The Zoo

Shelby thought it would be a good idea to take Laurel and Elena to the zoo together before she has her baby in a couple of weeks. I had taken Elena to the zoo once before (with playgroup) when she was only 3 months old. I think she was able to appreciate it more this time. We visited the "North America" section.
She liked looking at the ducks. They were actually really cool. They would dive completely out of sight for over 5 seconds and then reappear.
These Galapagos tortoises were original inhabitants of the zoo and they are back for a visit. It is neat that they let you get so close to them. They are named Tort and Retort.
I took a close-up because this turtle looks EXACTLY like Morla, the swamp tortoise from The Neverending Story. Very cute.
Elena and I went down this leaf slide a couple of times.
We amazingly all fit into the giant, hollowed-out, and plastic squash and some nice woman offered to take a picture. I think Laurel and Elena were a little freaked out to be in there. Everything we said echoed like crazy.
This was my favorite part. The two girls really loved watching the sea lions. It was as if they were watching a tennis match: their heads were zipping back and forth.
The day culminated in a ride on the carousel. Elena was so brave. When the alligator started to move, she was a little worried, but she ended up having a really good time. Notice that both hands are tightly gripping the pole. Her little legs were actually squeezing the gator pretty tight too.
I took this picture after the ride was over. She's feeling much more relaxed now.
We had a great time. When we go back, we'll have to check out "Africa" and take Dan with us.

Pumpkins!

We took Elena to the pumpkin patch last Monday. I love that every holiday is more fun when you have a kid to share it with. Even if she is less than a year old. It just makes me so much more excited about everything: Like taking a picture sitting on a giant pumpkin.
We chose one of these medium sized pumpkins for me and Dan...
...and Elena "picked" this little one.
Every time I see her with her Dad, I am struck by how much they look alike.

At the church youth activity (ages 12-18) on Thursday they carved pumpkins. I had planned the activity, and I was nervous that someone would lose a finger or something. Luckily, everyone had a good time and no one got hurt. :)
Here are my two favorites. Hermana Gomez and her daughter made these two after doing some research online. I love the one of the right. Hopefully Dan and I will find the time to carve our pumpkin sometime this week.

Our House...

...is a very, very, very fine house. With two cats in the yard. Life used to be so hard. Now everything is easy 'cause of you.

I couldn't help myself. Once I wrote "Our House" I had to finish the chorus from the Crosby, Stills, and Nash song. Dan was able to find the time to mow the lawn this past week and I thought I would take a picture of our cute, little house for those of you who don't live in the area. We love living here and we are really grateful for our home. Many of you know the work that we put into it before we moved in. Several of you helped - thank you very much.

The tree in the front was planted less than 2 months ago. It was our five year anniversary tree. Elena and I have already spread out a blanket under it a couple of times and played or read in the little bit of shade that there is. Dan did a great job building the raised flower bed on the left (I helped) and I planted the flowers. The front and back yards are actually 100% weeds, but they are green most of the year, so they're okay with us for now. Maybe we'll try planting grass in the spring - maybe not.

Email: 9 month update

October 14, 2007

Dan took some adorable pictures yesterday of Elena's first time taking a bath in the big tub.  Up until then, she was still taking a bath in the little plastic baby tub because it was easier that way until she started to try to stand up inside it.  Anyway - I didn't want to post these naked pics on the blog, but you all had to see her cute little tush (is that how it's spelled?).  I guess I will just make this her 9 month email since she'll be 9 months on Wednesday. 

New developments:
Elena recently learned how to spit out her food.  We had been lucky for so long.  A few days ago she realized that if she tried to keep her lips sealed but breathed out that the food would exit and it would make a pretty cool sound.  I think she does it whenever I feed her baby food to encourage me to give her more table food.  She is loving everything solid.  She's been eating bananas, peaches, cooked carrots, different crackers and cereals, and cottage cheese.  I am slowly trying to get over my fear that she may choke.  She only comes close if I put too much food in front of her - she'll shove it all in.
She still scoots around the same way that she has been for the last two months, but we have highs hopes that she'll lift her rear and crawl someday soon.  She is starting to pull up on things.  Mostly onto her knees, but once she pulled up on the coffee table until she was standing. 
Elena has a new sound.  It is kind of like she is singing the Tarzan yell now that I think of it.  She decided that today during church was the premium time to perfect it.  Everyone in the Spanish branch just loves her, so I know they don't mind, but it was disruptive and we had to keep taking her out.  At least it's a happy sound.
The older she gets, the more she loves books.  She will sit and turn pages back and forth for minutes at a time.  "Minutes" may not sound like much, but normally she's very used to one-on-one time and not so keen on alone time.  Her favorite alone activity besides reading is to scoot over to one of the bookcases in the house and to pull all the books off the bottom shelf.  She's very good at it actually; she's not one to back down from challenge.  She'll try each book until she finds the weakest link that will pull out.
Elena has starting giving besitos (kisses) not just to people, but also to her books.  She'll kiss the animals and the pictures of people and then look up smiling proudly, so that we'll say, "Aww, you are so sweet."  tonight before bed, she was kissing Dan's face in an album over and over.  It was adorable!

Those are the big updates for the month I guess.  I hope that you all have a good week and stay tuned to thedisonfamily.blogspot.com to see what we are all up to.

Dan's birthday weekend

Dan turned 29 last weekend! He had a great time watching conference and playing football with the guys (in his new cleats). We were lucky enough to have Bethany here too. She is a saint! She watched Elena so that we could go to the temple Friday night (it's 90 minutes away). I had a lot of fun with her this weekend and Elena loved having her Aunt BB around. Bethany and I took her to a birthday party at "The Little Gym". It is definitely geared toward older children, but she had fun. The birthday girl was turning one and she and Elena really enjoyed the bubbles that were blown for the kids to play in on the trampoline.
Dan had a football themed birthday (he got cleats, a ball, flags, a pump for the ball, etc.)
Elena is following behind Laura. She's a very sweet and creative girl who I tutor.


This is the birthday girl (Mia) with Elena. She is Laura's little sister.

Fun with Daddy

Here are two of the games that Dan loves to play with Elena:


What Dan keeps saying is ven. It means "come" in Spanish


They've been playing this one since she was just a few weeks old. She actually used to be able to hold her balance better than she does now.

Mohawk

Elena's hair is starting to get slightly longer and thicker, so I thought I would try to pull it up on top of her head with a hair band. When that failed (miserably), I used some gel to make it into a pretty little mohawk. Unfortunately, it is kind of hard to see it in a couple of the pictures because the background was dark. We went back to her usual style the next day, but trust me: it was very cool.



I had to throw these in as well since she's so darn cute!


I have a couple of videos that I will post soon - maybe tomorrow...