A Babysitting Adventure

We were asked by Son #4 to keep their almost-two-year-old for three days last week. After raising 4 boys, I thought one little one would be a snap! Ha! I had forgotten about the continual motion syndrome when they are awake! And thank goodness for naps and early bedtime. The minute she was asleep I headed for bed also! I was pooped! Guess I am out of practice.


But Miss Ella Bella is a real joy! She runs--never walks! She laughs with glee at the simplest things like rolling a soccer ball down the hall and having me roll it back. She loves to clean things--the picnic table, our car when it sprinkled on it, the kitchen table after eating.




She enjoyed going shopping with us and had to have her purse over her arm just like mine. In the car she was always on the lookout for COWS! She loves cows and announces her sightings of cows in a VERY LOUD VOICE so that we would not miss them! We stopped by the roadside and watched one near the fence eating grass. Ella Bella watched for a minute and then announced: "BIG tongue!" Yes, that cow did have a very big tongue. Ella talked about the cow's big tongue all during dinner and gave several demonstrations of the way it licked its upper lip!


She loved story time with her granddad.














She was a great help in the kitchen. She learned how to snap fresh green beans, make Mickey (er, excuse me--she LOVES Minnie!)Mouse pancakes and then she helped make yummy brownies for the neighbor down the street who had surgery. She also very efficiently helped load silverware in the dishwasher after each meal.



The last day we were there I was taking pictures of flowers for possible painting projects and she had to take one picture "all by herself!" Not bad for a young 'un! Maybe she is a budding young photographer--or maybe I will paint it for her!



Most amazing of all are her computer skills. She has an ABC program at http://www.starfall.com/ that she loves. We had to call her mother to tell us how to find it and then we were able to access the program several times so that she could do her ABCs. Amazing!