Happy Easter!

I knew that Elliana would be born sometime before Easter, so I had been planning to get her all dressed up and take her to church on Easter Sunday.  We got a really pretty dress at a baby shower from my friend Julie that I thought we would use for an Easter dress, however Elliana is so small that she doesn't quite fit into the 0-3 month clothes yet.  She fits best into the Newborn outfits (and could probably wear preemie clothes too!) right now, but hopefully soon she will be fitting into the next size.  Anyway, when I was home at Christmas we looked through a box of baby clothes that my parents saved from all three of us kids, and I found one of my favorite dresses that I wore as a baby (I used to dress my Cabbage Patch doll us in it too), so I brought it back to put on her.  She wore it home from the hospital and we also decided to dress her in it for Easter.  Here is the dress that we took photos with during our maternity photo shoot.

 I was a little worried about the timing on Sunday, that we would not make it to church in time (it usually takes us about 45 minutes to drive to church, with little traffic, and longer on the way home) or that Elliana would wail and cry and just make it a miserable trip.  However, God saw it fit to make it a smooth morning!  Actually, we ended up leaving 40 minutes later than we had planned, but we ended up with no traffic and only being 10 minutes late to church!  Elliana did well sleeping in her carseat for most of the service but woke up about 30 minutes before the end of the service and wanted to eat, so I took her to the nursery to feed her.  I got to meet several other moms, which was kind of nice.  I also met another little baby named Eliana who is about 2 1/2 months old.  :)  We discussed the fact that we did not think it was a very common name when we chose it, but now we keep hearing about more of them.

We forgot to take a photo at church, but we did go to lunch afterwards with our friend and co-worker Clare, and had yummy Thai food, so we got a few photos at the restaurant.

Happy and pretty girl getting her diaper changed!

We met this lady and her daughter on the street who were handing out these little tiny baskets with an egg in them for Easter, I think advertising their church.  So, since we didn't have an Easter basket for Elliana, we tried to get some photos with them and her...they didn't turn out quite like I was hoping. haha

She's like--what are you guys doing to me?

This is kind of fun!

I'm adorable!  And yes, Mommy Loves Me! 

The day that I went into labor, by BFF Amber sent me a package in the mail with a little newborn outfit that said "My First Easter"--so sweet.  I was really excited to put it on Elliana and take photos, and then we were actually able to use it when the photographer, Heather, came on Saturday, the day before Easter!  We got some photos of her in a basket, with a homemade blanket we got as a gift from some friends of Michael's family, which I thought turned out pretty cute. :)   Here is a link to Heather's website to give credit to her for these photos.  http://heathermeinen.com/

Thanks, Auntie Amber for the cute outfit!!

All in all, it was a great first Easter with our new little family!  And most importantly, remembering the amazing sacrifice that Jesus made for us by taking our sins to the cross and raising again so that we can have life and have it more abundantly, is the greatest gift we could ever be given.  Praise God!