Christmas 2009 Pictures

Palm Beach Shores, FL

We spent a week in Palm Beach Shores, FL with my mom and family at their timeshare. We had a very relaxing time! We went to a drive thru safari, out to dinner at some very yummy places (Dave and I even had our own date night out for sushi), and a small road trip to another little down down the coast. Here are a few pics, in no particular order..

Ethan helping Daddy drive thru the Safari. You should've seen these animals right next to the car!!
Hanging with Grandma by the pool
The family after the drive-thru Safari. We stopped at the zoo portion to walk around a bit before heading back to the hotel.
Although Ethan didn't care for getting his feet in the sand or ocean, he LOVED when daddy walked out into the water and the waves rushed up on them.
With Mommy by the oceanOn our little road trip, we stopped for some ice cream.
Cool man with his sun hatHaving some yummy chocolate milk by the pool while Daddy grills us some dinner.

Chillin' on the couch
Our GROWN up looking little man!!
Playing on the playground
Ready for take off on our way back home. Doggy is sharing the seatbelt!
It's rough traveling...thankfully mommy and daddy's lap makes a nice bed!

Halloween 2009

Last weekend we carved our pumpkins up. We had a variety of designs. I did just a basic face (I'm not so creative), Ethan wasn't very interested in the whole ordeal, so I just carved a big "E" in his his and Dave went ALL out! As you can see by the picture below, he got out his jigsaw to help him with the mouth, otherwise i think his arm would've been pretty tired from doing all the ups and downs.

We were also invited to a pumpkin painting party @ one of my coworker's house. Ethan had fun with all the colors, but was most interested in the tractor toy (if you can imagine). I'm seriously considering telling Dave we need to sell our house and move to the country and start a farm business. :)

Here are a few pics of Ethan in his costume. Depending on the day, he did/didn't want to wear the hood of the duck. This kid must've grown an inch or two since we bought it a month or so ago, because it barely fit him!! As far as trick or treating, I took him into Dave's work on Friday afternoon, where all the kids were invited to come in and everyone had candy on their desk. Ethan was very timid at first, but before we left, he was running around and playing peek-a-boo with everyone. He was a sweaty little boy once I took off the costume. Saturday, we took him around to a few neighbor houses, but then went to dinner with friends.

We went to a birthday party at a place called GymQuest and Ethan loved the trampoline! He was a bit timid to go thru the obstacle course, but with a little prompting, he went through once.

Finally, just a little upgrade we did this past weekend was planing some trees. Or, actually I should say Dave did MOST of the work!! We couldn't pass up a 70% off sale at the landscaping place down the road. We got 4 big trees (2-Autumn Blaze Maples, 1-Padamore Ash and 1-Autumn Blaze Pear). These trees are 400-600lbs each. We had the delivery guys drop them near the areas we were going to plant them, and then we dug the holes and jointly lifted/pushed them into place this weekend. Thank god Dave is strong!! Actually, the hardest part of the whole thing is after you got about 10 inches down in the soil, it turned into this rock hard clay that basically only Dave could dig thru. So, I was help for the first 30 minutes of digging. Each tree took an average of 2 1/2 hours!! But, come next year, our lot will look very nice...and in the fall, these trees turn very pretty colors!

Visit to Museum

Last weekend proved to be another busy one for us. Dave and I actually went out with some friends on Friday night and Uncle Patrick came to hang with Ethan...well, stay at the house while he slept. :) But, the cutest thing was that Ethan wanted Uncle Patrick to rock him to sleep...not Mommy or Daddy!!

Saturday morning we woke up early and got to the Children's Museum when it opened (always a good tactic, because a half hour after the place opens - it's packed!!). We ended up getting a membership, because I figured with winter keeping us indoors and Dave about to start studying for another test, it would be a good investment for us. Ethan's favorite part was the boat, but I was also proud of him for going upstairs into a glass tunnel area basically all by himself - very brave.

