our belle turns 7!

 our beautiful monkey turned 7 today!

as every mother says...

i can't believe how fast these seven years have gone.

she brings a lot of light into our family.

we love this girl!

 ella received an early birthday gift.

we gave her clues to help her figure out what the gift was.

1.  we're going to a place by target.

2.  it's a noisy place.

3.  they have food and toys there, but NOT the kind you would like.

4.  this place is a little bit smelly.

5.  mom isn't crying, it's just her allergies.

6.  no matter what you name it, dad will still call it a rat.

 ella's eyes got very big while reading the last clue!

we have been pet-sitting for our friends. 

ryan's been calling the pet a "rat".

 so she knew when she read the clue that she would be getting a...

HAMSTER!

 ella and hugo the hamster. 

i keep suggesting we call him tiny h, but no one likes that idea.

"he's not a rapper, mom!"

 marmee and gg added to ella's collection of country critters.

she had a hard time pulling herself away from them this morning before church.

 she also received some clothes, pink boots, a coloring book, a wii game, a gymnastics poster, eraser, bookmark, and earrings.

ella chose red robin for lunch out yesterday.

pancakes for breakfast

kraft macaroni and cheese for lunch

homemade macaroni and cheese for dinner with cucumbers and broccoli on the side.

and a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.

she was even serenaded with happy birthday played on the violin by aftie!

tomorrow brings chocolate and vanilla cupcakes for her class at school.

this weekend brings a glamour pajama party.

happy birthday sweet lady!

happy thanksgiving!!

my personal chefs are cooking up a feast for me!

happy thanksgiving!

pretty ladies

ry and i took a couple of hours while in stuttgart, germany to visit the porsche museum.

my sweet ry has long been a fan of the porsche.

a beautiful, clean, white space!

i loved this beautiful place!

 

 ryan's dream car.  he doesn't want a new one.  he wants one from the 80's.

 not me. 

i like brand new!

 we did the audio tour.

the history was fascinating to me.

i loved hearing about the races and the cars created just for certain races.

 this is a photo i pulled from the web, but it shows the clean beauty of the inside of the museum.

gorgeous architecture!

goin' to church

when ryan and i were in rome, we went to church.

alot.

technically, we went to a lot of churches.

here's one.

it's sort of famous.

st peter's basilica.

 wowza.

here's the statue of st peter.

poor thing, everyone's rubbed his toes off!

this is st. peter's square.

the pope had spoken the day before we visited.

we also saw the sistine chapel!

it was beautiful and much smaller than i had imagined. 

we also did a tour of the vatican museum.

ryan loved the first part of the tour...

going through security.

the guards just sat and chatted with each other, never once paying attention to the monitors or flashing red lights when people walked through the metal detectors.

i guess the pope was out that day,

as they didn't seem to care about the 10,000 other people in vatican city.

rome. aaaaahhhhhh.

the beautiful view from our hotel balcony.

when i arrived in our room, i stepped out onto the balcony and saw this beauty.

it was so lovely and i felt so relaxed.

i still had the day to wait for ryan to arrive, so i...

opened the sliding door,

took a long, hot bath,

took a little nap,

and perused a travel book.

heaven.

these beautiful steps can be found in the piazza de espagna.

they are commonly known as the spanish steps and have been featured in many movies.

we stepped our way to the top with all of the other tourists, but it was still magical!

the trevi fountain!

so amazing.  this was ryan's favorite!

the cutest couple!

it was hard to snag a spot to take a photo, but we scooched our way in.

the pantheon.

the best preserved building in rome.

it has a large open dome at the top and when it rains, the water dances on the floor inside.

i guess you wear your rainboots to church if it's raining.

raphael's tomb inside the pantheon.

the beautiful, spectacular colloseum.

halloween!

this halloween was filled with fun, but it sure went quickly!

 we attended the annual trunk or treat at our church.

 afton, the peacock, with cute friends!

 sadly we bought our pumpkins at wegmans. 

we usually try to fill a saturday with a trip to the pumpkin farm. 

 the always joyful afton, scooping seeds!

a serious worker. 

 this year we had a marmee pumpkin. 

wait!  that's the real marmee with us!!!

 mom and marmee got to visit ella's school halloween party.

 sharpay evans, of high school musical fame, prepares for an evening of candy collecting.

 we spotted a beautiful peacock in our neighborhood!

off to trick or treat with dad!