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Home › Diaries › Bonnie's › Introduction

Bonnie's Diary Entries

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Introduction

Without keeping anyone in suspense, I will say right off the bat that the holidays were just wonderful. Filled with all of my favorite things, family (extended and nuclear), food, presents, laughter. It was blissful. Without going into too much detail, I will summarize…

Since school was out, Ella and I went down to the Cape on Monday, and Jamie met us on Wednesday. Every Christmas Eve my mom throws a little party and Mike (her husband and Ella’s Grandpa) dresses up as Santa and brings presents for all the kids at the party (kids being a loose term—I got one until a few years ago when I had Ella). Since Ella is the light of his life he was both nervous that she would recognize him and excited to share this moment with his grandbaby. Despite my trepidation that she would break his heart by crying and running from Santa, Ella was an angel, quivering in my arms in excitement as he Ho Ho Hoed his way into the house and eagerly hugging Santa and earnestly letting him know how good she had been. It made my heart burst with pride to see these two bring such joy to each other.

Then, it was Christmas morning. Despite a genuine feeling by myself that Christmas is NOT about mainly presents and greed, I have to admit that our family is definitely one of excess and overabundance, and, true to form, the tree was literally overflowing. One thing that I was very pleasantly surprised about was Ella’s lack of greed this year. Maybe she just didn’t know exactly what she was seeing, but she barely batted an eye when we first ventured into the living room and then was content to just look and go about her morning while we waited for the rest of the family to wake. Indeed, throughout the day she was just wonderful, happily opening presents (excitedly crying “What is it? What it is?” while doing so) when they were offered, and showing joy at the contents, but also content to wait or to help others open their gifts otherwise.

The goods!!!
No surprise at all, Ella was totally spoiled in the gift giving department. Like last year, we ended up holding on to some of the presents and bringing them home with us for later, since she had so much and was already risking serious overload. She got a lot of books (Raggety Ann from Lisa, Very Lonely Firefly from Kristian, more from Stephan and Judy and Aunt Carol), stuffed animals (Elmo from Nami, a turtle from Maggie), some nice clothes (Mike and Rachel, Erin and Floyd), and the Leappad learning system (John Warren). I think her two favorite gifts seem to be a musical Sit and Spin (now, why did they have to go and make a perfectly wonderful classic toy into an obnoxious blaring headache by adding sound to it!?!?) from Grandpa and a little cloth doll house with four little cloth bunnies and furniture inside from Great Gran. MY favorite present was a sapphire bracelet that Jamie gave me to match the Sapphire ring he gave me two years ago (Sapphire is Ella’s birthstone).

My personal gift that I gave her was a medical kit that I carefully explained was a Nurse Practitioner Kit (although I guess, technically, it was billing itself as a Dr. kit) and she spent a lot of the vacation giving everyone in the family thorough check ups.

Another milestone…
I think I mentioned in an earlier entry that Santa was going to be bringing Ella a set of sheets for her big girl bed (a full size bed left over from when her room was a guest room). She was very excited about the sheets when she opened them, immediately demanding we take them out of their packaging and rolling around with me in them on the floor and making a tent in the middle of the living room. Very cute. When we got back to Arlington she immediately wanted to put them on the bed but we soon discovered she thought they were going on her crib! She was noticeably disappointed and saddened to discover they were for the bed in the room but was still eager to help set them all up and roll around on them some more. She also listened carefully when we talked about her sleeping in the bed but really didn’t seem to keen on the idea, which was fine with me. In my mind, this whole ‘get sheets’ thing was timed more around Christmas then any need for her to be switching sleeping arrangements. Plus, she seems to really enjoy her crib and I was content to wait for her to be ready, maybe starting with some tentative trial naps along the way.

So imagine my surprise—shock really—when the very next night Jamie told me Ella decided that she was sleeping in the big girl bed. Bravely she lay down on it (she hates covers and never uses them) and bravely Jamie and I wished her good night and tentatively closed the door behind us, waiting for the wail of fear and protest. It never came. The silence was deafening to me, but as the minutes ticked by we dared to dream. Finally, after waiting as long as we possibly could, we stealthily tip toed up the stairs and their she was, our tiny peanut asleep in that great big bed, her breathing deep and regular as always. The lump in my throat was so big I could barely swallow. We’ve had so many milestones over the months but this one hit me hard, I guess because it is such a concrete, tangible jump between infant and child. She slept there all night and was as happy as always in the morning. What an amazing child I have.

Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve. We are planning on heading to our friend’s house (Steve and Doreen) for a small gathering. We are bringing Ella and her port-a-crib and hope she will be snoozing away, although hopefully this latest milestone won’t make her averse to her sleeping arrangements. Time will tell, I guess. Looking back, 2003 has been a wonderful year in so many ways. Getting started in my nursing program and finishing my first semester (straight A’s, I might add) makes me excited about my future but watching my family grow has been the most magical, satisfying, part of this year. I am truly blessed.

As always, thanks for reading.
Bonnie



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