yes!

Christmas present shopping is complete! Ellis's new bunk bed and dressers got delivered yesterday despite our steep, icy driveway! One of Trey's co-workers is probably giving us an infant car seat! Ellis didn't come into our bed at 3AM this morning! My boss is out of town!

So, today I give myself the day off from freaking out about not being ready for the new baby, mixed results at work, and the various pre-Christmas preparation as yet undone.

The Most Accomodating 3 Year Old Ever

Me: Ellis would you like a bowl of potato soup for lunch?

Ellis: No Dad, I was going to finish my doughnut for lunch.

Me: Ellis a doughnut isn't really something you eat for lunch.

Ellis: It's okay dad. I don't mind.

bullets of randomness

• We finally had our first snow. Nothing major- less than an inch or so. We'd already heard that the municipalities here don't really believe in salting the roads, but it seems they don't really believe in plowing either. So, our "do we really need snow tires debate?" is back on.
  
• I think most everyone who reads here already knows via other channels that we are expecting a new baby in February. Happily, everything is going fine so far. My midwife, however, wants me to do this to make sure the baby is in an optimal position. It's only about 80% as uncomfortable as it looks, but it's not an "optimal positon" for eating ice cream and watching movies and therefore not really in line with postures I care to assume these days.
• Ellis has been extra ornery lately. He's especially bucking routines we've had in place for a long time and refusing to do tasks he can easily on his own. For example, "Ellis, please get the forks for supper" he replies with "I caaaan't. I need somebody to help me. I don't have any hands." Properly motivated (=bribed), however, performance improves as this morning, when he rapidly put on his own coat and snow boots with long, tricky velcro fasteners in order to procure his gummy vitamins.
  
• This weekend Ellis "rescovered" (this his word for, well, re-discovering a beloved and forgotten item). We were at the grocery store and he recognized those little refrigerated jello cups that one of his classmates brings for lunch. Naturally, he starting begging for them and I refused to buy them because 1) they won't fit in his bento-style lunchbox and 2) I am just not paying for pre-made jello no matter how low my standards of domesticity sink. But I did agree to purchase a couple boxes of jello and discussed how we could use cookie cutters to cut out jello shapes. Ultimately, though we decided on canned mandarin oranges suspended in orange jello and fruit cocktail in lime jello. By the way, fruit cocktail...it's kind of grosser than I remember or this type is anyway. Ellis, however, LOVES it and cannot get enough. He will shove his tongue down into the corner of the bowl to get the last clingy gelatinous bit. Mmmm, appetizing. Which means the only question now is whether I think $12 is an appropriate amount to spend to let Ellis experience this little gem (link has been corrected) from my childhood. As a bonus, I'd finally be able to attempt the "stick of dynamite" jello mold (one orange juice can for a mold, one package cherry jello, one string of licorice [there's a picture of this in the updated and link and doh! i forgot the banana! thanks, internets]).

Repose

Comfy chair: check. Tasty snack: check. Movie: check.

Ellis has been ordering us to be quiet lately. We will be sitting at dinner and he will announce that there will be no more talking. When we ask him, "Why can't we talk?" He always comes back with some ridiculous answer like, "Because I have a glass of water." I have concluded that these silly reasons don't reflect his sorry attempt to come up with a real reason, but mirror back to us that he thinks most of the reasons we tell him to do, well, anything at all, are completely arbitrary.