Eleanor: 10 things

1. Eleanor's new favorite princess is Tiana from "Princess and the Frog." We watch the movie at least once a day (sometimes more with how sick mom's been). The cutest part is she can't say frog or Tiana, so instead she says "ribbit" when she talks about it. But she doesn't say "ribbit," exactly; it sounds more like "a-bwub-bwub-bwub." Seriously, too cute for words.

2. Ellie's vocabulary grows every day. It only amazes me because she's the exact opposite of Jude. Jude had little signs and code words for his language for the longest time; it's strange to have a kid who just talks! She now says no, cheese, nigh-night, flower, bug, bee, shoe, among many others.

3. Amazingly, Ellie has started to like having mom do her hair. But we have to call it "princess hair." Mom really needs to step up her hair skills, cause a half pony or pig tails is about all she can figure out.

4. Shoes, flowers, princesses... Eleanor really is a girly girl. It's like a magnetic energy just attracts her to pink, frilly things. I guess I assumed this wouldn't start till much later, so I find it rather entertaining. I also can't resist encouraging it sometimes; how can you say no to all those cute little dresses in target?!

we found the game "pretty pretty princess" at the thrift store. the kids both love it

5. After a bad experience with my parents' dog getting jealous and aggressive, Eleanor is now terrified of dogs. Well, kinda. She still loves dogs, in theory. And from afar. But when I try to get her to pet the neighbor's dog or a dog gets too close, she cries and climbs on me. Based on her reaction, I think part of it is attention-drama and part of it is actual fear. While I have no plans to own a dog anytime in the near future, I really don't want to have a child who's afraid of dogs. They're everywhere, especially in Danville, and I don't need a kid who breaks down into hysterics every time we try to go for a walk. We're working on it, slowly. I think it'll pass eventually.

6. Another one about princesses: Eleanor loves "Beauty and the Beast." She likes Belle and all, but who she really loves is the Beast. She actually gets kinda sad at the end of the movie when he turns into a prince. We have this exact conversation about 100 times a day and at the most random times.
Ellie: Bee! Bee! ::shrugs shoulders and lifts arms to say 'all gone'::
Me: Beast is all gone? Did he turn into the prince?
Ellie: Hyep.

7. My little girl sometimes likes to be a little helper. Her favorite job is to unload the dishwasher. She has no idea where anything actually goes, but she loves to open the silverware drawer and try to stuff everything inside.

8. We're in the thick of the "must carry stuff with me always" phase. We can't go anywhere without something in each hand. Usually it's her princess Tiana doll or her little people princesses. Sometimes it's a Disney storybook that weighs almost as much as she does.

9. I always hear parents talking about how traumatic it is getting kid's shots done. I really lucked out with Ellie; she hardly even cries when she gets her shots. (And Jude's the same way; gotta save that drama for elsewhere I guess.) We just had her 18 month appointment and she didn't even flinch when the needle went into her leg. It may have been because the nurse promised her a sparkly bandaid afterwards, but hey, whatever gets you through the night.

10. We've officially gone binkie-less. Well, at least during the daytime. Ellie only gets her binkie now at naptime and bedtime. At first, she did not take it well at all, but now she's pretty content about it. I have to say she's actually much cuter without her binkie; she says so many things and smiles and it's just adorable.