Cheers...Ellis Turns One!

First photo on her first birthday and she looks like she wants to cause some trouble.
Poor thing is going to hate having a birthday in January. It snowed all day long. Thank goodness I didn't have a party planned today.
Close-up with rosy cheeks
Morning time snuggles on her daddy's lap
Inspecting the quilt that her Pop had made for her
Playing and Crawling
Standing up like a big girl
Bath time with curly hair
Bath time tushie.

Okay, I'm going to try to keep this relatively short because I could very easily expound on this past year for, well, about a year. But, in keeping things simple, I will only say that Ellis has changed our lives tremendously over the past year. Vimal and I thought that we had a great life before. We traveled extensively (almost ridiculously); we enjoyed our time together; we took advantage of being a dual income family without kids in the best ways possible. And then, we had Ellis, and she has made everything before seem like we were simply killing time.

It's not to say that people who choose not to have children or who can't have children aren't perfectly fulfilled. It's just that, for us, we didn't know how much we needed Ellis in our lives. Since she's been here, we have both grown by leaps and bounds. I have realized what it really means to be loved and to love unconditionally. The way Ellis loves, the light in her eyes when she looks at us, is so pure and so genuine that it can't be described. And the kind of love that we feel for Ellis is like no other. We look at Ellis and we want to be better, to be something greater than ourselves, for her. Every single day Ellis changes and everyday we love her more and more.

So...(raise your glasses)...here is to another year of changes, of growing, of becoming the woman that she's going to be. I, for one, hope the time inches by as slowly as possible so that I can savor every second that I have with my lovely Ellis Kaye.