Ellen's Very First Birthday Party!

Guests at Ellen's Party

The Photographers

Thank you to Wendy and Caroline for taking all of these pictures. We really appreciate it... you know they are priceless to us!

Toddler in Action

Ellen has zoomed past Lucas on the difficulty scale. She is into EVERYTHING. Just a couple of weeks ago she was fine in the t.v. room by herself, as long as we had the gate blocking the stairs. Now if we let her go she climbs up on the couch and then the coffee table. She's knocked that lamp over twice. You can see that Lucas is used to it (as she crawls over his head)... we just need to get used to it!

Preschool Artwork

I love the art work that Lucas does at school! The colors are so pretty and we are able to use it as decoration all over the house.

First little curl...

Yogi

Ellen's Uncle Scott (a yoga teacher) sent Ellen this little shirt for her birthday. For some reason Scott got a size 3yr, but it actually turned out great... she can wear it as a dress now and a shirt later... we'll get 2 years or more out of this. I'm going to have to try this with other cute shirts. Girls clothes are so much more fun than boy's clothes. And check out the leggings! (Jenn, I found some here for cheap).

Meditating

Some pose that I can't recall the name.

All done with her practice!

Brother and Sister

They have their own little relationship now. They play together, they laugh at each other, and they fight over the same toys. Ellen tries hard to keep up with Lucas, and Lucas tries hard to pull her along for the ride. She falls down a lot, or gets knocked down, but most of the time gets right back up and toddles after him. We're gonna have a lot of fun with these two!

Baby Doll

I didn't play dressup with dolls when I was little. Man, I sure missed out - this is so fun!

Caroline's Baptism

Today was a special day for us. Our little friend, Caroline, got baptized this morning. We were invited to the ceremony, but the kids would have had to go to daycare, so we decided to celebrate with them at the brunch. I did get to sneak away from our kids for a few min, however, to take some pictures of Caroline and her family at the church. It was really fun for us all to get dressed up and start the day with what feels like our family here in Raleigh. I met Wendy's family in 2000 and have been invited to so many family events that I really do feel like we are part of their family. They are very special to us : )

Wendy and Caroline

Sweet Baby

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Before lunch we tried to get a few family pictures since we were dressed up. Lucas was all about it, but Ellen was not : )

You can see in this picture Ellen's first pair of shoes! They are about the cutest pair of shoes that I've ever seen! Little white first walker high tops! And they went so well with this smocked dress that our neighbor, Michelle, made for Ellen. She said it was sized at 6 months, but it fit our tiny 12 month old perfectly.

And I think this picture is so cute because it shows how much fun the boys were having and how Ellen loves being doted over by them!

Lucas and Charles had a blast together, as usual...

Wendy and I thought it would be cute to get a picture of all of the kids. This was the best that we got...

Sophie, Ellen, Kayleigh, Caroline, Charles and Lucas

And then little Caroline had had enough!

So we moved on to trying to get a family picture...

And then a few picture with me and my favorite girl. I just noticed that our dresses were similar with our puffy sleeves : )

And finally, a picture with my sweet friend :)

8 More Days!

Today the lady hung out with her cousins AGAIN. We had a good time at a local farm. There was a corn maze... (and no, I didn't get my hair cut like Peter Pan)

... and there was a hay ride and a ride made into a cow...

and finally, there was the bird in the corn box.

Countdown, Day 9

Today our bird hung out with her cousins and brother while Jeff and I went on a short date. Jill watched her and Lucas and told me that neither of them seemed to care that we weren't there. Her comments on Ellen when we returned were:

1) She has a 'tude! Haha. She said that Ellen wanted to put her cheerios in Jill's salad and when Jill told her to stop she grunted at her and pushed her hand away.

2) She pulled Lucas's hair three times when she wanted his attention and he wasn't giving it to her : )

3) She went for every outlet and both sets of stairs over and over again.

Another thing we did today was go to Cameron Village to get a gift and an ice cream treat. I feel like I'm with a movie star these days when I go out with Ellen. She turns heads and even stopped two cars in the parking lot today. I guess it's because she's so small and is walking so well... and always smiling and waving at strangers. She does look like a little baby doll walking around.

Oh, yes, the carrot. It's her favorite thing to hold in her hand and chew on these days...

Last night before bed she was clowning around on the couch... in a silly mood.

In this pic she was dancing for Jeff...