NH Trip

Ella and I flew home for a few days last week to attend a sweet high school friend's wedding. Since it was Ella's last time flying free before she turns two, we extended the trip a bit to see family. 

Ella loves my parents, Bo and Gram. Or Mema as she now calls my mom. They always have fun toys and adventures in store for her. 

Playing with Bo's golf balls: 

Loving the coloring table, or rather handing people crayons and encouraging you to color with that crayon. 

Massive train communities: 

Playing with her uncles' tanks and ninja turtles. (Using their swords as q-tips):

Horse rides: 

Experiencing her first ever pumpkin. Grown by Bo: 

Celebrated Christmas early with a singing manger scene: 

Sneaking some of Bo's breakfast: 

More work on colors: 

Dinner out: 

Playing with cousins: 

Ella and Danny plan their escape:

Snuggles with 4-month old Timmy: 

Here are some wedding pics. 

Naomi's dress was gorgeous and she was just beaming. Ella kept pointing at Naomi and saying "bride". :)

The wedding-ring-search party: (the adorable ring bearer dropped them in the way down the field) They were found after only a few moments. 

Another flight with Ella

Yesterday Ella and I flew up to NH for a sweet friend's wedding this weekend. Since this will be the last time Ella can fly free before the big 0-2, we decided to make a long weekend out of the trip. 

To get our energy out before our flight we enjoyed the completely empty "Kidsport"! 

Flying!

Watching planes out the window: 

She did great on the plane! I'm so blessed with a cheerful flier. Originally we were sitting next to a (very pleasant) man, but the second the doors closed he popped up and jumped over to the empty row to our right. So Ella ended up with her own seat. :) 

I wasn't really looking forward to splitting 1 seat between myself, a bouncy 21 month old and my extremely kicky 7 month belly. 

So what did we do to entertain ourselves? EAT! 

I opened this container of puffs when we boarded (approx. 5:11 PM). When we landed at 7:03 PM, there were only 28 puffs left in the container...

Ella is a big fan of the seat-back tray: 

When she got tired of moving the puffs around her tray and back-and-forth between our two trays she tried out a new eating method. 

Step 1: fill shoe. Step 2: pour into mouth.

Then we had a few minutes of obligatory staring at the guy behind us. 

The view of Boston as we landed: 

Vacation Videos

Here are a few videos from our vacation in Bethany Beach, DE last week. I'm not able to upload videos from my phone when I post live, so these might be out of order.

This is of Ella smashing sand castles to find her hidden toys. A game invented by daddy and loved by all:

We found a "splash fountain" right by our house one day; Ella splashed around for over an hour. I love seeing her so joyful!

Ella splashing in the ocean:

Ella chasing seagulls:

Ella loved playing on all the chairs on the rental home. Josh found her "stuck" like this one day during breakfast:

Blueberry Cobbler

This recipe is to die for! I had never made a cobbler before, but found this recipe online earlier this summer.

I made a few modifications and like it much better. You can taste the blueberries more. Basically I increased the crust amounts by half and removed some sugar from the topping. 

Ingredients: 

Crust
1 1/2 cup of sugar
3 cups of all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon of salt
6 tablespoons of shortening
1 1/2 cups of milk

Filling
2 pounds of fresh blueberries
3/4 cup of sugar
4 tablespoons of butter

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Grease 9x13 pan with butter or shortening
3. Mix together all ingredients for the crust; put 3/4 of mixture into the bottom of the pan
4. Add all blueberries to pan
5. Pour additional crust mix over the blueberries
6. Top with 3/4 cups of sugar and cut up cubes of butter
7. Bake for 45-60 minutes or until the crust is golden brown.
8. Enjoy with ice cream!

Gillespie Family Picnic

We got back from the beach on Saturday afternoon and headed to Ohio on Sunday right after lunch for a family get together. 

Ella playing with her cousin Michael. He is always so sweet to her. He was teaching her to tickle. 

Then all the kids went into the "hot pool". Ella loved splashing and playing in her intertube. 

We did hot dogs and s'mores by a fire at night. Ella liked the marshmallows best.