Happy Birthday, YOU

My dear...we are here: your FIRST birthday. It was only twelve short months ago (and one hour, from the exact time I am writing this) that you came into this world to greet us. As is my tradition for the first year of this blog, I am writing one birthday blog for every member of our family to serve as an introduction. At this point, I would like to introduce you to...yourself at the age of one year.

Baby Ella (which is what you know yourself to be...you point yourself out in pictures on the wall when we ask "where's baby Ella?") is the newest and most advanced member of our family! She understands everything and is the most friendly little lady in the sandbox. She is currently capable of challenging her 240 lb father in a pound-for-pound eating contest and she spontaneously dances with wiggly hip motions when she hears music or is otherwise delighted.

Without a smidgen of exaggeration, baby Ella has singlehandedly changed her father into a blubbering fool (I cried more than you did the first time you really took a dive). She is able to cross whole living-rooms in a series of bobbling bounds and she is miraculously capable of managing to get all manner of foreign objects into her mouth before her Daddy can stop her (no matter how close at hand I may be).

In short, Baby Ella is the superhero of her Daddy's life.

Now...you show me which of your little friends has THAT kind of introduction written for her! I'll bet none. The way you are burning through books and baby sign language, too, I'll bet that by the time you can read this, we will be nearing your second birthday and you'll be finding my errors in grammar (there are plenty...I shift persons dramatically in those paragraphs above).

Ella, you are the shining example of what each of us could be if we spent each moment being exactly and totally what we have the potential to be. You are my daughter and you are my hero all in one, tiny, and periodically messy package.

Happy Birthday.

Dad.