It's Been a While...

It's been a while since I have posted, so there's lots to recap. I am super-thrilled to have spent my last official day as a full time working Mommy. On January 4th, after Christmas break, I will go part-time for the remainder of the school year. This decision is bittersweet. At the end of the year, I will have to decide whether or not to return to work full-time or stay home. I reached my career goal and have my dream job as a Literacy Coach and fully believed that this would be the position that I would remain in until retirement. I have always been so career-oriented that I never dreamed returning to work after having Ethan would be so difficult. I obviously didn't listen to all of the people that said everything changes after you have children. They were so right! We have the best nanny in the world and I never worry about him when I am not here. Ben, Ethan, and I love her dearly, but she got to spend all of the time with him that I so desperately desired. Even now, she is so amazing that she understands how I feel and is willing to stay with us part-time! God is so good and has provided an amazing blessing!

The Tri-State Tour, our annual trek across Georgia, North Alabama, and South Alabama(on the Florida line), was adjusted this year and we were able to spend extra time at Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw's house. Ethan spent a lot of time entertaining Paw-Paw and was his little helper just like his outfit says. We introduced sweet peas while we were at Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw's house, too. So now, we are eating rice cereal and baby food. He's getting to be such a big boy!Maw-Maw thought we were starving Ethan, so we appeased her by introducing some new things. I knew if I didn't, she would slip him some bacon to gnaw on.
We also experimented with apple juice in a sippy cup. Surprisingly, Ethan is not a fan. We will have to keep working on that one. Right now, I don't mind at all that he doesn't like it! I would like to keep him away from anything that tastes sweet for as long as I can. He LOVES to chew on the lid to the sippy cup, though. It makes his 2 little teeth feel so much better.

We had a family picture taken at Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw's house courtesy of Ben and the self timer on our camera.

Here is a picture of Paw-Paw and Ethan. Ethan loved to hear Paw-Paw's voice. Whenever he spoke, Ethan would turn his head to look at him. Ethan's wearing the Christmas outfit that Mimi bought for him.

Here's Ethan in his Santa suit with Maw-Maw.

Ethan showing Mimi some love.

Uncle Chad and Ethan pose for a picture.

Granddad and Ethan having a good ole' time.

Uncle CJ and Ethan hanging out.

We did make the trek to Georgia overnight for a family reunion before returning to Maw-Maw and Paw-Paw's. Here's a picture of Pop and Ethan.

He was really interested in the Christmas ornament that Nana Lynda had made with his name on it. What he really wanted to do was eat it!

After all of this traveling and seeing people, we had a very tired and overstimulated baby. Not to mention that 2 nights before we left, he went from sleeping 12 hours at night (that's right, you heard me!) to waking up 2, 3, 4, and sometimes MORE times each night. As hard as I tried, you can't travel and stay on schedule. Additionally, he has mastered rolling over left and right, tummy to back and back to tummy, but something happens to him at night. He'll roll over, get mad, wake himself up, and start screaming. Since this now happens EVERY night, he spent the 10 days we were traveling sleeping on my chest because I didn't want him to wake up everyone in the house. So much for good sleep! By the end of the trip, the poor baby(and Mommy and Daddy) was exhausted. So, I guess you can imagine what the flight was like on the way back. Let's just say, baby Benadryl is now my best friend.