Let's start off with our biggest news, which may be old news by now!

We made this into a T-Shirt for Ethan to wear to help us announce that we are expecting a baby in November!  Ethan doesn't really understand what's going on, but he just knows that a lot of people really liked his shirt and wanted to see it.  

Here's Baby 2's picture at 8 weeks.

It's been a while since we've posted, so I'll try to just stick in a few fun moments in our lives.

We decided that Ethan needed an outlet for his energy, so we got him this little trampoline.  You can see he actually can get some air on it.  This was the first time we set it up for him, you should see him on it now!  We'll have to get another picture because he raises his knees up and really gets bouncing on that thing! 

It's a bird, it's a plane, no it's Super Ethan!  Our friend Kelly brought this outfit over for Ethan to try on, and we thought it was so cute!

Ethan has his first real trip to the hospital with a hurt leg.  He fell off a short step stool and then refused to put any weight on his foot the entire day, so we decided to take him into the InstaCare at the new Riverton Hospital.  They X-rayed his leg and determined that he hadn't broken anything, but as a precaution they splinted it .  Ethan was totally fine the next day and even tried running around with the splint on! 

This kid is already hooked up with the I-pod, loving listening to music.  He'll listen for a while, then chew on the ear pieces.  It's super cute when he bobs his head to the beat!

This kid loves Brandon's I-Pad and discovered the "Photo Booth" app.   He thinks it's so funny to see his face on screen in so many different colors! 

We officially have to keep all bathroom doors shut or else you may find this, or someone's hand in the toilet when you finally figure out why it got so quiet all the sudden.  He'll go in and close the door and it doesn't matter if it's pitch black in there, he'll find a way to get into things.

This is Ethan's little pal who lives at the end of our building.  Each day as we go out on our walk we have to check to see if "Sammy" is outside.  If he is then Ethan loves to hang out with him and pet him and follow him around.  Sammy is really good with him too and allows him to do that.  

We decided it was time we gave Ethan a haircut, and rather than go to the professionals, Brandon decided that since he can cut his own hair, why not give it a try on a squirming little 1 year old.  It was working out okay until he dropped the clippers (squirming boy remember) and they stopped working and he had to use regular scissors.  Oh, like the very same ones you see Ethan holding without us realizing he has them!  Sheesh! Next time, I say we bring him to a salon!

My budding artist!  Like Mommy, like son!  As many of you may know, when I found out I was pregnant again, I decided that I would not be returning to teaching next school year.  It was a tough decision, but one that will be the best for our family.  I've spent the past 9 years teaching roomfuls of high school kids how to draw, paint, learning how to create and express themselves through art.  Now I can focus on teaching on a smaller scale, and I am looking forward to it!   Here's Ethan's first painting experience!  He loved it!  He made this for one of his Grandma's for Mother's Day! 

And lastly, just for laughs, here's Ethan making friends with a couple of real "asses" at the petting zoo in Scipio!

Well there's a little bit of an update, and now that school is out, I will hopefully be able to update this blog a little more frequently! 

You Are Never Too Young For Potty Humor!

Since Ethan was just a wee little baby we tried to teach him a few simple signs to help him communicate. Signs such as "all done", "more" and "eat". He picked all those up pretty quickly. And recently, we decided to teach him more with the help of technology. As you can see you can never be too young for potty humor! He is definitely a little boy!

New Pictures!

 Well these aren't super new, we took them a few weeks ago, but I haven't had the time to post them.  We took Ethan to FotoFly in Draper and had these done.  He did pretty good, but was all over the place.  Now that he's mobile, it's hard to get this kid to sit still for any period of time, no matter how short!  We were pleased with how many turned out and that the photographer didn't just get a blur as Ethan was constantly on the move!

Love the eye brows!  This is such an Ethan look!  I was glad the photographer snapped this one.  This is a look Ethan often gives us. It's his look when he's is wondering about what you are doing or what something is.

We had him lay down to take this one.  But he wouldn't stay down for long, and as you can see with the next shot, he would stand right up and usually head for the camera because he wanted to grab it!

Our little nerdy book worm!  This kid just loves to go through his books every day.  We brought a few of his favorites to the photo shoot.

Silly kid!

Have I mentioned that this kid loves balloons? 

Love the dark lashes on his soft, sweet cheeks!

Surprised we even got a picture of this!  He was running so fast with his balloon!

Anyway, we just love this little guy and wanted to share a few of our favorite pictures from that day.  Hope you enjoy them! 

