A year in retrospect

Today is our beautiful little girl's first birthday. We can hardly believe how quickly it has gone and how blessed we are to have her in our life. She came into the world , a week late, with a head full of hair and ready to go. She held her head to move it to the side our second night in the hospital. By five months she was crawling and now at a year she is trying hard to run everywhere she goes. She has gone from a soft cry to a loud one and now says "hiiiii" "byeeeee byeee" and makes the sound of a monkey when she sees one. She waves and even managed to climb out of her crib. She has become a travler and in her short life has been to New Jersey, New York City, Atlanta and South Carolina. She has been on plane rides, boat rides and in a cab. She saw the ocean for the first time when she was 5 months old. Lisa saw the ocean for the first time when she was 17 years old. She is one of the happiest little girls and we love how she makes us laugh everyday. We miss out little tiny baby, but are loving see her grow and change with each passing day. Below are pictures of Ella from a few hours old to her first birthday

Newborn

One Month

2mths

3 mths

 

4 mths 

 

5mths

6 mths

7 mths

 8 mths

9 mths

10 mths

11mths 

1st Birthday

So big...so adorable

Ella's before and After with her hair cut

Things in the Carlin household have been very busy as we are preparing for Ella's first birthday. We had a lazy Sunday a couple of weeks ago and couldn't figure out what to do...so we went to the local Aquarium. Ella loved it so much we bought a year pass and can't wait to take her back to see her fish friends. Ella also saw a very large snow for the first time and was excited. IF we could find snow pants to fit her she would have gotten to play it it, but she is still too tiny and they just fall off. Ella recently had her one year photo shoot at the pictures turned out so amazing. It is going to be hard to choose what to print off. To prepare for her close up Ella had her first haircut. She now has little bangs that make her look so grown up. Ella has gone from sometimes taking steps to being a walker. It is a rare day in this house that Ella crawls. She can sign more and please. She has also said her first words, hiiiiii and byeeeebyeee...she knows what they mean to as she says them as she first sees you and waves, or as you leave and again she waves.

We wish you a Merry Christmas

This month was crazy and exciting all at the same time. We had things planned every weekend and kept very busy. We went to the Holiday lights at the Columbus Zoo, a Charles Dickens Christmas at the Ohio Village, and Billy and Lisa spent time in Colorado. Christmas Eve and Day came much quicker than planned, but turned out to be the most wonderful day. Ella had an adorable sleeper to wear, until she wet herself and her sleeper. Santa came and brought Ella lots of presents. We thought for sure it would take Ella a long time to open her gifts, but once she got started she was an unwrapping fool. Ella especially loves the rocker toy that her Grandpa Chuck got her. Ella has started sitting up on the couch on her own and does not care to sit with us. She loves her stuffed toys and is often giving them hugs and kisses. Santa brought her a lap top for Christmas and she loves to sit with it and pretend to work on it. Ella is also starting to take steps (without help) and walks great with help!

After the family left we sat on the couch as a family and watched the Polar Express. It was nice just spending quiet time as a family. We had an amazing first Christmas and are now preparing to get everything planned for Ella's first birthday. It is hard to believe that in five weeks our little girl will be one year old! We see her growing and doing more and more each day and wonder were the time has gone!

An amazing week!

This past week was a mixture of amazing views, exciting new experiences and the feeling of missing someone more than you could ever think possible.

Dec 11, 2009 marked the four year anniversary of the unexptected passing of Lisa's mom. Lisa always goes away and does something fun to remember her mom. This year she suggested a trip to Colorado. Billy was of course stoked as he never thought we would go there when there was snow on the ground. We orginally planned on taking Ella, but instead invited friends to go along. Our 4 day trip turned into 6 and we were set to go. Never having left Ella before left us with fear and for Lisa naseau. Although we knew she would be in great hands (with her grandparents) the thought of leaving her left us both uneasy. It didn't help that we planned to leave on Thursday and on Monda we had Ella in the emergency room as she had croup and was still recovering from a nasty ear infection. Thankfully she did great, however we missed her more than we had missed anything before and both have agreed that 6 days away from her is too long!

While in Colorado Billy skied, Lisa went dog sledding, we saw Michelle Branch and Ryan Star (who Lisa LOVES) in concernt, went snow tubing, snow mobiling and on a "sunset" sleigh ride (we failed to see the sun set due to massive amounts of snow falling!) It was beautiful and so fun, however we were very excited to get home and see Ella, and equally excited that she was happy to see us.

Ella continues to grow and learn new things. She has offically taken up to 3 steps with out falling. We can hardly believe in just a month and a half our tiny baby will be a year old. When people say it goes fast you can not truely understand how true it is, until you experience it.

We are looking forward to the week ahead and spending our first Christmas together as a family. We can't wait to see Ella open her gifts from Santa and try her mommy's homemade Christmas cookies.

Bedroom in the condo

Living area with fireplace

Dog Sledding

Ryan Star from Rock Star Supernova

Billy and Lisa

Village at Winter Park

Views heading home

Views while on the snow mobile

Ready for our closeup!

Today we went to Portriat Innovations to have our Christmas photos and Ella's 10 month photos taken. It was crazy busy and we had to wait a little bit, but even being sickly Ella was all smiles and ready to pose. It was so hard to choose which shots we want, but we eventually did! Then we found out we get a CD with all the pics anyway, so we ended up owning all the pics that were taken. Having the picture taken by the tree reminded that Christmas is upon us and that we are so blessed this year!

I see COOKIES!

Opps you caught me...