Since Eliana comes within about 2 inches of filling up her crib, we decided it was time to move her to a day bed.

Plus she needed more room for her stuffed animals and dolls. What you see in the picture is only a part of her collection.

Plus her little sister will need a bed of her own.

The Empress has actually been sleeping in the day bed for several weeks now but this is a new comforter that Carmi bought her for Christmas. Beneath the comforter is a Dora sheet.

Around mid-afternoon I braved traffic and took a road trip down to Charlotte with a guy from church who plays the drums in our praise band. We walked into a store called Sam Ash and exited an hour later with a brand spankin' new toy. I purchased for the church a Roland TD-3SV compact electronic drum set. Can't wait to hook this bad boy up tomorrow and give it a workout.

I took the afternoon off so I went by the daycare provider's house, picked Eliana up and we headed over to Gran'mommy's for lunch. Afterwards there were a handful of errands I needed to run.

One particular errand was a stop at the bank. As soon as the Empress hears the work 'bank' she asks, "Can I have a sucker"? No teller with half a heart can resist such a request from a child so of course she walked away with some candy...and the tongue to prove it.

From China Daily...

As soon as I brought Eliana home after work, she headed straight for her little yellow table in the living room and began to color. I headed straight for the kitchen and began preparing supper so we could eat when Carmi came home.

Before long, she began to lightly sing and I stopped what I was doing to listen. The tune was unrecognizable at first because her voice was so soft but as I strained to hear through the wall, the words from our Baptist hymnal shortly made sense to me:

Standing, standing
Standing on the promises of God my Savior
Standing, standing
I'm standing on the promises of God
There is something very peaceful and reassuring about hearing Eliana sing, which she does quite frequently. Some would say that singing indicates a happy child. I hope they're right.

Word to the wise...don't fall asleep when Eliana is around with a page full of stickers...

Eliana poses with one of her Christmas presents. This is a 1993 Chinese Barbie in the original unopened box (which is no longer unopened). From what I can tell, this was the first Chinese Barbie in the 'Dolls of the World' collection.