Happy Birthday Ethan!

On December 15th, our little Ethan turned 1 years old! We can't believe how quickly time flies!  It seems like only yesterday we were first celebrating Christmas with our newborn baby boy, and now he has turned 1!  Check him out in his formal wear for his birthday party with Brandon's side of the family.  I brought him home 8 balloons and he was so excited to have them!  Also notice the little Santa quietly watching just on the edge of the picture.  Silly.

This kid had no idea it was his birthday, he was just excited to have some balloons to play with!  Ethan loves balloons so much that when he sees them at a store, in a display or whatever, he won't stop pointing at them and gets upset when he can't have them.

 

Ethan was so interested in the candle and you can see him sucking in his bottom lip which he does from time to time, when he's checking out something new.  He was definitely excited for this birthday moment!  I do have to hold his hands down to keep him from grabbing the cake and candle.  Thanks Sheila for taking this cute picture! 

 The look of a content chocolate covered baby with sugar overload.

This was taken around Thanksgiving when his Grandma Helen and Grandpa Tim came up to visit.  This kid definitely loves his Grandma! 

 Now that Ethan is 1, it's time to do some updates.  Here's a list of what he's into and doing these days:

1)  Elmo and Sesame Street.  He loves Elmo and gets excited to see him on TV!  Needless to say he got lots of Elmo/Sesame Street related toys, DVD's, and books for both his birthday and Christmas.  Notice we are using our smaller T.V. because our other one broke. Again. Actually we just replaced the bulb, again, and it's working just fine.  So now Ethan can watch his Sesame Street on the big screen! 

2)  Oranges.  He kept pointing to one in his book, so I got him some when I went grocery shopping, and he just loves them! You can see he is pointing to the one in his book while eating an orange! Sweet Christmas PJs!

 3)  Talking.  Yep he's talking.  Here's a list of words he has said:

Mom, Dad, Ball, Book, Dog, Cat, Door, Pump (as in Pumpkin), Hat, Football, Bub (as in Bubble), Pop, Cool, Duck, Shoe, Milk, Car, Look, Cook (as in Cookie and also when pointing to "Cookie Monster), No, One, Two, and loads of other things we don't understand.  When he says "look" sometimes he yells it like this "LOOOOK!" and points, it's pretty cute.

4)  Points at stuff and wants you to see it and tell him what it is.  He carefully watches your mouth when you tell him what the thing is called, like he's studying how to say it.  It's pretty interesting and he never gets tired of learning new things

5)  Swimming in the bathtub, kicking while on his belly and blowing bubbles.

6)  Trying to climb up the oven to see the stove top, very scary! He grabs on the oven door handle and puts his toes onto the top of the oven drawer and pulls himself up for a look. He is very interested in cooking and the goings on of the stove top. 

7)  When Brandon gets home, he likes to run away from him, because he loves to be chased.  He usually heads to our bedroom closet!  Saying "I'm gonna get you!" results in squeals of delight from Ethan as he scurries away as fast as he can.

8)  He's also started to disappear when he's pooping.  Looking for that much needed privacy to do his business.

9)  He likes to wrestle and rough house with Brandon.

10)  Kicks balls around the house, dribbling them like a soccer player and even tries to do it with the big exercise ball.

11)  Loves playing in the curtains, will hide behind them as you ask,  "Where's Ethan?" Then proudly poke his head out and smile and giggle.

12)  When Brandon says "Do the King Kong."  He pounds on his chest.  When he says "Show me  your muscles."  He makes his hands into fists and squeezes and goes "Uhhhhmm!" Like he's flexing.

Here's Ethan's One Year Stats we got from the doctors this week:

Height:  31 1/4 inches tall
Weight:  29 Pounds
Clothing Size: 24 months (can barely squeeze into an 18 month outfit).


It's just amazing how quickly Ethan is learning things, and it's so fun watching him experiencing his surroundings and new things each day.  We are so blessed to have him as a part of our lives and our family.  He is such a happy boy and he makes us laugh every day.  Happy Birthday Ethan!

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

We hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving spending time with family and sharing all that delicious food!  We were lucky this year to spend some time with both sides of our family.  This year we spent Thanksgiving Day with my family, and then Brandon's parents were able to come up on Friday, and we got to have another Thanksgiving dinner that night with them!  

Ethan was loving getting to spend time with his extended family and spent quite some time seeking out that special attention from both his grandmas.  While they were busy cooking or cleaning up, you could find Ethan clinging to their legs, begging to be picked up, giving them his irresistible smile, and of course it worked like a charm!

