Wow!

It has been a crazy week since I lasted posted here. On Thursday we left for my cousin Patrick's wedding in Lubbock, Texas. It was Ella's first time on an airplane. Keith and I prepared ourselves for ear pain, crankiness, tiredness, etc. but fortunately Ella was a terrific traveler. Except...she came down with a stomach virus at our first layover. Fun! We had either dirty diapers or projectile vomiting at every stop! She had the virus pretty much the whole trip but you wouldn't have known it from her personality. She handled it so well. We were so glad that we made the trip despite all of that...it was great to see Patrick get married and spend some time with family. Then, once we got home, I came down with the virus. I'm guessing that it hits adults harder than babies because I haven't handled it as well as Ella! :-) So, needless to say, I haven't been through all my Texas pictures yet (I have 7 GB worth of pictures...A LOT!) But here are just a couple until I can get them all done.

Waiting at the Montgomery airport to get on our first flight (of 6 total):

At the Dallas airport they had the coolest little kids play area. This picture was taken about 30 minutes before Ella upchucked everywhere:

When I was a little girl, I always got to jump on hotel beds...Ella really enjoyed doing that too!:

They had their rehearsal dinner at a really quaint local restaurant. Ella hung in there until 8:30 or so even after getting up at 5:15am:

Before the wedding we went on a little tour of Texas Tech where 3 of my cousins went to school:

There was a beautiful flower garden right outside the church where the wedding was held:

The happy couple, Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Schneider:

During the dollar dance, we gave Ella a dollar to give to Patrick. Keith took her up to him and she handed him her dollar and proceeded to dance/snuggle with him. We couldn't believe it because at that point she wasn't letting anyone else hold her!

Ella says "NO MORE Paparazzi!!!"

heehee...Ella was eating spaghetti tonight and had it everywhere so I grabbed my little camera to snap a picture and that's what she gave me. Oh well...I guess she's really starting to develop PCS (photographer's child syndrome ;-)). I knew it would happen...

Happy Birthday Mom!

On Sunday we celebrated my mom's 52nd birthday. We had Pizza Hut pizza and a coconut pie from Jim 'n Nick's. Yummers!

Last week we got together with Tonya, Taylor, and Tinsley to swim at the Deer Creek swimming pool. The splash park wasn't working, but Ella didn't mind one bit. She loved the zero entry baby pool. She must have felt like she was back at the beach. :-)

Tinsley said "baby floats are for babies! I'm going to lay on it like a big girl!"

After swimming we sat around the pool and ate our lunch. Ella ate her whole pb&j out of a tupperware bowl without throwing it one time! Big milestone! :-)

14 months and some good news!

Ella turned 14 months yesterday. She is so full of energy...I had to call in reinforcements (Keith) to help me keep her in the chair for her picture.



In other news...Keith has accepted a new job! He's going to be the IT Director for our church, Frazer United Methodist (www.frazerumc.org). Now, I know you might be thinking...IT for a church...no big deal. However, Frazer is not your normal church. We have a congregation of over 8,000 and a full staff so this is going to be an exciting new challenge for Keith. We have always known that the IT world is a great fit for Keith, but we never thought that he would have the opportunity to use it as a ministry. God has been so faithful to allow Keith to not only do what he loves and is good at, but to use it to win people to Christ as well! Wow! :-) We are just so very thankful that God has blessed our family so richly. Also, thanks to everyone that knew Keith was interviewing and was praying for him. We really appreciate it!

4th Pictures (and a couple more)

Here are a few more pictures from our 4th of July celebration. God was so good to give us a beautiful day!

After a full day in the pool, we headed downtown to the Riverwalk to watch Montgomery's fireworks. They were pretty good I think. Ella hung in there like a champ...we didn't make it home until around 10:30 which is pretty late for her. We got some popcorn while we were there which she loved so I think that distracted her from her sleepiness. :-)

Ok, so admittedly I am not a fireworks photographer, but I did my best. They were so pretty!

Here are the last of the smiling pictures from the other day. I hope she keeps it up...for awhile we went through a smiling dry spell in pictures!

Finally, Keith has Ella into another sport...golf. He takes her into the backyard and hits balls. She thinks it's great. He even came home with a little golf club set just for her. I love that they have fun things they like to do together. :-)

4th of July

I hope everyone had a really terrific 4th of July! We had a great time getting lots of sun, eating good food, and swimming in the pool. Ok, so I'm up to my eyeballs in client images and don't have time to work on our personal ones. But I've promised myself that I'm not going to get behind on the family blog! :-) So here's one picture from yesterday for now...more to come later.

B-Ball

There's a basketball court down the street from our house and we've been going a few times a week to let Ella run around and Keith shoot a few hoops. To say Ella loves it is putting it mildly. She thinks it's great! She gets the biggest smile on her face and runs around squealing. She's her daddy's girl on that...she certainly doesn't get a love of sports from me! :-)

Keith's got hops!

Taking a break from basketball to find and eat some dirt...yum.

This is how Ella helps me do laundry...she climbs in the basket and proceeds to pull down all the neatly folded piles of clothes. Such a big helper! :-)

One big smile for today...more to come tomorrow.