April 13th 2010

Happy Birthday to my dear sweet Ella Grace! I had no idea one year ago today how much my life was going to be blessed with you in it. You bring joy to my EVERY DAY! You are such a happy girl....you always have been. You have been such a joy to take care of, and you have for the most part been easy to take care of. I love you so so much, and cannot imagine my life without you. Thank you for loving me. Your love is so unconditional and makes me feel so special. Thank you for loving your daddy. His world lights up when you are in it. I love watching you two love each other....you are two little peas in a pod. This last year has been somewhat of a whirlwind!! It's so hard to believe that a whole year has past, yet it also is so hard to remember what our lives were like without you! You have changed your daddy and I so much. Our hearts are so much more full than we ever knew they could be. WE LOVE YOU!!!! Happy Birthday our little Ella Bear!

April 1-12, 2010

The first part of April has been a good one in our house. I worked my very last night shift on April 2, so we were all happy to put the chapter behind us. I'm sure it will take most of April for me to get used to dayshift, but it will be so much better overall for our family.

Easter morning all ready for church. This is the first Sunday mommy has been able to go to church in several months! So glad that is over too!!

Mommy and Ella all dressed up for church.

Sweet baby girl!

I don't know what I was thinking wearing five inch heels....our bodies just weren't made to be able to do that! :o)

Quick picture in the parking lot at church. Ella wasn't into it!

Try again. It was really overcast and humid that day. The sun came out in the afternoon though. We went over to Andy and Amies for Easter brunch. I forgot to take pictures from that.

I painted Ella's toes for the first time. They looked so cute, and she loves to play with them.

My beautiful flowers from Jeff and Ella for being done with night shift.

My friend Rayanne and I are learning how to make hairbows. This is all the ribbon we ordered! FUN!!

This is my little gymnist. She likes to play a game where she gets into this position, and then has you flip her the rest of the way around into a summersalt.

Pretty Princess in Purple

Waking up from a nap....ready to go PLAY!

So excited!!

And of course, more swinging time!!

We go to the park quite often, but I never remember to take my camera with me. She LOVES the black baby swing at the park. She can see it from a distance as we are walking to the park, and she starts squealing!

Such a big girl!

Daddy giving underdogs.

I got a new mirror in my bedroom, and of course it already has baby handprints all over it! She loves to look at herself. And, as you can see, she also loves her toothbrush!! :o)

Hi Mommy!

Our friends Joseph and Jennifer are moving to Ohio, so we all got together one last time and had dinner. All four of us girls had on the same color, so we had to get a picture!

Their daughter Gena and Ella are only a few months apart. It was a lot of fun to watch them play together. Gena was having fun pushing Ella around on her little train scooter.

Ella also got to try out Gena's rocking horse.

Trying to stand on her own! It won't be long now!!!

This was the first weekend that I was on days. Daddy didn't take very many pictures, but he took this one of Ella trying to play the piano. She loves to sit and play the keys. She is very gentle with them too....she usually doesnt bang.
Jeff and Ella also came up to my work this Sunday afternoon and had lunch with me!! That was so much fun and brightened my day!!!! Just one of the many benefits of working days now!

I can't believe our baby girl is going to be one this week!!! It has been an amazing year!! I wouldn't trade it for anything!! Ella brings so much joy and laughter into our home!! We are so blessed and so thankful!!

