November Fun

November was filled with all kinds of fun activities and new discoveries.  Ethan has discovered how to scoot on his bottom and reeeeach to grab things off of the coffee table.  (Time for us to move things higher!)  One morning he was so proud of himself for "finding" Daddy's chips left on the table from the snack the night before.  The bag made a very satisfying crinkle sound.

 

 

 

Unbeknownst to G.G., we took this updated picture of her and the boys for a cute birthday gift for her!  Still hard to get Ethan to smile, but he's cute anyway. 

 

Look at those blue, blue eyes!

 

These are Mike's first grilled pizzas.  Don't they look yummy?  They were!

 

One of the members at church has converted most of his upstairs into a scale replica of a train line.  Then he opens his house up annually for people to come and see all of his beautiful (hard) work!  Caleb loved following the trains from one room to another and Momma was in awe of all the small details.  What an amazing hobby!

 

Ethan was not as impressed as the rest of us and would prefer to touch everything Momma wouln't let him.  The pacifier was his "consolation" prize.

 

Caleb wouldn't smile fast enough for Momma to take the picture of the engine coming out of the tunnel beside him and Dada!

 

I don't know if you can even fathom from the pictures what this really is, but the front of the picture shows the bannister for the stairs to go down and the hanging light is for the foyer...the train track was built suspended and cut into the wall to enter the room behind. 

 

In the middle of November our church had their annual Fall Festival.  Always a fun time to eat some yummy grilled food and play carnival games.  Caleb's favorite (as always) was fishing for a prize!

 

We sure do have a lot of pictures of Ethan sitting in his stroller while the rest of the family has a fun time...poor kid!  You'll enjoy these outings so much more when you can walk too, Ethan!

 

Here's Caleb trying to ring some pumpkins.

 

The bounce houses are always fun.  I LOVE this action shot.

 

What a cute kid!

 

Dada and Caleb got to go on the tractor pulled hay ride while Momma fed Ethan some lunch.  They did have a good time, though Caleb wouldn't smile.

 

Someone even brought some animals for a small petting zoo.  What a great time to play and enjoy the day together.

Halloween

We had a lot of fun carving this pumpkin for Halloween.  Caleb wanted a scary face and drew Momma a picture of what he wanted.  When we opened up the pumpkin Caleb did not like the slimy feel of the insides and decided to go play while Momma got that part done.  Here he is smiling with our finished jack o' lantern.

 

 

Scary face jack o' lantern..scary face Caleb

 

 

For Preschool Time at the library they asked all the kids to dress up and then they played games, did a craft, and had a cookie walk (where everyone eventually got a cookie) that they could decorate and eat.  What a fun experience!

Here are Ian as Spiderman, Caleb L. as a superhero, and our Caleb as a Tyrannosaurus Rex

 

Here's Caleb waiting his turn to bowl down the ghost toilet paper rolls with a small pumpkin.

 

Caleb working on his haunted house craft.

 

Caleb's choice this year for Halloween costume was a bit of a challenge.  He really wanted to be a fairy (Momma said, no) and then it was between a pirate, a dinosaur, Diddy Kong (from a Wii game), and some others that I can't recall right now.  He finally narrowed it down to a dinosaur and he was his favorite...a T-Rex.  Momma made everyone's costumes and Caleb's turned out the best!  Here he is being ferocious.

 

 

And eating his brother's hat!

 

Ethan was a Pteranadon.  Hard to see, but he had wings attached to his arms and a hat with a dino head on it.  He wasn't the biggest fan of his costume, poor kid.  He may have a bit more say next year!

Ethan tried to be in character for this picture and so he is "eating" a crab...at least it's close to fish!

 



 

What a cutie!

 

Here's the whole family trick-or-treating at the neighbors' house.  Momma was a triceratops and Daddy was an anklyosaurus.  Mike's turned out pretty well with an armored back with spikes and a tail with a club on the end.  Kati's was awful and really looked like an alien gone wrong!  Ah well, that's what you get for trying to make your own costumes. :)  Caleb had a blast trick-or-treating though we only got part of the way down our street before he was tired (and had an overflowing bucket!).  Happy Halloween!

Help in October

Mike got a great opportunity to go on a mission trip to Kenya again to help at the eye clinics there.  He was gone for ten days and Kati did not think she could handle two small boys alone and keep her sanity, so she asked for help!  A friend and co-teacher from Trinity, Michelle, agreed to stay at our house and help me out in the evenings.  She was such an amazing help!!

