Some of Ana Elisa's favorite things...

It's fun to watch Ana Elisa as she develops her likes and interests. One of the things we discovered she really enjoys is music (we actually discovered this really early on). On our way to church on Sunday we put some classical music on in the car. She started swinging her arms around with her pointer fingers pointed like she was directing the music. It was so cute! Here are some pics of her demonstrating her love for music:

Here she is with her very first drum set (aka our cheap version of a drum set!)

Some ladies in our ward get together every Tuesday for a Music & Me class. Ana Elisa loves to go and especially loves when she gets to get up with her instrument and march...
(Sorry, the picture is a bit blurry, too much movement!)



On Thursdays they have a kids show called "Dewper" at the mall where they sing and dance and perform for the kids. Ana Elisa loves it. I had a hard time getting pictures of her boogieing, but here's sample of what it's all about...





Another thing she has really grown to love are the Sesame Street characters, specifically Elmo and Cookie Monster. She gets so excited when she sees them. So, on Saturday we took her to a Credit Union who was featuring Elmo live to meet the children. She was in heaven. They had popcorn and drinks for the kids and Ana Elisa kept trying to go over and offer Elmo some--which I'm sure he'd have loved since he was out in the heat! Ana Elisa is so thoughtful :)



She also got to see the woof woof...


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Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Yesterday we went to Walmart and saw a lady leaving the store with a bunch of shamrock balloons. I asked Ana Elisa if she wanted one and she yelped for joy. We ran to the area where they have all the holiday things and found the last balloon there.


Ana Elisa has been so happy with her balloon. When we got home from the store she went running to the kitchen and opened a drawer and grabbed two long plastic spatula type spoons. She used the spoons to wack her balloon around the room. She did that for a long time. Now she carries the balloon around everywhere with her.

New Car

Our poor Mazda has been really struggling. It's no wonder, it's almost ten years old and it suffered a fender bender almost four years ago that never left it quite the same. We've been trying to run it for as long as possible. We even decided to keep it when we saw that the car won't run when it's raining (poor Emerson had to figure that out the hard way at about 10:00pm when he had to pull off to the side of the road on his way home from Phoenix). We figured that it doesn't rain that often here, so we held off on replacing it. But we finally broke down (no pun intended) and decided it was time to get a new car when the breaks started acting up (again, poor Emerson found this out the hard way when someone cut him off in the middle of an intersection and he couldn't get the car to stop--luckily he's great at maneuvering cars and was able to jerk out of the way just in time).
I wish I would have taken a picture so you could see the pathetic state that poor car was in. The hood paint was almost all gone, and until recently it didn't have any hubcaps. Inside, though, we kept it really nice. I'm sure the new owners will appreciate that!! :) Poor Emerson called me a few months ago in a panic because one of the Directors of Honeywell wanted to go to lunch with him and wanted Emerson to drive. He was so worried about what the director would say or think when he saw our car. Hahaha...I told Emerson to think of it as a good thing--maybe the director would feel bad for him and decide that he needed to give Emerson a raise!! It didn't work, but at least the director didn't seem to mind!
Anyway, after several weeks of searching, we finally bought a new car (and got a great deal on our trade in!). Here are some pictures of our trusty new Hyundai Sonata.

The seats even move up so that I can see over the wheel! hehe...



I don't know if it was the way this picture was taken, or if it's just a reality check,
but Ana Elisa looks so big and grown up!

Now that we have the car buying out of the way, we decided to make Saturday a clean up the yard day.

Emerson worked out there for about three hours and is still paying for it--his allergies were so bad yesterday and today that he's just miserable. Hopefully, (now that we have a new car I can say this), hopefully it'll rain so that Emerson's allergies can clear up.

Ana Elisa helped Daddy with the yard work and enjoyed an ice cream cone as her reward for being such a great helper!



For those of you who know Ana Elisa well, you know that she is really full of energy. Very little can get her down. She had the croup last week and wasn't feeling well. You'd think she'd want to stay inside and rest (yeah right!), here is what she did as we stayed home so that she wouldn't get any other kids sick...



That's our girl!

Girl Scout Cookies and a Trip to the Park

Family Home Evening last night consisted of two things: Girl Scout Cookies and a Trip to the Park.
Someone at Emerson's work gave him a box of Samoa Cookies. Emerson was really excited to come home and share his cookies with Ana Elisa. She has a sweet tooth, just like her daddy. At first she just laid back to relax with her favorite blankie and the box of cookies on her lap.
[A noite familiar de ontem a noite teve duas coisas: Girl Scout Cookies (bolachas) e uma visita ao parque. Uma pessoa que trabalha com o Emerson mandou uma caixa de bolachas para nos. O Emerson estava animado para chegar em casa e compartilhar as bolachas com a Ana. A Ana gosta de um doce--assim como o pai. A principio ela estava toda relaxada deitada com a caixa de bolacha e o cobertor favorito.]

It only took one bite for her to pop up. The cookies were too yummy to just have them there on her lap!
[Mas ai a Ana deu uma mordida na bolacha hummm...as bolachas estavam muito boas so para deixa-las no colo.]

Are there any more in there??
[Tem mais ai?]

After they ate cookies, we went to the park by our house. Ana Elisa gets so excited when we go. She points at it and starts to giggle. She wants to be like the big kids and climb everything!
[Depois de comer as bolachas, fomos ao parque proximo de nossa casa. Ana Elisa mal pode se conter quando ela ve os brinquedos de longe. Ela quer ser como a criancas mais grandes...quer subir em tudo.]







We stayed until it got dark.
[Ficamos ate ficar de noite]



It was what my niece, Brittney, used to call a great Happy Home Evening!