I took these pics one morning before heading to church.
Kella looked so big to me that morning. We are about a week away from her 3rd birthday. This has been such a year of growth, which the only thing I have to compare it to is year one & two, but now we are getting into more development intellectually rather than learning to walk, talk, etc.
She has learned the majority of the alphabet and is now learning what words start with certain letters. The other night Kipp was wearing his flag football t-shirt, she started picking out letters and saying "F...F is for fishy and football" "R...R is for Ryan and raaaaainbow", "O...O is for octopus", "L ... hmmmm, then she looked at the ceiling and said LIGHT, L is for light."
Most of the songs she sings are ones she learned at "school", luckily mom is a kindergarten teacher and knows what she is singing. I am getting lots of lessons and help interpreting the songs! One in particular was "R-E-D RED, R-E-D RED, I can spell RED, I can spell RED, firetrucks are RED, firetrucks are RED, R-E-D, R-E-D." I had no clue she was actually spelling RED. Gosh! How big she's getting.
We are still continuing to work on getting through the night without a wet pull-up. I'm not quite sure how to get this mastered. Daytime we are completely good and since Ryan has arrived she likes going alone and yells when she's done, which is our sign to come & help wipe. We stopped putting her in diapers for naps awhile back and have only had a couple of accidents. We have always let her have a cup of water beside her bed when sleeping, but now know that is confusing since we are now trying to cut out drinking past a certain time at night. Geeezzz!!!
I let her help me cook as much as possible and she has learned to put dishes in the sink when finished. Sometimes I will go in the kitchen and she has gotten in the fridge, helped herself to some pudding, yogurt or whatever snack she could reach/open on her own and will be sitting at the table eating. Seriously.... I think this all happened overnight! Where did my baby go?
Kipp and I will sit and discuss our favorite "Kella words" like the way she says computer is cooter, refrigerator is fridge-a-lator, bar-b-que is barka-you, she loves Sonic's blue coconut slush which she says blue splush, our favorite is how she remembers the names of colors. Once she learned the basics (which seems like forever ago) we started working on variations of colors. But most the time we have forgotten what we taught her and she will correct us and say, "no mommy, that's not blue its aqua!" Funny, funny girl! Her nightly prayers are getting more and more personalized. We used to thank Jesus for chocolate milk and polka dots, but now we list our school friends, family, Spanky & Spencer, etc. I love being able to teach her about helping others. Over Christmas we participated in a friends effort to provide a homeless shelter in downtown Dallas with coats, gloves, socks & bibles. We met beforehand at the Crawford's to bag together the items, Kella was the official bible supplier, stuffing all the bags with the bibles that had been donated. I hate that I didn't get a picture of this. It wasn't a safe environment for her to go along to the shelter, but I think she learned a good lesson with what part she did get to do. I have a few upcoming events where I am donating items and time to charities that are very kid friendly. I am really looking forward to sharing this with her as well! Hopefully I will remember to get pics of that!
Her health has been surprisingly well for her condition. It was a big decision for us allowing her to start school. Even though she only goes 2 days a week, she would still be susceptable to all those classroom germies. I have only had to go get her once for a fever and I was able to get that down with a dose of Tylenol & not a trip to the ER. Her dr.'s at Children's were all for her starting this program and felt that, even though it might mean a few more trips to the ER, it was something she needed socially & developmentally at this point in her life. October marked one year from when she initially got sick. It has been a long road of dr. visits, ER visits and exploring alternative methods to do what we can to boost this little girls immune system. God has placed some amazing people in our life. They have, in turn, introduced us to some amazing dr.'s.
Our last checkup at Children's showed her neutraphil count to be 450!!! Anything below 500 is considered neutrapenic, so we are not far away. We will visit them again in February to see any progress/changes.
Kella was so excited to help make such sweet treats for her friends! 
The first pan is loaded & ready to bake...
Unfortunately, only one came out that was a true flower that actually stayed on the stick. Where is Betty when you need her.... Crocker, that is! Since I have been a little sick & worrying with these cookies was really the last thing I wanted to be doing, so Kipp volunteered to go to the store and buy some. After making 3 stops, he & K came home empty handed. Ugh!!!
Good thing I had bought some sugar cookie dough as well. Here is the finished product. Man I hope these kiddos enjoy them. 
Kipp was such a trooper, long after K went to bed we stayed up and bagged each of the cookies. I wanted to attach a cute little note, but at 10pm I was SO. OVER. IT!!! It all worked out and Kella had an exciting day of celebration with her friends. 
