zoo trip

This one is getting so hard to take a picture of!  He doesn't sit still for two seconds :)

Brave boy petting the bunnies!

The bears were so active and so close!

My play group had a fun day at the zoo today!  It's been a busy week for us.  More fun to come later this week, my mom gets in tomorrow afternoon for the weekend!

the circus!

Ethan was so thrilled to see the elephant.  Don't let his serious face fool you!  When Steve started walking toward the elephant Ethan started to get very worried.  Once daddy confirmed that we were only going to go close, that Ethan didn't have to ride on the elephant, he was ok and didn't want to leave.  He told us several times after that though, "we're only going to go close, don't ride on it".  During pretty much every act Ethan asked "where'd the elephant go, mommy?"  He enjoyed most of the other acts as well, just the elephant topped them all by far :)  

One other highlight, during one of the acrobat acts, Ethan repeated many times, "She's gonna fall!"  After I told him that she wasn't gonna fall, that she practiced a lot and she wouldn't fall he started saying "She's doing a pretty good job".  Such a funny kid.  

He has talked a lot about it since Monday night, and when I ask him if he liked a certain act he gets super serious and says "oh, I did", nodding his head.  I love how engaging he is about everything, he loves to talk!  

more funny stuff he said

He keeps cracking me up! Today he hugged my legs, looked up at me, and then said "you're a big boy, mommy!"

This morning on our way to church we were singing the song My God is So Big, and Ethan tells me, "that's too loud mommy, turn it down".

milestones

Yesterday I got my first, totally unprompted "I love you" from Ethan. I tell him constantly that I love him, and he says it a lot to me too, but it's usually right after I tell him or right before bed or something like that. So yesterday when we were playing outside and he wrapped his arms around my legs and said "I wub you mommy" it completely melted my heart.

Also, for the record, we are potty training around here! We are on our 4th week of no diapers and most days are great. For a while he would have an accident if I didn't take him really regularly, but lately he's the one who will tell me that he needs to go. He still gets a diaper for nap and night times, but they are often dry. However, the last hurdle is going #2 on the potty. He waits until he's in his crib to go, and seems to be pretty afraid to go on the potty for that one. We're working on it, but it seems that it might take a while to warm up to the idea. Any advice will be appreciated :)

Some of the funny conversations lately

"don't put Jesus in the potty. He doesn't want to be in there"

Ethan, as we are driving home: "I have to go pee pee"
Mama: "can you wait till we get home and go pee pee in the potty? We are almost there"
Ethan: "nope, in my car seat"

As Ethan's taking a bath I hear him saying "uh oh. Poo poos coming out! Oh no, it's just little toots." I take a peek and it definitely was not just little toots.

Ethan arcing his back reaching around and sounding a little upset: "oh no. What's this on my back right here?"
I run over to see what it is. "oh, that's called your shoulder blade." and he goes back to playing.

more cute pics

split personality? or just being a boy :)

It amazes me that this little angel...

Is also this little bug killer...

I love the way he yells "I got it!!" in his angry voice :)

Pets!

Meet the newest 5 additions to the family :). We used some of Ethan's birthday money for a new fish tank. Ethan loves his new little buddies and calls them all by name now. We have Pumpkin, Oreo and Mickey (all platys) and Gilbert the guppy, and lastly Bob the zebra danio. Steve and I are enjoying having a tank again.

2 years old

a 2 year bear pic

how fun it is to compare to these pics

Ethan be two!

Ethan's reply when you ask him how old he is today is "Ethan be two!" That's right, Ethan turns two today. He is quickly turning into a little boy, that's for sure. His language is developing rapidly, and he's now saying "me" and "you" correctly much of the time, as well as using him, her, our, my, although I love to hear him ask for help by saying "mama help you?" because I know that these little grammar slips are going to be disappearing all too quickly.

When people ask me what his personality is like I'd always had a hard time describing. I want to say that he's social, but it's not quite the right word because he actually takes quite a bit of time warming up in social settings and does best with one or two friends on play dates. The closer word I'd use now is relational and interpersonal. He is very interested in people, wants to know who they are and likes to know the relationships (that's the baby's mommy, etc) and in big groups loves to just watch what people are doing, and what kids are playing with more than actually playing with his own toys. He loves to talk to people and talk about what's going on around him.

His favorite thing in the world right now is the computer. Many days the first thing out of his mouth is "watch computer please?" and it's really the only thing that I've seen him have the patience to sit down and study and learn how to use. I guess he comes by it honestly since Steve and I both have computer-related bachelors and masters. Go figure.

I'm hoping that he'll want to spend less time in front of the technology in our house as the weather warms up, because a close second to the computer is being outside, and being adventurous! This guy loves to explore, throw rocks and sticks and snowballs, draw with chalk on the driveway, and go sailing down the street in his toy car.

