Keeping Busy

On Thursday the Brust cousins were heading out. Their goal was to leave around 11:00 so Ellie and I tried to arrive in Elverson before 10:00. Somehow I always take a very long time to leave in the morning. This morning Ellie decided to sleep and sleep - I finally just woke her up (she always wakes up when I transfer her into her car seat. I did try to keep her sleeping, but failed).
Upon arriving in Elverson Ellie and I spent time with the cousins. Grandma, Kelly, and Clark were all there, too. Calla and Kelsey both took turns holding Ellie. Calla and Kelsey were in charge of packing up their stuff - well, their dolls' stuff. At one point they had their six dolls lined up in front of the back door ready to go, with their back packs next to them. We miss having them around but are so thankful they can come visit on a regular basis!

You can never have too many babies.

After they were on their way Ellie and I ran to Walmart for a few groceries to hold us over the weekend. My goal for the next few weeks is to pick my grocery store and learn the layout so that I don't keep going to Walmart for convenience sake. Although it is convenient, they frequently do not have what I want and their service is pretty terrible. Hopefully I'll transition soon. I'm not holding my breath.
Brittany Mountz texted in the morning asking if I wanted to come over and work on a sewing project or something with her in the afternoon. Since I didn't have anything planned I said yes. Plus, staying busy helps avoid missing the cousins! So around 1:30 I headed over to Birdsboro along with my sewing supplies. Brittany just pulled out her sewing machine after a few years of owning it and has decided to want to learn how to use it. She had a purse pattern and fabric so she worked on cutting out the pattern while I worked on some Christmas presents for Kelsey. I had bought a bunch of fabric from the clearance rack for her birthday present and have since used it for Calla's birthday presents and still have plenty left over. After Kelsey's Christmas presents I may have to keep figuring out more ideas. Carly, you will be sick of the white and pink fabric by the end of it!
Ellie was not very compliant while at Brittany's house and would only settle down when she was being held. Towards the end I laid her on her blanket and put a pile of fabric in front of her to look at. It worked for almost 10 minutes, which helped give me time to cut out all the pieces. I enjoyed spending time with Brittany during the day, which doesn't happen often because she usually works.
Jon and I ate chili for dinner and then spent about an hour and a half just cleaning up the house. It was getting out of control! When mail comes that I don't know what to do with, I put it in a pile. When I don't know where to put something, I put it in a pile. When something needs dealing with in the near future, I put it in a pile. We just had too many piles of un-dealt with stuff. It was wonderful to work together to accomplish this. Jon put Ellie in the Bjorn and she soon fell asleep. After picking up and organizing we spent some time writing some thank you notes before Omar came over. Omar and Jon went to the basement to play some FIFA while Ellie and I hung out upstairs.
Thursday morning I decided it would be fun to have some people over Friday night. I ended up inviting Peter and Brittany, Jere Scott and Dorothy, and Omar for games and crafts. Peter, Brittany, and Omar came at 6:00 and we all had chicken BBQ from the Conestoga Christian School fundraiser event. The Bradshaws had just eaten them for lunch so they came over around 7:15. The girls spent our time in the living room working on sewing projects. It really worked out because Dorothy is very skilled in sewing and could direct Brittany with her purse project. I unfortunately found out that I was misleading Brittany a few times. "Do the patterns need to be cut out precisely?" "no, I think it doesn't really matter." Wrong. Whoops!
The boys taught Jere Scott how to play Settlers of Catan. Unlike Carly, Katelyn, and Caleb's game on Tuesday night, their game lasted closer to two hours. Afterwards Jere Scott claimed he would play again, so at least they enjoyed themselves! They also spent some time playing FIFA in the basement. Everyone ended up staying until after midnight and ate most of the snacks - a successful night by Grandma's standards!
After the late night I was very thankful that Ellie only woke up at 6:30 and 8:00. She's getting better! This was Jon's first Saturday where he could invest the entire day on our home, so he wanted to get an early start. I slowly got ready and ended up heading out to the Conestoga auction with Mom around 10:00. Although I didn't purchase anything at the auction it was a fun event to attend. A lot of kids from our church attend Conestoga so we saw numerous familiar faces. Mom and I ate lunch there (which was delicious) and hung around until 2:00 before heading home. Ellie and I checked in on Jon's progress before picking up our feet and resting until it was time to get ready for our next event. Emily Feist got married two weekends ago at Raysetown Lake. Since it was technically a destination wedding they had a reception locally. Cat and I had agreed a few months ago to attend together so I left at 4:00 with Ellie to go to the reception. First we stopped by Bed, Bath, & Beyond to pick up gifts (sad, I know) and then ate at Applebees. It was a dessert reception so we ate dinner and arrived right at 7:00. It was a lot of fun to see Emily. The only other people I knew I didn't really talk to (Bryant and MaryJo Lucas, Peter Catranis and his wife) but Cat and I got to catch up towards the end of the reception Emily came and sat at our table and we talked to her for a while. It's always fun to see people from High School and hear about their lives.

Ellieisms:
Ellie has a cold or something right now. She has the saddest sounding cough and her nose gets clogged up. She also sneezes, which is adorable.
She has also really started to smile. I need to catch it on video.

Jaybird

Not looking too comfortable...

Helping Daddy write a thank you note

Sleeping baby

My craft.

Checking out the menu

With the bride

It's like Ellie knows she's getting her picture taken.