March 2010

March brought "mostly" much better health. We had three weeks of feeling great and being active. Then we had a freak snowstorm right after it had been 80 degrees. A few days later, Ella started acting like she was getting a cold. Within a few days, she took a bad turn and ended up having to be hospitalized for a day and a half for croup. She recovered pretty quickly though, and ever since then, has had boundless amounts of energy. She is definetely NOT acting like a baby anymore, but a little girl. A little girl who wants to know what EVERYTHING is and is into everything! She keeps us very busy. She LOVES to go on walks, and loves to swing in her swing in the backyard, and in the swing at the park. She and the puppies continue to be best of buds. They have to know where she is and what she is up to at all times! One big problem we have run into now that Ella is a pretty independent eater is, she loves to feed the dogs, which we thought was adorable at first.....until we noticed that they were starting to get FAT!! Now we are having to train her to not feed them, and train them not to sit at her feet when she is eating. Let me tell you, it's hard to untrain a bad habit. Ella finally got the hang of sign language this month. We have been working with her to teach her basic mealtime words like, "more" and "all done". One day, it just CLICKED, and she started doing the signs to tell us when she wanted more food, or when she was finished. We were so excited!!! I never thought she would catch on, but it's amazing what they can learn at such a young age.

Like always, I have just uploaded a random assortment of every day pictures....some of them are pretty boring, but they just give you an idea of our every day life! :o) Here is a picture of Jeff and Ella right after a shower!

Nothing really significant about this picture....I just think it's cute!

This is my third cake. My frosting didn't go on very smooth, so I had to heavily decorate it to cover up my mistakes. It was fun learning to do different techniques.

Jeff took this cake to work....so I wouldn't eat it all!! Cake is one of my weaknesses!

Amy and I with our cakes! :o)

Ella discovered the cabinet where we keep all of the tupperware. It's her favorite thing to do...pull everything out, and crawl inside the cabinet. It's a daily activity!! LOL

Little miss is into exploring everything lately. She likes to crawl into any little space she can fit her body into.

Including hiding under the clothes basket. She is constantly on the MOVE!!!

We have so much fun in the swing in our back yard. It's nice to have one right at our house. We use it every day that it is warm enough, and sometimes multiple times a day. Ella laughs every single time you push her. It's the simple every day joys like this that I love so much!

LOVE the hair!!

Jeff loves to read to Ella! He wants her to be smart! :o)

We went on a shopping date with my friend Brooke, and her baby Luke. It was a beautiful day, and the babies were so good.

Taking a break from shopping to feed the little ones!

Not too sure what to think!!

Jeff tiled the backsplash in our kitchen. The one that was there before was hideous! It was burgundy, pink, and white checkered. This is a much needed improvement. So thankful to have a handyman around!!

Other side of the kitchen.

This picture speaks for itself....TOTAL BUDS! Dawn told me I should enter this one into a photo contest....it really is adorable!!

Met up with some friends at the Cheesecake Factory. We missed you Rayanne!!

This girl jumps so much and so hard, that she wears herself out. It's funny, if it's her bedtime, and she is acting like she isn't tired yet, we stick her in her jumper, and she will jump herself to sleep. I hope she doesn't grow out of this too soon.

Just Playing in mommy's room and making a mess.

And keeping a watch of the neighborhood.

Cake #4. I wanted to practice making a tall square cake because I will be making a square cake for Ella's birthhday party.

I was able to buy a Kitchen Aide with my birthday money!! It makes doing cakes and making frosting so much easier! Plus it looks pretty in my kitchen! :o)

Jeff decided to tear the old tile out of our guest bathroom. The old tile was pretty ugly too.

New tile. He did such a great job!!!

Big girl all ready for church!! My first little pony in my hair for church.

Daddy and his little mini me!

More swing time....it was a little chilly, so we just bundled up.

Taking a bath in the newly tiled tub. This is one of Ella's favorite times of the day. She crawls into the bathroom whenever the door is open and stands up at the side of the tub and starts jumping and screaming! haha.....she has such a funny little personality.

She LOVES her five little rubber duckies!

This is a sad picture of Ella when she was in the hospital. I brought Jeff's swimming trunks up so he could take her in the shower. She usually loves showers, but you can tell from this picture that she felt horrible!! Poor baby!!

Ella in her little hospital bed.

It didn't take her to bounce back to her happy healthy self. These last pictures show a little glimpse of miss Ella's sweet little personality.