I got up too early this morning, so I'm sitting here blogging while I wait for the coffee to finish brewing. Ella fell asleep early last night and woke up early, but it wasn't as early as it's been in the past! Cole's up early, too, because he woke up and didn't find us upstairs. He's falling asleep again on the couch, though.

I have a bunch of laundry to put away today. It will make packing on Sunday so much easier, so I just need to get that done. I need to bake cookies, too, which I've also been putting off. Also have to call the paper to stop delivery while we're out of town. We have nothing going on today, so I should be able to accomplish those things. Cory will be home most of the night, too, after he's finished with a 5 p.m. counseling session.

Tomorrow will be busier. Accalia and Cole have art - and their art class Christmas party - and I might try to take Ella and pick up a few stocking stuffers. We'll see how that goes. She's at an age where I can sometimes sneak things in the cart and she pays no attention, but other times she'll zero in on something and not forget it's there. After lunch tomorrow, Tylan has her four month checkup and Ella has her three year check up. In a recent picture of Ella, I noticed that her right eye is crossed, and I had never noticed that before. Then, a couple days ago, I noticed her eye briefly crossed when she turned to look at me. Cory had crossed eyes when he was little and actually had to have surgery for it. I don't know if it's even a problem with Ella or if it's something that occasionally happens if she's a little tired and having trouble focusing, but I'll ask.

After those appointments, Cory's going to take off work a little early so we can take the van in to the mechanic. Yes, once again. Thankfully this is something we'd been planning to do. There are a couple belts that need to be replaced, and we wanted to do that before we travel for Christmas. Cory works tomorrow night, so we probably won't see him except for when we take the van to the mechanic. He's definitely looking forward to next week, though, when he doesn't work at all.

Glad I had a chance to type while Tylan is snoozing in the sling. It's hard to believe that at nearly four months old (tomorrow!) it's already hard to do things like type while Tylan is awake. Just over the past week or so, Tylan has turned into a grabbing machine. It's clicked with her how she can coordinate her arms to stretch and her hands to grab so she can bring things to her mouth. She's an incredibly oral baby, too. All babies are, of course, but Tylan is much more interested in putting objects in her mouth than either Ella or Cole were. Accalia loved putting everything in her mouth, too. Tylan's also becoming much more demonstrative in her affections with Cory. When she sees him, she'll try to lunge out of my arms to get to him. Then she'll bury her face in her chest and put her arms around his neck. It's such a sweet thing to see. She's ready to come back to me within a minute usually, but she's definitely showing the love to her daddy and siblings.