Playing a little music for us

Sometimes I think Daddy enjoyed the museum a bit more than Ethan! :)

Just like Daddy...Junior engineer putting together some piping

Up in the glass tunnel looking down on us

We also had the opportunity to visit with Dave's sister and our niece (Uncle Robin was busy with a conference in Chicago) while they were in town from Pittsburgh for the long weekend. Rowan and Ethan are almost exactly a year apart, so it's always interesting to see the differences. It's too bad that we live so far, because it would be nice for them to get to know each other a little better. But, they do just fine the little time we do see them.

Ethan playing tea party with Rowan...kind of. :) This picture cracks me up because Rowan is 'all girl' with her pretty skirt and pink hat on and Ethan is 'all boy' with his camo hat and football shirt! :)

Rowan immediately put ont he ballerina outfit we got her for her birthday..very cute!!

Playing a little play-doh together at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

We look forward to seeing the family again at Christmas!!

9-1-1

No, Ethan didn't dial it on the phone...but he might know how, if he knew what numbers looked like. :)

Last week was 'Fire Prevention' week at Lauren's house, complete with a visit to the local fire department. Ethan loves fire trucks, so that might be why the topic is near and dear to his heart, but either way, the stuff that Lauren taught him has definitely stuck with him. Randomly, he'll start talking about fires and rolling around on the floor and then he'll duck down his head and say walk, walk (as if to get low under the smoke). Then he says, 'go outside, see fire truck'. So, he knows to walk low to the ground, roll on the floor and then get outside to the firetruck. He also talks about "Emergency 1-1-1" (I repeat the '9' for clarification so he knows, but he gets the point).

Anyway, just something I thought was pretty cute and like I said, he's started the discussion multiple times, so he definitely remembers.

Ethan's (John Deere) Birthday Weekend

Things for Ethan's birthday pretty much started Friday evening. We had dinner at home as a family and then headed out to get last minute groceries for the party. Ethan likes to go grocery shopping because we get to see the fish in the pet aisle of Wal-Mart. :) When we got back from the store, Dave took care of bedtime with Ethan while I started multi-tasking. I was able to start laundry while I made the pasta, baked, shaped and frosted the cake, and clean up the mound of dishes! Pictures below of my creation of a tractor cake for Ethan. (Note: I did this while he slept Friday night and I debated about waiting to unveil the masterpiece at his party for a surprise, but my excitement got the better of me and I showed him Saturday morning when he woke up. As soon as I tried to put the cake back in the fridge, he freaked on me and instantly started crying that he wanted it!! Luckily I assured him that we WOULD in fact see the cake again and he calmed down after a few minutes).

Saturday morning he decided to sleep in until almost 7:45!! When he wakes up I usually give him a few options for breakfast; we talk about these while we have our diaper change and then he tells me which item he wants. Well, he declared that he wanted banana bread and he wanted to share with Doggy. After breakfast, we took Daddy with us to story time at the Oswego Library and then checked out a few new books. Once back at home, Ethan decided that he wanted to ride his bike and low & behold, he can now pedal a bike on his own!!! So, we bundled up to ride our bike around the block a few times before lunch. So proud of our little man, big boy bike is on the list for next summer for sure now!! After lunch was his usual nap while I did final preparation on food/decorations. As you'll see below, Ethan had a great time at his party. We had all grandparents and uncles as well as some good friends over to help us celebrate. Ethan got some great new clothes, tractor items, puzzles, snow gear, etc.

Riding the bike around the house

Opening presents

Time to sing Happy Birthday!

A few funny pictures before bedtime..

Uncle Patrick hung around a little longer..

Bedtime story from Uncle Patrick

Sunday was his actual birthday. I originally had big plans to take him to the Children's Museum, but didn't realize they had shortened hours, so we'll save that for another weekend. We ended up bundling up for the cold weather and going to a Pumpkin Farm in Aurora. We each picked out a pumpkin, saw some of the farm animals and then took a tractor ride thru the corn maze. Sunday afternoon was spent getting his pictures taken (post below) and shopping at Target for a few extra birthday gifts courtesy of the Great-grandparents who sent money for Ethan to pick out his own gifts (play-doh was the theme - a good indoor, winter activity that should entertain him!)

On the tractor ride

That's the birthday weekend wrap-up!! 2 years of many great memories, and MANY, MANY more to make!