 

Michelle agreed to go with us on an outing with our dear friends Matt, Kim, Ian, and Ryan to a fun little Halloween "festival" at a nearby grocery store.  There were fun little games, cookies to decorate and eat, and pumpkins to color.  Caleb got WAY too much candy and had a great time!

 

Michelle helped push Ethan around so Kati could help Caleb go from game to game.

 

 

Ian and Caleb coloring their pumpkins.

 

Ethan "chilling" in his stroller.

 

Caleb "fishing" in the fish department for a bag of candy.

 

 

Michelle also played with the boys each evening so I could make dinner in peace.  They were happy, Momma was happy, and Michelle said she had fun too!

 

 

Serious contemplation of what they should play next...

 

pirates...basketball...

 

Hyper-blast...

 

...all the while Ethan spent his time pulling his socks off and eating them!

 

Michelle even played pretend with Caleb and he made sure to give her specific instructions on what her characters could and could not do.  Now I wonder how he always seemed to win?

 

Ethan enjoyed just being in the same room!

 

Thank you, Michelle for being such a HUGE blessing from God! 

I don't know what I would have done without you.

 

October Activities

Here are some fun pictures from October.

Caleb was given this adorable onesie from our good friends Corey and Melanie Moss when he was a baby and we had to make sure to get a picture of Ethan in it as well!  He wears it so proudly...drool and all.

 

Can't you just hear Ethan's "comment" here?  "Ahhh...Caleb what are you doing?"

 



 

Grandma Brandon gave the boys these VERY cute outfits to wear this year and here they are showing them off!

Sweet brothers!

 

Look at these tiny slippers!  They just barely fit Ethan's chubby feet!

 

Caleb is showing Ethan how to play pirates while Momma cooks dinner. 

(Ethan just wanted to chew on them!)

 

Here Caleb is painting with a corn cob for "Mommy Preschool".  We were learning about the different seasons.  Note the autumn colors and corn which is harvested in the fall.

 

Caleb reading to Ethan.

 

 

Caleb has really started to like coloring.  It helped that Dada spent some time coloring with Caleb and teaching him how to stay in the lines and how to use different colors to make "realistic" pictures rather than just pink and purple.  One morning Caleb told me he was going to surprise Dada with a beautiful colored picture when he came home.  Dada sure did love how well he colored!

 

This fun dino ball popper toy is so much fun.  The balls are just the right size for holding and knawing on!

Here Ethan has realized that the fun looking knobs next to him when he is in the kitchen with Momma are actually drawers.

 



 

Open, shut, open, shut, giggle, giggle, giggle!

 

 

Grandma and Grandpa Brandon came for a fun day with the boys.  They loved all the special attention. 

 

Grandpa can always get great smiles out of Ethan!

 

This zoo has become such a fun toy.  Especially chewing on the animals.

 

After reading Chicka Chicka Boom Boom in "Mommy Preschool" we made our own coconut tree snack!  The pretzels are actually alphabet pretzels from H.E.B.  What a fun snack!

 

This picture does not really do justice to how much stuff Ethan can pull out even though he isn't moving anywhere yet!

 

 

Somehow Ethan got this book stuck on his back.  How?  No one knows, Dada just took the picture!

 

(Ethan) "What are you looking at?  Nothing to see here."

 

 

Ethan at Eight Months

Ethan just gets more and more adorable each month!  He considers himself a big boy and is already in twelve month clothing, though he's still our baby!  Ethan is still not crawling, but he's very close!  When he's sitting up he'll "fall" sideways over his leg in order to get to his tummy.  But he STILL doesn't like being on his tummy and gets easily frustrated that he can't just crawl immediately.  Who wants to work at it?  He can swivel 360 degrees while on his tummy by pulling with his arms and will push himself backwards into things, but that forward motion just evades him.  Maybe by next month!  Another interesting thing Ethan has begun doing is scooting to where he wants to go from a sitting position.  He will do a bounce/scoot motion and move halfway across the room.  One time he even scooted to the coffee table and had his little hands trying to reach the things on top.  He's not strong enough to pull himself up yet, and doesn't really stand for very long without becoming wobbly, but he was determined to find a way to get what wasn't his!

