Awesome Weekend

As you can see from the title, we had an awesome weekend.

Saturday, we did our normal grocery shopping run early in the a.m. Ellie LOVES to go grocery shopping (which also makes me love grocery shopping); she loves being high up in the shopping carriage and greeting people as we walk down the aisles. She also loves to try and snatch stuff off the shelf and throw things out of the cart that I've just put in there.

It rained for the rest of they day, so we stayed in. We did LOTS of floor-time playing, opting to keep the TV off for the most part.

Speaking of TV, Ellie finally discovered the ON/OFF button on ours yesterday. She's been pushing the little green light next to it (the sensor) for the past month and getting pretty pissed off that the button was broken. Yesterday, curiosity must have gotten the best of her because she decided to push the space next to the little green light and VOILA!... the TV miraculously turned itself on. She pushed it again... and it turned off. AHA! On, off, on, off, on, off... for the next 10 minutes until I cut up a plastic card and promptly taped it over the new-found magic button. When Ellie tried to push the plastic card, the TV didn't go on. She was not a happy camper, but at least I'VE saved my sanity.

We've been putting her to bed 10-15 minutes earlier every night since Wednesday in hopes of fiddling with her sleeping schedule for the time-change. Last night, Ellie was in bed by 6:45pm (her normal time is 7:30pm). Not too bad. It only took her 10 minutes or so to settle down. And this morning, she was up by 7:20am. I'll probably have to wake her up the next couple of days in order for us to get out the door on time, but I'm hoping by the end of the week, she'll be waking up on her own once again.

So, after a delicious breakfast of French Toast, we decided to take a page out of MinneMom's schedule and head off to the kids' area at one of our local malls. Harry had mentioned taking Ellie to this place a couple of times this winter, but I was afraid she wasn't quite big enough for it yet. I'm happy to report that I was completely wrong.

Ellie had a fantastic time this morning. She loved running around on the bouncy floor and playing with all the stuff. I couldn't believe how much fun she was having. We got there a few minutes before the mall opened, so she had pretty much the whole place to herself for about 10-15 minutes. As other kids started to trickle in, she greeted each one with a big "HI!"It was so cute. She wasn't shy with them, and she politely waited her turn for things. She played for about 30 minutes total. We then took a short walk around the bottom floor of the mall so I could get a little exercise, too. We are definitely doing this more often. We're gonna try to go again next Sunday at 10am, so she can have some time to herself again. And we're gonna remember the camera, too.

My mom came by for a visit this afternoon and ended up staying for dinner, too. Ellie's really taken to her lately, which is great. I guess my sister was right; my mom really just doesn't do well with babies. Now that Ellie is toddling around, it's a different story. They get along famously, and Ellie thinks Grammy is a riot. I'm so glad. I love seeing them together.

And lucky for us tonight, all the excitement of the day pooped our little girl out. She went to bed at 7:30pm and fell asleep within 5 minutes. Good stuff.

All in all, this was one of the best weekends this winter.