bella m. and all the other bellas

well, it already happened. you know how you agonize over finding that perfect name for your baby, one that isn't so far out that she's ostracized but one that isn't going to be one of 15 kids in her class with the same name? we did that. we had all kinds of names on the list - hazel (a family name), dahlia, sofia - and we chose bella. sean loved it, it was very italian, and I didn't know anyone named bella so I had no negative connotations with it. then I used this thingie and it said that the name was on the rise. still not too bad, though...until I had her, and everyone asked me if she was named isabella. turns out isabella is one hell of a popular name.

bella has 4 classmates at daycare: kaylie, giovanna, connor, and ISABELLA. who is called bella. 2 out of 5?? wtf?

at any rate, here are some things that MY bella does that I bet that other one doesn't do. she's currently on an "eeeeeewwwww" kick. everything she sees that isn't quite right is met with "eeeeeeeewwww!!!!" something spilled on the floor? eeeeewwww! her shoe is untied? eeeeeeewwww! her peach is touching her ravioli? eeeewwwwww! (I admit, that's my fault.) she was 'watching' (sitting down, twirling her hair, drinking mokey moke) big love (not this week's show, last week's) with sean and he said that after the line "go get your kids, margeane, they're eating bugs" bella said "eeeeeeewwwww!! eat bugs!" so everything is eeeeeewwwww at home right now.

she is in love with the outdoors. she loves "blowers" - dandelions ready to be blown to the wind - but has trouble blowing them. she gets it too close to her mouth and winds up with little seeds all over her lips. which, of course, is met with eeeeewwwww. she loves walking alone - without holding hands or walking alongside me. she's so independent that I can, without a doubt, see directly into our future where we will battle over who opens the box of cereal, who puts on her shoes, and how she learns how to drive.

she also loves to climb. she likes climbing all over the furniture and getting up and down from chairs by herself. needless to say, this makes me slightly freaked out and I'm waiting to blog about Bella's First Stitches or Bella's Giant Scab or whatever. so far we're doing okay but I'm not sure how long it'll last.

shifting gears a bit, trent went to a combined tryout for both the travel soccer team and this thing called "premier", which is more expensive but the kids play at a way higher skill level. even though I had noted on trent's signup form that we are only interested in travel (which is already kind of steep) the premier coach pulled me aside after tryouts on saturday (which bella and I spent blowing blowers, racing matchbox cars down the sloped sidewalk, and exploring the front seat of the car) to ask me if I was interested in putting trent in premier, because they think he's good enough for the team. it was a big compliment for trent (and by transitive property, for me) but I just hope we are able to do it financially. more than that, actually, I hope we are able to do it timewise. it's a big committment. we'll see how it shakes out.