I hate to say it but the camera is officially broken. My replacement battery made it yesterday, I charged it up, popped it in and........................it still doesn't work. Ugh! I'm going to find a local repair place for my one last ditch effort but sadly, I may need to buy a new camera in the near future. What a serious bummer. And we didn't have that camera for very long! I actually know exactly how old it is because we got it when I was pregnant and basically right before Eloise arrived. So it's 20 months old. That's terrible.
So with no camera comes no pictures. That's pretty much a good thing for this week because my child is "that" kid you see at the grocery story or library with a giant brush-burn running the entire length of her nose - from tip to bridge - after faceplanting on the concrete driveway this week. Awful. She actually faired well and didn't seem to mind the trail of blood streaminig down her face. I, on the other hand, was completely mortified. And here we are 5 days later and it still looks pretty rough. As proven by each of the places we go and someone says, "Uh oh, looks like someone fell down." Or they say, "I was afraid to say something in case that was a birth mark but it looks like she fell down, right? Poor thing." Uh, yeah. She fell down. And thanks for making this situation worse than it is. Sigh.
Speaking of the concrete faceplant, we officially call Eloise Tumbelina courtesy of the Baby Whisperer. Eloise tumbles her way through her day as she bounces off of walls, floors, steps and the like falling right and left. Sometimes you wonder if she spends more time on all fours than on her feet but for whatever reason - this age or her lack of grace - she is our little Tumbelina. With a brush-burn nose to show for it.
This weekend is our turn for hosting the neighborhood supper club. We're expecting 8 couples to come here tomorrow night at 7pm. We are in charge of the "main course" and all the others bring everything else. I tried to get creative with our "month" and so I came up with a "Super Bowl Supper Club" theme and asked everyone to bring something delicious indigenous of the home town of their favorite football team or where they grew up. Mike and I are making Beef on Weck - thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Vail special mailing us 3 dozen kummelweck rolls from western NY and then also a few crockpots full of chili. We wanted to do chicken wings, for the obvious reason, but we aren't that good at making them and we haven't found a local place that matches Buffalo's delicious flappers. Anyway, Eloise will be here - hopefully sleeping through the entire party. With 18 people total, this is going to be interesting. I'm thinking she'll slumber right through it. Let's hope.
One other update for now - Miss Eloise and I are on a full-on battle of wills. Daily, or I should say hourly, she is testing her limits around here and if I stick to it, she's not getting her way. I'm assuming it's this age, and also her highly spirited, and extremely strong will power, plus add in some inherited stubborness and we've got a full on war around here. She's a good kid but I'll tell you, she is really, really testing me. As displayed at the grocery store today in the deli section. I'm trying to order the roast beef for said Beef on Weck sandwiches and all of a sudden Eloise starts screaming. (her new thing when Mommy has any sort of grown-up conversation) I turn to her and she immediately stops. I tell her to stop it, be nice and use her inside voice. I turn back to the woman helping me and Eloise immediately starts screaming again. Repeat the above about 3 times and I swear I thought the police were going to escourt us out of the store. Sans beef. That little girl is something else. Ahhhhhh!!! I did my best to get her preoccupied with something else but obviously I have some serious work to do in this area. Oh, the joys of parenthood.
That's it for now. Have a great weekend! Go Steelers!!!
