"Mom, what's your name today?"

Here's our Eleanor Elizabeth, almost four years old.  I love this picture because it captures all of her energy and personality.  She's quite a chica these days!

I love the way she takes care of Matt.  When this tired Momma is fighting the battle of the bedsheets in the early morning, I can sometimes hear Miss Ellie over the monitor in Matt's room, reading him stories and talking to him until I get there to bring the kiddos down for breakfast.  Sometimes she even helps herself to the Cheerios in the pantry and carries them up the stairs for a pre-breakfast snack.

Lately, she's big on pseudonyms.  She generally chooses Meredith or Akrisa (?) or, simply Big Sister.  Then I have to choose Holly or Kathleen or Ellie.  Sometimes she uses my pseudonym, sometimes she just calls me "my dear" or "sweetheart."  Then she pretends that we are taking naps, going to the parade, visiting relatives, or making food.  Sometimes her imaginary friends and sisters come along:  Daney,  Riley, Laney, and a few others I can't figure out how to pronounce or spell.

Here are some other things she likes:

Working on her computer alongside Rob

Being Doctor Princess Ellie.  I am a very good patient.

Wearing her heart-shaped pink sunglasses. She earned all the money for them by potty-training.  The Family Home Evening where we counted her pennies and quarters and turned over the sunglasses was, in her words, "The Best!"  By the way, Rob subsequently took the bag of change to work for his afternoon soda fund, and thought that was The Best.

Riding her bike.  She's learning to pedal and is quite proud of herself when she can do two pedals in a row.  She informed me yesterday that she needed a helmet to be safe.  Hard to argue with that one, so off we went to Wal-Mart to find one.  Amazingly, they had one with all her favorite princesses on it!  Whew.

A few other things:

• She will only wear twirly dresses to church
• She has all kinds of t-shirts with flowers, turtles, and other cutenesses (including my personal favorite - a white t-shirt with a map of the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens on it).  But everyday she wants to wear a plain brown short-sleeved t-shirt that I bought at a consignment store for $3.
• As soon as she walks in the door from anywhere, she immediately takes off her shoes and puts on a pair of purple and gold dress-up slippers.
• She told me recently that her three favorite songs are "You Make Me Feel So Young," by Frank Sinatra, "Human," by The Killers ("Except I don't like their scary name"), and "You're Not From Texas," by Lyle Lovett.  I'd say that's a pretty good cross-section.
• She loves the feel of the wind in her hair when we drive in the Jeep with the sunroof and windows open.  My thoughts exactly, babe.

Here she is overlooking the Ohio River and feeling the wind in her hair.  We love this chica!