Ellie’s 5th birthday

Ellie celebrated her fifth(!) birthday this summer. To celebrate, we invited a bunch of her friends to come and celebrate at Enchanted Forest: a theme park based on fairy tales which hasn’t seen too many updates since the 1970s. However, all of the adults agreed that that was part of its charm; it isn’t flashy or over the top, but offers some great entertainment for a reasonable price without going crazy.

For her actual birthday, she was insistent on wearing her princess dress, and looked beautiful and grown up. Continue reading “Ellie’s 5th birthday”

Ellie’s 4th birthday

Our sweet baby girl is not so little anymore. As she continues to grow, she amazes us more and more with how intelligent, funny, creative and curious she is.

For her birthday, we went to the Evergreen Air & Space Museum and Ellie had a blast looking at all of the planes and rockets.

Then, her main birthday present from us was a big girl (double) bed which she was ecstatic about. Continue reading “Ellie’s 4th birthday”

Ellie getting a bike for her birthday [VIDEO]

Many months ago, Mama mentioned to Ellie the possibility of her getting a bike for her birthday and since that day, she has professed to everyone that she “is getting a bike for her birthday”.

So we couldn’t really fail her. We celebrated her birthday a little early since we had family visiting, but her reaction when she got her bike was hysterical. She had this nervous laughter that she couldn’t quite believe she got a bike. She was a bit shaky at first, but within 24 hours she’s already zooming around. Continue reading “Ellie getting a bike for her birthday [VIDEO]”

Ellie’s 2nd birthday

It’s been a couple of weeks since Ellie’s birthday now, but we’ve only just had enough time to download the photos and sort through them.

We had a really enjoyable time at Dell Holmes Park in St Pete: Ellie and all of her friends made the most of the splashpad in the blistering hot weather. Continue reading “Ellie’s 2nd birthday”

Thoughts on buying gifts for Ellie

We’re very thankful to have such generous people in Ellie’s life, and we truly appreciate anyone who wishes to buy her a gift.

With that in mind though, we’re not raising Ellie in a “conventional” fashion and there are certain things that we’d rather Ellie did not have, or that she simply cannot have.

These mainly revolve around our desire to raise a low-media, vegan, creative, intelligent child. Continue reading “Thoughts on buying gifts for Ellie”

Ellie’s 12-month picture

We made it a full year! In many respects it seems like just yesterday, and in others, a lifetime.

It’s been a true blessing to be able to nurture, watch and encourage Ellie over the last 12 months, and I’m looking forward to the next 204 or so.

And for good measure, here’s the whole series of monthly pictures.