Ethan getting cuddled by his Grandma LeBras, this kid loves his grandma!

Ethan and his Daddy getting ready to go up on the sidewalk.  Ethan is walking pretty good, but not so good with his shoes on!

This funny face Ethan is making is due to him seeing his aunt Nathalie who was calling his name, he loves to giggle at her!

This kid was checking out this tree in my parent's yard, he is such a little sweetie, we are grateful for him this year!

It's official! Ethan's walking and a trip to the Zoo!

 

Ethan's first trip to the Zoo!  I had a couple days off of work for Fall Break in October, and it was predicted to be a beautiful day, so we decided to join a few other friends and go to the Hogle Zoo!  It's been awhile since I'd been there, so it was a pretty neat experience for both Ethan and me!  I think when he's a bit older, he may appreciate the animals a little more though. 

Ethan was actually more interested in the fence around the elephant enclosure than the actual elephants themselves.  Go figure. 

Here we are at our ward's trunk or treat.  This little turtle to the left is Ethan's little buddy Ian and his mom Susan.  Ian is just a few weeks older than Ethan. 

Ethan and his Great Grandma Gilbert.  He gets to spend one day a week with her when I go to work.  He just loves her!  As you can see, Ethan once again had a sucker that he would not part with. 

Ethan's newest favorite thing to do, get into all the cupboards and empty them out!  Makes for a hazardous cooking environment!  Gotta always watch where you step!

You can see that mischievious smile of his when he knows he's doing something we don't like!

Here's our little walker!  He's taken little steps here and there since October, but it was the beginning of November when he really started to venture out on his own.  He gets better and better everyday, and can pretty much walk all over the place.  He still can't get up to his feet on his own, unless he can grab onto something like a wall or couch, but he'll get it soon. 

We had snow storm come in a few weeks ago and Ethan was fascinated by the white flakes outside our window.

More walking practice!

This kid loves tight spaces!  We got a new washer and dryer and Brandon had to fix the venting stuff and Ethan kept trying to get back there with him.  One minute he's with me and the next he's in the laundry room.   He's constantly on the move and getting into everything! 

We'll we can hardly believe he's gonna be one year old in a few weeks!

8 Teeth and Counting......

"What you talkin' bout Willis?" Check out those lips!  This was the face Ethan kept making when I tried to get a look at his new teeth.  I would say "Let me see your teeth!" and try to pry his lips apart, and he would just pucker up his lips and not let me see inside.

You can only see his two bottom ones here, but this kid has 8 teeth!  His bottom middle came in first, so those are well established since August, but a couple weeks ago we noticed his top two teeth starting to emerge and then the other two top ones on the sides quickly made themselves known, much to Ethan's discomfort.  We thought we'd be done with new teeth for a little while, but nope, earlier this week while Ethan and I were playing with a little flashlight I noticed he had two teeth coming in on the bottom on either side of the middle ones!  So now he's got 8 teeth! 

 

 

We recently bought this stroller on KSL classifieds.  It's one of those all-in-one jobs, it can be a jogger, stroller, and attach to our bikes!  Here's Ethan all cozy for a morning walk.  We've really enjoyed being  able to take him with us for bike rides too!  I wish we would've got one earlier in the summer so we could've enjoyed using it more before the cold sets in!

Here's Brandon and Ethan while we were down in St. George last weekend.  We were taking a quick break to let Ethan out to stretch his legs!  He does pretty good in the stroller, but an hour ride is about his limit.  The weather was absolutely perfect in St. George last week, just in the low 80's high 70's and lots of clear skies!  If only we could get the mild weather to last a bit longer!

At the playground on the slide! Can you see his little bit of hair sticking up?  Ethan loves going down the big twisty slide by our place. 

Same outfit, but down in St. George at a playground there.  Ethan loves to explore these places.  He can get around pretty good on his own, but I have to stay close to keep this adventurous boy from falling off these things!

Again with the tough guy face!

Yesterday at Brandon's work, they had families come to trick-or-treat around the office.  So we took Ethan's cart, green pumpkin (it has an 8 pound weight in it to slow it down) and his Dragon costume and headed over!  He got a sucker from the receptionist and would not let it go! He pushed that cart one handed!

Brandon did unwrap the sucker and let Ethan have his first taste of candy!  It was a very messy and sticky situation!  We had a good time!