Thanksgiving 2011

For Thanksgiving this year we loaded up the car and headed to Louisiana for a nice relaxing 5 days.  Well at least we thought it was going to be relaxing!  Our first night at Nona and Papa's ended up in a 3 hour trip to the ER (don't worry Ella ended up being fine) but other than that the remainder of the week stayed very uneventful!  We had a great trip that included lots of family and friends, an LSU game, a birthday party, a visit from Santa and even an impromptu family football pick up game!

We were finally successful and getting a decent family picture of the three of us!  Ella was even looking.  This was after not alot of sleep thanks to that ER visit but for once we are all happy and smiling!

My little monkey of course spent lots of her time in the wagon on Thanksgiving day (it is her favorite place to be).  Luckily there were lots of people there to pull her around and she even had her favorite little buddy to ride along with her.

I swear this baby is always full of smiles!  I don't think in 1 year that I have ever seen this kid cry!  He definitely enjoyed his wagon rides too.

Nona really enjoyed having her girl around for a few days and spent lots of time chasing her up and down the stairs.  They were both all smiles after some delicious food which included lots of fried turkey, all the Thanksgiving casserole staples, and Keith's favorite Oyster dressing!
Somehow after lunch while the younger boys were throwing around the football, an impromptu pick up game of boys versus girls got started.  This might have been the funniest thing I have ever watched!

Bre got very into it!  Hey Bre, don't let DZ see this or they will have you playing on all of the Intramural teams!
My dear husband even showed the younger kids how it was done!

Luckily we only ended up with one casualty when Papa Ron laid out for a catch and broke his cell phone case.  No real injuries though!

I have lots of other posts from all of our activities during our week in LA and I will slowly get those up!

Happy Black Friday!

My little turkey wants to wish everyone safe shopping today! Keith and I will be spending our day tailgating and attending the LSU v Arkansas game while Nona is hanging out with the little Miss.

We sure hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and enjoyed all the Turkey (preferably deep fried... Thats how we like it!) they could possibly eat! Our day was wonderful and included a great meal, lots of family, a birthday party, a visit from Santa and even an impromptu Turkey Bowl! Don't worry lots of pictures to come.... Those Underwood and Dicke families get real serious about their pickup football games (this one even had Papa Dicke laying out trying to catch a few passes!)

Welcome to the Holiday Season everyone!

The Lime

We went to eat on Sunday night for a friend's birthday and Ella decided she wanted to taste one of the limes that was on the table. Knowing that she loves pickles (just as much or maybe more than her momma), we decided to let her go for it. Here is the progression...

Sad thing is, she continued to eat them even after this face was made!   She even tried to share them with her daddy.  Guess like mother like daughter, my kid loves a little sour in her life!

Happy Halloween!

So as usual I am a little late with the obligatory Halloween Post but since this is a record of our family life, I have backdated it to keep things in order.

I loved Ella's little outfit for Halloween, but she refused to let me get a good picture of her in it.  She is just not a fan of having her picture taken.  Guess she is too busy going going going all the time!  You just can not get that girl to stop for a minute unless its Nap or Bedtime.

Since our little lady loves to dance around like crazy, we decided to dress her as a dancer, but not just any dancer, we went full on 80's with oversized sweatshirt and legwarmers included!  Ella does this crazy thing with her feet that is reminiscent of flashdance so I felt it was 100% appropriate!

Doesn't she just look great!  She loved her little costume and made sure to dance plenty for us all night.  Unfortunately she would not pose for a picture of me and Ella looking down or her back was the best I could get.

I made Chicken Tortilla Soup and brought it over to our friend's Jill and Cody's house for Ella to do a little trick or treating and hand out some candy.  Jill and Cody have two little dogs and Ella had a blast chasing them around and feeding them her goldfish and dinner.

You can barely see her in the background, but that is Chloe eyeing Ella and waiting for her to drop more food on the ground.  I am pretty sure those poor dogs had gained 5 lbs by the time Ella was gone.

I can't help it but I just love that little tush!  Guess that's a good thing since usually this is the only side of her I get when taking pictures!

Can't wait to see what crazy costume we decide to put Ella in next year.  There has already been talk of bringing back Fred and Wilma now that Pebbles has made her arrival :)

Nona and Papa Visit

Nona and Papa came to visit the little miss a few weeks ago and I am just getting around to posting.  While they were here we tried to keep EK as busy as possible cause she likes to Go Go Go (which while they were here she learned to say!)

Saturday we took a little trip to the zoo which not surprising Ella loved.  Here Papa spoiled her and picked her up to see every exhibit which she just loved!

The lions were out sunning themselves and I had to get a picture of the King of the Jungle.  This was after he had been sunning his belly but that picture didn't come out good!

We let Ella run around a bit and she just loved it!  The Caldwell Zoo is great because it is so spread out that it never feels like there are lots of people there.  It was Boo at the Zoo the weekend we went and still we never had to fight people to see the exhibits which was just great when you have a 1 year old that wants to constantly go!

