Eleven Months Old

Hard to believe (at least for me), but Ethan is less than three weeks away from being a year old!  Here's the latest:

• He loves to clap.  If you say "yay", he'll usually start clapping.  He also waves bye bye now.  He'll wave if you say bye bye, hi or night night.  I've been working on signing "more" and "all done" when he's eating.  He claps if he wants more & waves if he's all done (and says "a da" when he's done).  It's pretty cute.
• If I sing "aaahhh", he usually will imitate me & sing it back.
• He has another tooth on the bottom & has three more very close to poking through.  We usually know when it's bothering him whenever he wakes up in the middle of the night or wakes up really early.  But otherwise, he handles it pretty well.
• He loves to play with whatever his brother's playing with or whatever's not a toy.  Of course!
• He is a STINKER.  He gets great pleasure doing whatever we tell him not to do.  Sometimes he waits until he knows we're watching to do it right in front of us.  He also still likes to bite - especially me.  If I tell him no, he'll look at me, lean down & bite me again.  Ugh.  He doesn't do it meanly.  It just happens to be one of his favorite things.  I have a feeling we are going to have our hands full with this one as he gets older.
• He's taking a few steps here & there but he really doesn't have much interest in it.  We got him to take about 4-5 steps a couple times yesterday on Christmas with the family around.  He has good balance & coordination.  Whenever he decides he wants to walk, I have a feeling he's just going to take off!
• He's still been pretty clingy to me but has gotten better recently.  Holding him all the time was getting a little old - especially when I needed to do something like get ready for work.  And he is getting heavy!
• Speaking of getting heavy, he has been eating a lot lately.  We think he's going through a growth spurt.  I don't know how his little tummy holds all that food.  I'm glad he's a good eater & pretty much eats whatever we give him.

It sure was fun celebrating Ethan's first Christmas.  He liked his toys but he really liked the wrapping paper (especially trying to eat it).

Ethan didn't really want to take pictures (as you can see below).  I'm surprised I got one halfway decent one!  The boys wouldn't sit still long enough to get a good one of both of them.  And you can see where Alex was playing while I tried to get Ethan to smile for me.  Silly boy!

Merry Christmas!

Alex's 3rd Birthday!

Two weeks ago, my first baby turned three.  I can hardly believe it's been three years since I first became a mom.  When people tell you time flies with kids, they aren't kidding!

We had his birthday party the weekend before his birthday.  He picked a fire truck theme.  I called our local fire station & found out they give tours for parties/groups.  It was a perfect activity for the little ones!  We learned a little about fire safety, one of the firemen put on all his gear, we got a tour & then we got to check out the fire trucks.  On a side note, having the kids see a fireman wearing his gear is a really good thing.  When they're completely suited up & wearing their oxygen mask, they look & sound a little scary (think Darth Vader voice).  The kids got to watch him put it all on & then go up & touch the gear, give him high fives, etc.  If your kids were (God forbid) ever in a fire, they may be scared to go to a fire fighter since they look & sound a little intimidating.  It was good for the kids to see & understand it's just a regular guy (or could be a girl) under all that stuff.

After the tour, we went back to our house to have cupcakes & open gifts.  Alex had such a great time. 

All suited up

Checking out the fire truck

Fire fighter, Alex!

Ethan & his Mo (Michael's mom)

Talking on the headsets

Opening presents

Cupcakes!

I'm planning on doing another post about the decorations.  Hopefully I get around to it!

It's been awhile since I've done an update on Alex, so here's what he's been up to lately.

• He loves his brother (most of the time).
• He's a talker & I'm frequently impressed by his vocabulary.  He also can count to almost 20 & knows most of his letters.
• He makes me laugh at least once a day.
• He's always going, going, going.  Lately he's been hitting doors, walls & falling down a lot because he's always running so fast every where he goes & doesn't pay attention to objects around him.
• He's a little more opinionated these days & he struggles being obedient sometimes but I think it's par for the course with this age.  It's been a good chance for Michael & I to work on our patience - ha.
• He's still not potty trained.  I put it off earlier in the year because I didn't think he was ready physically.  I believe he is now but he has zero interest.  Ugh.  My goal is to take a weekend in January & try to knock it out.  We'll see.  Anyone have any pointers out there on how to make it as painless as possible for him & me??
• We sure love him a lot.  We sure are lucky to be blessed with this little boy.

Santa

The boys got to visit Santa last week at Michael's company holiday event. The pictures crack me up! Alex looks scared but he really wasn't. He was a little shy but he told Santa he wanted a bike. He just looks a little odd because the photographer said - "smile big, let us see your teeth" & I think it confused Alex. Ethan was kind of interested at first (as long as Daddy held him) but then he was just unsure about the whole thing. 

The cutest part of the night was on the way to the party. While in the car, Alex asked - is this town? I wasn't sure where that came from until he asked if Santa was at town. Then I realized he was thinking of the song - Santa Claus is coming to town. We told him we were going to see Santa & he thought town was a place like home or the store. Too cute!!

Anyway, enjoy our lovely pictures!

Hope you've been good this year!

Gift Ideas

It's the holiday season!  I love shopping, so I enjoy this time of year.  It's a little stressful because I really try to pick out gifts I think the person will like & sometimes I draw a blank.  Here are a few things I've come across that I think would be wonderful gifts.

Echo Touch Gloves

Most people have touch phones/devices these days.  I hate pulling my gloves off to use my phone & these have special fabric on the fingertips that allow you to use your device.  Plus, they're cute!  They come in a lot of great colors, but I think the mint is especially cute.

Thermos Stainless Steel Tumbler

A co-worker has one of these & he attests to its ability to keep his coffee hot for a ridiculously long time.

Hot Chocolate & Marshmallows

Williams Sonoma does it right.  Yum.

Birchbox
Perfect for any woman who likes beauty products.  You can buy a subscription for someone for a few months.  They'll get 4-5 samples a month.  I've been subscribed to Birchbox for over a year now & I love it.  You get points for reviewing the products & then you can use your points to get a discount on full sized items on their website.  If they decide to keep the service going, it's only $10 a month.  But if not, they got some fun goodies for a few months.  Win win!

Fitbit One or Fitbit Zip

I have a Fitbit One & it tracks your steps, flights of stairs, mileage, calories burned & even sleep.  I really like it & it pushes me to be more active.  It's amazing how often I don't reach 10,000 steps a day (the recommended amount) & I think I'm a decently active person.  I've heard the Fitbit Zip is good, too & is a little less expensive than the One.  This would be a great gift for a fitness buff or someone wanting to get in shape.

What's on my wish list?  Well, I can't help but want the gloves & coffee tumbler for myself (but I promise, I came across these originally as ideas for others!)  I'm also swooning over the new Urban Decay Naked Palette 3.  Such pretty colors!

Also, this is totally weird but I came across this sweatshirt in the Dick's Sporting Goods mailer & crack up every time I think about it.

They only have it in boys sizes & it's a completely obnoxious color but I swear I can see myself wearing it.  I figure I need to assert myself with a house full of boys & remind them that if mama's not happy, no one's happy.  There have been days when I've felt like the Hulk with his anger management issues.  Ha!!

Happy Holidays!