Ella: New York, New York

Ella had a few more firsts this weekend. Her and Mom started their swimmy class at the Y and they were both all smiles. The instructor said that Ella was the best kicker in class surely due to all the practice in the bathtub (Mom thought it was really because of all of her practice kicking inutero, but we weren't about to volunteer that information.) The class is for babies 6-36 months, and she was the littlest one there, but it didn't hold her back a bit. She smiled at the other babies, mommies, and daddies, and loved the end of the class where we sang songs and jumped up and down.

After swim class it was off to New York! We packed up the car, which really took way longer than it has ever before, but we were ready! We stopped along the way for some donuts and coffee but made the trip with a sleeping Ella for the whole 2 1/2 hours. We checked into the hotel...

We found our way to a great sushi restuarant - Mom and Dad got a sushi boat for the first time and Ella got lots of attention from many awesome waitresses. Then we headed off to see Sister Anne down the road and she got even more attention from lots of awesome nuns (Sorry no pictures - we thought we left the camera at the hotel). We headed back to the hotel for another trip to the pool - this time with dad! A nice way to end the day.

The next day was a yummy NY breakfast at Bella's restaurant and off to Dad's friend Zach's engagement party. Dad has great friends from college - he had 5 roommates his senior year - all of them made it to the party except for one, so Ella got to stand in for him in the pictures...

We said goodbye to everyone as Ella started to fall asleep on Dad's shoulder and headed out to CT to visit her great grandma. We had a nice quiet dinner with her and again Ella made friends with the waitress and a few other patrons.