Speaking of which, Momma has begun calling him "Mr. Grabby"!  He is very quick to grab anything that he's not supposed to have, especially Momma's hair.  His grasp is VERY strong and Momma is quickly becoming bald with all of the hair he's pulled out.  He also likes to grab Caleb's shirt (pants, nose, ears, hair, fingers, toes, anything in reach) and pull him close to him.  Which Caleb doesn't always think is funny.  You can often hear, "No, no, Ethan."  Coming from Caleb as the two are playing in close proximity.  (Just wait, big brother, until Ethan crawls!!)

One of Ethan's all-time favorite things to do is grab, pull, and empty both his book basket and his toy basket.  Once everything is out it is no longer fun, so someone has to put everything back in so Ethan can pull it all out again.  This will keep him busy for a very long time, though, if you're willing to put it all back!

Eating has gotten a little better, though Ethan is still not a fan of food.  No matter what the food is, the initial bite always creates a sour look on Ethan's face!  We have learned, though, that prunes are his favorite food!  Mix it with anything and he'll eat it.  He is not really a fan of most of the vegetables and detests the meats (who can blame him??), but even the fruit gets funny looks at first.  Then he'll devour a whole jar, but veggies really need to be mixed with fruit if they're going to go down!  Try something he doesn't like and he'll stick his tongue out with the food still on it and try to push it out of his mouth! 

Ethan has begun making some really fun sounds and faces!  He can get Caleb really giggling with some of them!  He will scrunch his nose up and sniff in and out, then giggle at his own joke!  He also will fake cough or fake laugh, look at you, and expect you to grin at him.  If not he'll try again and then laugh at himself.  The "te-te-te" sound (think very breathy) is also a favorite right now and he'll "talk" at his toys.  If they don't behave he will make one loud, short yell at them like he's telling them what to do.  Of course he tries this with Dada and Momma too and is told that yelling at your parents is not okay and that he won't get his way that way (surprisingly, he seems to understand because he'll stop and try another tactic to get his way!)  He also loves to make a "machine gun" or "airplane" sound that is so much fun to listen to!  He and Dada have some great "conversations" back and forth with this sound.

We finally "bit the bullet" and stopped swaddling Ethan in the hopes that we could get him to sleep through the night.  We have, and for the most part he does.  It took a very long week and a half of listening to a lot of crying (so bad that Mike moved to the other room so he could function at school the next day!) but he finally made it.  Yippee!!  It's not perfect, and he now seems to lose his pacifier and can't find it since he scoots around his crib, but leaves the pacifier behind, but Momma is now getting a good seven hours of sleep a night, broken up once in the middle, instead of three!  This has definitely helped the rest of the day go much more smoothly!

Bathtime continues to be lots of fun for both boys.  The latest is that Ethan has discovered he can use his hands to splash the water and get it everywhere!  Caleb in turn splashes back and then even Dada or Momma gets wet by the end of bath!  Ethan also loves when Caleb's feet come up out of the water at his little tub seat.  He laughs and laughs trying to "catch" Caleb's toes.  One time Caleb even let Ethan get his toes which Ethan proceeded to chew on!  Caleb howled with laughter as he pulled his foot away!

We are having so much fun watching both boys grow and learn from each other.  Caleb is an amazing big brother and loves his "best friend" very much.  Ethan adores Caleb and tries to do everything he does.  We pray that this bond continues to grow as the boys get bigger and Ethan begins to get into things more! 

 

 

 

Creekfest

At the beginning of October we went to the second annual Creekfest.  It was a little festival with fun crafts and activities for kids, vendors, food, artwork, and other fun things to do just down the road at our neighborhood library. 

 

The first thing Caleb was able to do was build and paint a fire truck at the Home Depot booth.  He had lots of fun with Dada working on this project.

 

 

Ethan was a trooper the whole morning as we went from one thing to another, though he really wasn't a huge fan of being in the stroller as everyone else looked like they were having so much fun.  (Though his pacifier did keep him company!)

 

Here Caleb is learning to hula hoop and was given this hoop to keep.  How fun!

 

We also picked up lots of freebies from various vendors and each boy won a book from a "book walk" at the library.  Here Caleb is working on a craft at the Girl Scouts booth.

 

When we went to the face painting booth, Caleb wanted a spider on a web.  Maybe because the boy before him had gotten one?  However he chose it, he was happy with it!

 

Here Momma is helping Caleb make a maraca at the art museum.