Ella and her Papa tried and to take a picture in front of the big spider web.  If you can't tell by EK's face, she was squirming to try and get free so she could go and run around.

 Sunday we spend most of our afternoon outside which Ella would love to do 100% of the time.  That kid just loves the outdoors.  She was having a blast with her Papa driving her around in the wagon. 

She also had a blast playing on her little playhouse.  Unfortunately she has not mastered the art of going down the slide just yet, but I did get some great action shots.  These just crack me up!

We had a great time with Nona and Papa in town and can't wait to go to LA for Thanksgiving to spend more time with them and the rest of the Underwood family!

Trip to Houston

Last weekend we decided to take a 4 day trip to Houston to let Ella Kate spend some time with the grandparents and also her cousins, Nanny, and Parrain.  It was a VERY busy weekend and we kept EK going almost non-stop the whole time.  Luckily she was in a great mood the whole time and loved everything we did!

On Friday afternoon we took Ella to the Houston Children's Museum.  If you are ever near Houston I highly recommend it.  They have a wonderful area for children from Birth to 35 months called the TotSpot and Ella loved it.  All of the activities in that area are for children in that age range and they can just run free and explor.

They even had an enlarged lite-brite which Ella loved.  Though really I think her daddy liked it just as much!

She was so proud of herself when she figured out how to stick the pegs in the hole!

After exploring the TotSpot for awhile, we decided to see what the rest of the museum had to offer.  All of the exhibits are great and I really hope to go back soon when my nephew is in town cause I know he would love it!

Even Parrain came and enjoyed the museum with us.  As usual he won extra Uncle points for braving the museum with us when he really didn't have to.  Thanks David!

Saturday of course was LSU football day, so after a busy morning of shopping with Granny, we headed out to Missourri City to play with the cousins and to see Nanny and Uncle Brad.

Two of my favorite little guys.  Easton was trying to stop Rowan from eating chalk.  Needless to say Rowan was not impressed at the intervention.

The Millers even made it out for some football and Jessica had a great time entertaining the older boys!  I will never get over that Easton and Gavin are only 3 weeks apart!  Their size looks more like 3 years!

Daddy with his little princess and his godson.  I am pretty sure shortly after this Ella had a breakdown cause daddy was holding someone besides just her.  We have really got to work on her manners :)

Saturday night the adults decided to go out to dinner.  It isn't very often that all 4 older boys are together in one place so of course I had to take advantage of the photo op.  We went to eat at a great restaurant in Sugar Land called Rouxpour.  We really enjoyed dinner and even more the company.  It was great getting out and enjoy a meal without having to chase kiddos around.

Of course EK had a great time being entertained my Granny.  She just loved climbing up and down the stairs and finally agreeing to just sit on the bottom step and relax with a huge bucket of spoons.  Of course the filled bucket only lasted a few minutes before Ella spilled it all over.

Granny even let her sit on the floor and enjoy some crushed ice.  This of course was to have her forget about the fact she had just ran into the table and bumped her head.  It's amazing how quick they forget!
Sunday afternoon Granny and Papi braved the crowds and took Ella to the zoo by themselves.  Unfortunately I wasn't feeling to hot so I stayed home and took a much needed nap!

They had not started Boo at the Zoo just yet at the Houston Zoo, but they were letting the kids decorate little pumpkins and EK got her hand stamped and got to pick a pumpkin for herself which she was very proud to show off!

They recently opened up the African exhibit at the zoo and Ella just loved it.  I am pretty sure she would sit and watch animals all day if she could and I can't wait to take her back to the zoo again.  Luckily I hear the zoo in Tyler is pretty good for the size of our town so I think we will be headed there next weekend.

As usual our trip was great and Ella Kate even behaved so well in the car (a first for her).  I find that trips are starting to get easier with her now that she is older and there are no bottles to bring and she can eat right off of our plates.  Luckily we have a few weeks off to recoup before our next big trip to LA for Thanksgiving!  Thanks again Granny and Papi for the fun!

Ella's First Playdate

Last weekend we agreed to watch a friend of our's daughter so they could finish moving into their new house.  Kloe is three weeks older than Ella Kate so we decided to brave having both girls and learn what it would be like if we ever had one year old twins.  Needless to say it is really true what they say, kids really do have more fun when they have someone to play with.

Ella Kate and Kloe played so well together the whole time!  Ella just loved showing Kloe all of her toys and I think Kloe enjoyed playing with them.

They even shared really well.  Well that is after Ella showed her dominance over her favorite toys and stole a few from Kloe.  Luckily that didn't last to long!

They even enjoyed snack time together!  If you notice Ella Kate is eyeing Kloe.  That little girl sure enjoys her food and always wants to make sure someone is not eating something that she wants!

I love this picture!  It looks like Ella is explaining to Kloe how to use the toy.  Needless to say the girls had a great time and we would be happy to have Kloe at our house anytime.  Good thing too cause they have just moved into our neighborhood which we are SO happy about!  I am sure these two girls will have many more playdates together!