All About Ella

Ella celebrated her first birthday on Sunday, November 30. I can't believe an entire year has gone by since I had her. Time really does speed up as our family gets older and we have more kids. I think it is because of all the things going on all the time--not too many lazy afternoons or days anymore. Ella is such a spunky, funny thing. She really does know what she wants and has a fit if she is crossed. For example, she knows where the honey is on the kitchen shelf (she likes to suck the tip like a bottle.) When she gets to it and I have to take it away, I have an earache for an hour to pay for my apparent rudeness. She loves to climb on stairs or chairs. Of course she is a hazard on both these things and I have to stop her whenever she happens to get through a gate left open. Once I even caught her trying to climb over the gate on the stairs. This all comes as a shock to me because I've never had a climber before. Abigail and Maggie both had such different personalities. Abigail was really mild and independent, Maggie more clingy and stuck to me like glue.

For her birthday we took her to a nearby park on the Lower Pierce Reservoir. There is water with trails and jungle around it and a play toy. Ella is officially walking and I knew she would have fun climbing on the playground. When we pulled up there was a group (herd, congregation, family, what have you) of monkeys. Monkeys are just a plain nuisance to us now, but Ella does love monkeys so at first it was kind of cute to see her point her little finger and make a happy noise. She also loved climbing the steps on the play toy and sliding down the slide. She was very content and happy. The other kids were enjoying themselves as well. Then the male monkey, the leader of the pack, decided to come onto the play toy and perch himself right by the slide. This made me nervous because from past experience I know that the male in the family can be very aggressive, not to mention he is significantly bigger than the others presenting a more immediate danger to the small children. So Joseph gets on the play toy (I had the camera and I was taking pictures) and positions himself between this monkey and Xander who was playing happily on one side of the toy. (I just took Ella off altogether.) I think Joseph looked at the monkey wrong or something because He showed his teeth (and monkeys have very sharp teeth)and started swinging at Joseph and making a hissing noise. Joseph didn't budge and made a motion to shoo it away. That didn't go well either. More hissing and swinging. By this time I was begging Joseph to just get away and let him claim his territory--we would go. I wasn't about to let my kids anywhere near the thing now. Joseph reluctantly stepped away and the showdown ended. In Joseph's own words, "I wanted to break that monkey's neck." I suppose I could have snapped a picture of it all, but I was seriously worried he would swing onto Joseph and bite him in the neck and I would have to save him. I guess it was a memorable birthday.

The cake and presents at home went a lot better. As you can see, Ella thoroughly enjoyed her cake, licking the plate and her tray. We were all done taking pictures and eating our cake when I looked at Ella and she had put the plate behind her head. I said, "Oh Joseph look. Quick get a picture." All the kids started laughing and Ella didn't know what she did, but she started laughing too. It was a fun moment. More than her cake and presents, I think Ella sure enjoyed all the attention she was getting. She is sure a fun girl and we are glad she is a part of our family.