Growing Up!

It seems that there was an explosion in Ethan's understanding and interest in learning at 13 months and it continues as we have entered his 14th month. We are so thrilled to hear him as he has a "conversation" with us and is able to answer some of our questions. This is such a glorious time to watch him and he truly is a sponge right now taking it all in!

He understands almost all of what we say. Ben can ask if he wants to ride in his car (Cozy Coupe) and he will run to it, climb in, then wait for Daddy to push him around the house. I can ask if he has a poopy diaper, wants to go to school, or go night-night and I am sure that you will know the answer to all of those...it is, of course, that cute little "Noooo" with a shake of the head and in the sweetest little voice.

Here are the words he is using most often right now:

MaMa
DaDa
MiMi
Ball (Bo-with a short o)
Bath (Ba-with a short a, then running to the stairs, crawling up, and running all the way to his bathroom)
No (with a sweet tilted head and in the most precious voice)
Uh-Oh (Uh, he forgets the Oh)
Yum-Yum (NumNum)
Sit (Zit)
Banana (Nana)
Moo
Duck
Yes (Ya- with a short a and of course not used near as often as No)

This Little Man also gives the sweetest hugs and kisses. He wraps both arms all the way around you and just holds on tight, then starts to pat your back with his little hands. Sometimes he'll even surprise you with an open mouthed kiss right on the lips! With the cutest little grins and giggles and all the love he has to give, we couldn't be more blessed.

Mommy and Daddy love you so much, Ethan!

Seriously...

Don't let this sweet little innocent face fool you!

After I put Ethan down for his nap this morning, I sat down to do a little work for my part-time job. A few minutes later, I check the monitor and saw the black fuzzy screen. Hmmmm...I switched the channel to see if maybe it had accidentally gotten changed, but that didn't work. So I decide to go upstairs and try to sneak in without being seen. This little stinker had reached down behind his crib, unplugged the camera, wrapped the cord through the slats at the back of the crib, then wrapped them again through the side of the crib, and finally threw the plug over the top of the crib so that it could swing back and forth. Really!!!

And I thought the last safe place in the house was his crib.

What do we do now?

How do you get outsmarted by a 1 year old?

Through the first gate...
And the second gate...

We have a long road ahead of us! At least he latched the top gate after he got up there. What in the world do we do now???!!!

Playin' in the Buff

What's a baby to do on a hot day? Play naked in the backyard, of course.

Of course, like any good play time with Daddy, there has to be a chase scene. Grab the rubber ducky from the pool and run!

Best Buddies

Lucy came first, Ethan came second, but you would never know it in our house. Ben did a lot of research before we chose a breed and he couldn't have done a better job! Ethan loves his Lucy! Our high energy, slightly neurotic, overanxious, allergy-prone, attention-seeking Lucy is so laid back with him that Ethan can literally do anything he wants to her. While she might prefer him not to, she just lays there anyway and wags her tail. You can see the scheming face for what's about to come next.
Uh-huh, this is a regular occurrence in our house. What you don't see are the poking of the eyes, pulling on the tail, and chewing on the ears...and yes, I mean Ethan.

Yum! Yum!

This little boy LOVES meatballs! He was so intent munching on his meatballs at dinner that he realized his bib was getting in the way. No problem, he just turned it to the side and kept on going. By the time dinner was over, he had sauce all over his face and in his hair! This was one meal that took us straight to the bathtub.

On another note, of which I disappointedly have no pictures to document, we had quite an interesting afternoon one day last week. While Mommy was cleaning up the bathroom, Ethan decided to do some investigating in the drawers. In a matter of moments, he found a nail polish bottle. As he was trying to get it out of the drawer, he dropped the bottle on the tile. As I look down, all I see is a splatter of red polish everywhere! Thankfully, the bottle broke into 2 pieces and I was able to scoop them up quickly. But, Ethan had pretty red feet and we were left with red tile, red grout, red baseboards, and a red wall. Did I mention that our house is on the market right now? In my haste to try to quickly get as much up as I could before the nail polish dried, I did not snap any pictures of this priceless moment. I SOOOO wish that I would have at least taken pictures of his feet! In the last week I have tried to erase any indication of our catastrophe, but little did I know that paint does NOT cover up nail polish and once it is in grout, it is there to stay.

Ethan's 1st Tri-State Tour

This is the FIFTH time in a week and a half that I have tried to make this post, but my computer has NOT wanted to cooperate so hopefully I'll get through it this time.

We just returned from Ethan's first Tri-State tour. This is what we call the trek that we make to visit the whole family which covers basically 3 states. We started out traveling through the night from Rockwall to Guntersville, Alabama, where Ethan got to see Mimi, Maw-Maw, Uncle Chad and Aunt Ashley. We also got to spend time with Miss Betty, Jody, and Alisa as well! Ethan had a blast playing with everyone! His favorite toy...a little blue dog bone that Maw-Maw washed for him(her dogs had never used it). Why should Mommy bring his toys when we have dog toys to play with! He also spent most of his time torturing Maw-Maw's little dog Bo. You can see the "I've been caught" look on his face.

After the visit in Guntersville, we made our way over to Gainesville, Georgia, to visit with Aunt Melissa and Uncle Mike, cousins Cherie and Daniel, John Michael and Heston, Uncle Gary and Aunt Lynn, cousin Jared and Stephanie, Aunt Wanda and Trish, Pop and Nana Lynda, Uncle Harry and Aunt Robbie. We spent some time on the lake, at a family B-B-Q, eating at favorite restaurants, swimming, and lots of playing! We even scouted a few houses and neighborhoods.

Pop got this tricycle out for Ethan to give a spin. It was Ben's when he was little! He loved it!

You can see Pop's concentration to make sure that Ethan doesn't lose his balance.
Then Daddy took Ethan swimming. He thought it was hilarious when Ben stuck his face under the water to blow bubbles. We "tried" practicing this earlier in the summer at swim lessons.

Yep! Mommy was lazy that day, skipped the swim suit, and went straight for the swim diaper. But Ethan and Daddy had a blast anyway!

After swimming, we did what all little Georgia boys like to do...play in the back of the truck half- naked! It was too hot for clothes!

Once leaving Georgia, we made our way down to the sourthernmost part of Alabama touching the Florida line to visit Grandad, Granny and Grandpa, Uncle CJ, Aunt Cheryl, Aunt Cindy and cousin Jacob on the farm.

Daddy and Uncle CJ had some fun hitting golf balls and of course, Ethan is making Daddy proud with his interest in golf as well!
Grandad was so excited to take Ethan on a ride in the big tractor, but this was Ethan as soon as he heard the tractor coming. You can't see the look or terror on his face or tell that he's running in the opposite direction, but it was priceless!

He soon warmed up a little bit and let Grandad take him up in the tractor with him.

I soooo wish I had taken pictures of him with the horses and chickens. He wasn't too sure about the cows. I don't know how I forgot to grab the camera, but I did! We had a blast on the farm and can't wait for our next visit!

After our visit with Grandad, we headed back home. I must say, Ethan was a trooper up until the last few days. With so much car time, he finally decided he had had enough of the car seat and was ready to go home. We are so proud of him, though! He was comfortable everywhere we went and went to everyone...which says a lot for our little boy who will normally only go to a few people!