Greetings and Salutations

Well, without any fanfare, here it is....

Ellie is a beautiful, wonderful, extremely well-loved baby girl. I'm Ellie's dad (ED) and this, as noted in the description above, is a little catalog of sorts dedicated to her and her life. Ellie's anticipated arrival date is June 26. As such, I guess these first few posts will be more about her orgins and less about her specifically.

I've never blogged before and, coincidentally, I've never parented before. So while I'm nervously excited to experience blogging and parenting, if this blogging thing doesn't work out it's no big deal; I'm just trying to leave my baby girl a little gift of sorts. The real key here, of course, is the parenting of which I have no choice but to do and do well. Please take pity on me as a stumble through this and if anyone has any constructive comments pertaining to blogging, parenting or life in general, I welcome your input.

Ellie's mom (EM) and I have been married for what's coming on four years; we've been together for nearly ten. EM is 37 weeks pregnant and is struggling through the last few uncomfortable and swollen weeks like a real champ. She's had a virtually perfect pregnancy minus a few bouts of indigestion and an awful stomach virus. All her visits to the doctor have gone well and I'm proud to say I've accompanied her to all but two. We've also attended birthing classes and breast-feeding classes together. EM has been working very hard to get things just right for our baby girl... the nursery is essentially complete, her overnight bag is almost packed and the birthing plan is in the final stages. She's going to be a great mom. I love her and appreciate her dearly.

With that said, I expect most of this blog will be authored by yours truly. You see, due to the times being what they are, we both must work. However, I have the good fortune of working at night so that I can care for baby Ellie during the day and EM can care for her at night. Consequently, and I could be wrong, I suspect I'll have a little more free time (that, and me and the computer sometimes seem to be connected at the hip) than EM and so I hope to invest some of that time right here.

There you have it. I don't know what's going to happen next, but I look forward to whatever it is and I hope to write about it here when I get the chance.

-ED