There are two brothers at school, Matthew and Luke, who have always been besotted with Eli. When Donné collected Grace on Friday she heard them saying something about Eli. Luke came up to Donné and showed her a picture which said, “Eli the puppy hiding behind the grass.” Donné asks him, “Is your puppy’s name Eli?” “Yes,” says Luke. “Did you name him after Eli?” “Yes.” So that is how the puppy was named Eli.

We also saw the ENT yesterday to follow up on Eli’s ears, and the one ear was clear, with the other one busy draining, so no need for grommets! Thank you Lord!

Yum, yum, broccoli!

Grace says “Lippie, lippie,” and touches Eli’s lip and for some reason he just thinks this is hilarious.

Grace’s internal temperature setting has always been on the high side and if we gave her half a chance she would be running around in the cold weather in hot pants and a shoe string top. This leads to loads of friction with Grace taking off shoes and jackets and us trying to make sure that she stays warm and healthy.

This means that we arrive at school and she is the only child running around with just a top on rather than three layers and a warm jacket, turn your back for a moment and she is running around barefoot on the cold grass, and she fights putting on any jersey or jacket with long sleeves.

Fortunately sleeveless jackets seem to be acceptable as being short sleeved, so that’s the way we’ll be going this winter. Shoes and socks? Well, that’s just a daily battle we’re going to have to fight.

Every night Grace asks for dessert after supper, and when she asked tonight Donné said, “Let me think about it.” Grace immediately says, “Think, think, think….I can have dessert!” She did get dessert for making mommy laugh.

Now that he is crawling, Eli is working on the next thing – pulling himself up

Super happy, or evil baby face? You decide.

About half an hour before supper Grace starts getting restless and hungry. She rummages around, asking for food, asking when supper will be ready, and just generally harassing Donné. In Donné’s words, “Grace, stop begging like a dog.”

Today we sat down at the table to feed Eli while supper was cooking in the oven, so Grace says to Donné, “That’s not making me supper.”

When supper was ready Donné says to Grace, “Be careful, it’s…” “Supper!” Grace interrupts.

Grace is very excited to be four, because when she is four something very special is going to happen….she is going to be able to use the red toothpaste! The fact that she is moving from the blue toothpaste (for 0-3 years) to the red toothpaste (4-6 years) brings great joy. Enough joy that it is one of the first things she talks about when someone asks her about her birthday.

Today Granny was hearing about it, and last week she was telling John all about how she is excited to be four, so that she can use the red toothpaste, and she is also excited to be five….why?….so that she can get a princess toothbrush.

Dental care, or at least the tools for it, bring Grace lots of joy.

…that if Grace has a sleep in the day then she is sick. She was running a high temperature today, following on a few days from her brother. He was diagnosed with an ear infection, and she with tonsillitis.

Unfortunately Eli’s ear infection has resulted in fluid in the ear which apparently doesn’t usually naturally drain, which means a trip to the ENT and most likely grommets. I’m praying hard that by the time we see an ENT his ear will have miraculously cleared.

I’ve got you Mr. Spicey…now let me think about something.

I really like this collage that Grace made with fallen leaves from the tree and grass from the garden.

Just a little video of Eli crawling.