A year of growth

Our sweet little girl turned one this week. I haven't been able to blog in awhile because I'm so busy chasing her, tickling her, playing patty cake, reading books and laughing and laughing and laughing. I'm still wondering how this:

turned into this:

and then became this:

and then way too quickly became this:

and then I blinked for ONE SECOND and she became this:

Next thing I know, we're having her first birthday party and I'm smiling on the outside but freaking out on the inside thinking Where did that year go???

Pregnancy was so...stressful. Partly because I made it that way. Should we have waited longer to have a baby? Are we ready for this? Do I have enough clothes for her? Am I going to be a good parent? Everyone wants to give parenting advice and each person's advice was conflicted with the next person's and I read too many things about parenting and baby raising and took the advice/criticism of others WAY to heavily. Basically, when I went in to have the baby, I was a wreck.

Then that baby came out and they placed her on my chest and she opened her eyes and stared at me. My brain reset and my heart exploded and absolutely nothing that happened before that moment mattered. 

My husband and I talk often about how silly we were to wonder if we were ready for a baby. We weren't, but not in the way we originally thought. Nothing could have prepared us for such inexplicable love and joy.