We certainly love our little buddy and are having so much fun watching him grow! Happy birthday, Ethan!

Play corner!

One of the projects that I have had in my brain to do before Ethan's 2nd birthday (which is on MONDAY!) has been to finish part of our basement into a play area. I wanted a craft area, a magnet area, and we majorly needed toy storage. After shopping around we bought some stuff at Ikea (which Ethan calls Ikea's house) and here is the just-about-finished product.

The magnet board (a large drip pan on the right) still needs to be attached to the wall, and I have some magnetic photo ropes to display artwork that still need to be hung on the wall above it. I love that the stools (red ones next to his craft table) have storage in them for play doh, crayons, etc. and I'm amazed at how many toys that dresser really does hold.

It is so much easier to hang out downstairs now that there are not toys piled up in every corner! We love it so far, and it was miraculously finished in time to call it a birthday project for Ethan. I also bought some trains, and that craft table can double as a trains/cars table too.

amazing grace

Amazing grace is now one of Ethan's favorite songs. I'm sitting here listening to him sing it to himself in his crib as he winds down to take a nap. How precious :) Here's his version:
A - ma - zi race

How swee da soun

Da save a touch wike MEEEEE

Ah one was wos

But now I foun

Bline but now I SEEEE

Pics from a while ago

These were taken over thanksgiving. I don't think I ever shared them since they're from Steve's phone so here they are.

Crazy hair

am I ready for this?

Last night Ethan pee peed on the potty without either of us even knowing. He was running around the house without any clothes on, and Steve and I were busy elsewhere. I realized it had been quiet for a while (usually not a good sign) and then Ethan streaked into the living room yelling "Ethan pee peed!" I totally expected to find a puddle somewhere when I asked him to show me where he pee peed. Steve mentioned that he heard a tinkling in the potty, and thought that he had gone by himself. I didn't believe it until Ethan marched into the bathroom and pointed to the toilet. Sure enough, he had gone into the dark bathroom and gone to the potty all by himself. And now today he wants to do it all by himself, with no help from mama. We went to the store and he got to pick out some big boy underwear. He picked out Thomas ones. And then he didn't want to try them on when we got home, go figure.

I'm not ready for this, I really enjoy the convenience of diapers. Trips to the store may never be the same. I will probably give it a shot sometime in the next couple of weeks though. It seems like he really enjoys his independence in this area :)

video overload

My dad got Ethan this floating shark. Took a ton of videos of Ethan playing with it, but if you don't watch them all, at least watch this one. And make sure you have your volume turned up, I was a ways away from Ethan.

I love how he looks up at the shark and asks "how ya doin?"

And here are the tons of videos of adorable shrieking and running around.

Wantimes

Ethan says the word valentines more like "wantimes". I got an ecard from my dad for valentines day, and Ethan loved watching it. He cried when I put the computer away, and asked to show it to daddy later on in the day :) Here he is boogying to the music of the ecard

abc's

'

Ethan LOVES singing the abc's. He also is obsessed with drawing on his chalkboard, wanting to do it hours on end. I found it on clearance for being a floor model, so I got a brand new easel that was already put together for a great price!! Love great deals like that.

trip to cali

more funny stuff

Ethan has picked up the word "crap" from somewhere (it most definitely would never have been me! ;) ) and is using it quite a lot today. He isn't quite sure how to use it, but he's yelled "Oh crap" many times. I'm hoping that it's one that he'll forget and not use if he doesn't hear it again for a while. A good reminder to watch what I say.

He also was sitting on the washer as I put his boots on yesterday. I turned slightly to pick something up and he reached for the light switch. He almost fell face forward off the washer; as I caught him I said "holy moley" and he thought it was hilarious. He's been saying HOLY MOLEY! a lot now. He fell face first into his slide last night, and as he was crying he kept yelling "HOLY MOLEY! HOLY MOLEY!" which was really hard not to laugh at.

Another funny one he has picked up on is texting. I will tell him that we can't play with the phone, mama is just finishing up this text and then I'll put it away. Well the other day he picked up a thermometer and put it up to his ear like a phone and jibber jabbered into it for a while. Then he held it out in front of him and pushed the button a bunch of times saying "text".

On normal days I haven't been letting Ethan play with my phone much at all. He asks a lot but he gets so engrossed in it that it's hard to limit time on it, so we just have been saying no phone. It's very difficult to use my phone around him, so I usually just leave it in the bedroom so he doesn't see it ever. If he ever does start to play with it, I'll let him watch a short video or something, then ask him to push the button on top (to lock the phone) and put it away. Daddy however, carries his phone in his pocket. Steve was checking something quick on his phone after dinner while Ethan was trying to get his attention. Ethan finally told Daddy "Daddy push button on top" and "put phone in pocket" and told him "Daddy enough". You can tell he's heard that one a lot lately. He had decided that Daddy had had enough phone time for the day :)