a rock. After about an hour, I was done, and so was Grandma, so I went to get Mom to show her. When I told Mom to guess what I made she said all sorts of wrong answers.

"A mouse?"
no
"A cat?"
no
"A frog?"
NO
"A cat?"
nooo
"A. . .green dog?"
nooooo
A.. etc. etc. etc.
Finally, I told her it was a turtle! She said, "I was going to say that next!" I thought, "Ya, right!" but I didn't say so.
The End.

In my own defense, here's the turtle in question. Okay, okay, so he has stuff missing from him but still . . .
I missed the stripped back shell and green color.
Next time, I'll just ask ;)

Climbing Walls, and making noodles

Elle noticed the space in between the wall and our closet, and started getting ideas. I'm not sure how long she'd been contemplating this, but she finally asked if she could try climbing it.




I couldn't resist saying, "Yes." After all, What kid is there who hasn't done the same thing, or at least something like it?


I admit that I was encouraging her to climb as high as she could ;)

In other news. . .

We made noodles last night!

For Activity Days last week, we went to a real French Chef in our ward, and she taught us how to make them!

Elle and I were excited to make them ourselves.

Chris was game, and we wanted to buy a pasta machine, but then we decided just to roll it out by hand.

Elle and I rolled it out then rolled it up and sliced it like you do cinnamon rolls.

Chris rolled it out then painstakingly (and perfectly) sliced each strand.

We threw it all in together.

So fun! And so yummy!

Sunday dress and hair/a great thing about Fast Sunday

Since it was Fast Sunday, we had a little more time this morning before church. I played with Elle's hair, and Chris started some fancy bread. I'm pretty excited to taste it! (I'm sure It'll be extra good since we've been fasting all day :))

Anyway, I told Elle to put on her baptism dress so I could do her hair. She didn't hesitate at all, just said, "OK!"

I'm so glad because I've been wanting to fix her hair ever since last night when I was watching P&P with some friends. (short version)

When I saw Lizzy's hair at the ball, I was all inspired to do something fancy with Elle's hair.

Of course pictures can't really do it justice, but you get the idea.
Here's how cute she looked from the front.

And how cute she looked from the back.

And a close-up.

It amazingly stayed put through all three hours of church!
It's so fun having a girl!!

Yea! Go Cougars!

Guess who won the WA vs BYU game?!!