For my Mom

Hey Mom!!

     For Mother's Day I decided that we were going to take you to "Pancake Warehouse." I worked hard on convincing daddy that that's where you wanted to go. I wanted to do something special with you. Thank you Mom for putting up with my orneriness and my temper tantrums. I love you so much mom you are the best!!

Love your favorite older son,
                 Ethan

Ethan is going be 4 in just a month! I don't know how that is possible! Wasn't he just a tiny little 3lb baby yesterday? Now he is almost 4, a big brother, and will be starting pre-school in the fall. He has grown up so fast, I'm not sure I am ready for it! I am going to be enrolling him in gymnastic classes this summer at Sunrise Gymnastics. He loves to run, jump, and climb so I think it will be perfect for him. Hopefully it will give him something that he can focus his excess energy on.

He has done so well with being a big brother. He likes to check on his little brother when he is napping, always wants to be there during diaper changes, and is so protective of him. He has adjusted to it very well. We've definitely gone through some jealous spots but not as bad as we originally anticipated. He is just an amazing big brother.

Ethan enjoyed Whitmer's musical last week. He kept looking for Macey but she wasn't in it this year (had to drop out) but she was ushering so he still got to see her. He probably would have loved it more if she had been up on the stage b/c he loves to see her performing (he loved her in the Fall play). Today I re-introduced him to The Phantom of the Opera. He didn't last long mostly b/c he just didn't understand what was going on. Someday he will and when he does I look forward to him being my very handsome date to see it live.

Ethan has been enjoying the nice weather, playing outside, riding his bike, and of course Fritzie Freeze. He's really going to be happy when we are able to get the pool set up. He loved it last year. I have a feeling it will come in handy this summer. He's probably going to be one very tan dude from playing outside this year LOL.

Hoppy Easter!!

Ethan is really looking forward to going on his Easter Egg hunt tomorrow morning. He told us today that he wanted to go see the Easter Bunny. Unfortunately he waited until dinner time to tell us. We just didn't make it out to see the Easter Bunny this year which is fine b/c I figured Ethan would not go up once we got there anyways, that's what he did with Santa. A few days ago he saw a bunny in the back yard and so we told him it was the Easter Bunny scoping out places to hide eggs. He went to bed fairly well tonight b/c he wants to make sure the bunny has time to hide his & Finlay's eggs.

I have Ethan pre-registered for school next year. He will be going 3 days a week 9-11:30 at Precious People Preschool. I took him for a tour a month or 2 ago and he had a great time. We sat in on the class and he was invited to join in on the activities. He sat back quietly and watched their little experiment but he was too shy to go to the front of the class and feel. He is going to have a great time next year. It's so hard to believe that he is going to be 4 let alone be in school. I am really going to miss him. He makes me want to pull my hair out all day but yet when he isn't here it's too quiet.

Ethan is just loving having a little brother. He is very protective of Fin and he doesn't like it when people get to close he will literally put his hands on Fin as a way of letting them know they are too close. Lately every time Fin smiles or laughs at him he has taken to going up to him and giving him a kiss and telling me "He is so cute!" I find it absolutely adorable. Yesterday Fin had a blowout in his diaper that required a spray off bath. Ethan came over to help and instead told me "YUCK! Finlay smells bad!" and walked away holding his nose. It was pretty nasty but I about fell over laughing. He is very helpful and likes to show Fin how things work. I wonder how he will feel when he toys are no longer protected from his brother LOL.

Today we went through all Ethan's clothes. I had put away most of his 2T clothes but somehow some of them magically found a way back into his closet. I wonder who could have done that? He does not want to give up his Toy Story pajamma's but they just no longer fit. The tops are now 1/4 sleeves and halters and the pants are knee highs LOL. We managed to talk him into finally letting us get them all put away. I guess I will have to buy him some new toy story jammies LOL. I will be taking him shopping soon to get some new clothes for the summer. He mostly needs pants as his closet is full of shirts and half of them he will probably never wear. He is picky on what he wears so it's easier to just take him and let him pick out his clothes. Besides it gives him a feeling of having some control.

He has discovered a "wonderful" new show on Netflix called The Wonder Pets. Let me put it this way, he thinks it's the best show ever, we on the other hand think completely opposite. He has become obsessed with it. He likes to pretend he is Ming Ming (when he doesn't think he's spiderman climbing the walls) and runs around falling and telling me "ouchie". He definately has some imagination. He just thinks he's sooooooo funny. Sometimes he is. It's a good thing he's cute.

Fun Filled Weekend

Ethan had a great weekend this week. Saturday we went to Costco where he (and his daddy) enjoyed snacking on all the free food. They would spend all day there snacking if I would let them. Then yesterday we met up with Killian and his parents and spent the day at Imagination Station. None of us has ever been there before but it was a good time. The boys had so much fun running around and playing with things. I think their favorite spot was over in the electricity station at a spinning table. They also had a blast with the crane. But the best spot was when they got to shoot tennis balls up to the ceiling. It was so hard to pry them away from that location to go have lunch and of course they both had meltdowns in the cafeteria b/c they didn't want to stop for food. I think just about every kid that came into the cafeteria had a meltdown. After that we headed over to this one area where it was all about psychedelic images. The boys had so much fun in the tilt house and thought it was hilarious watching their parents slam into the walls. When we left we all decided we will be investing in memberships there. It's a great place to go during the winter or on a rainy day. They both are already talking about going back together. I made sure to bring the camera so I would have pictures to post.

Ethan has been enjoying all the nice gifts that he got at Christmas. He's been watching his movies just about every day and he has been playing his Mobigo every day. The Mobigo has really helped him to learn. The other day he was playing the Elmo game I bought him and he was pointing out all the animals on the screen and telling me what they were before the game said the name. Then he was telling me all about fruits. He has started to recognize his letters much better and has been working on his numbers but I swear that child has an aversion to numbers. He would rather play his letters game than deal with numbers. I sure hope he doesn't take after me when it comes to numbers and math. I am horrible with them. He has been enjoying all his books and he likes to read them before going to bed. We read him a story but he likes to sit and look at the pictures on his own and fall asleep looking at a book. He even tries to read to Moose, Penguin, and Frog.

Ethan is growing up so fast! I can't believe that in Sept he will be in pre-school. The other day I was looking through my photo albums on my Facebook page and I came across pictures of him doing his silly face and when he was just learning to walk and I couldn't believe that he was once that small. Of course he has just gotten cuter over the years. Well that and smarter. He has figured out how to open baby gates and the baby locks don't stop him either. Some days I think he might just be too smart for his own good :)

I have already started putting together the team for the March For Babies. It will be April 15 at 5/3 Field. This is our 3rd year walking. The last 2 years it has been so much fun and this year I have 2 reasons to walk. Ethan and Finlay. I sent out e-mails to all last years walkers or contacted them through Facebook. This year we are also participating in the Kickoff. It's on Feb 13 at the Sylvania Playland. It's free you just have to rsvp by Feb 8 which I also sent out e-mails about with all the information and where you can rsvp. It should be a good time. The kids get to play and there are crafts for older kids, free food, and team leaders can collect all their information. We will also get to meet this years ambassador family. It should be a good time. I am looking forward to the walk this year and being able to do it with my 2 beautiful boys.

Ethan's a big boy

I took Ethan to the ped today and he is getting so stinking big! He is 39 inches tall and weighs 34lbs. When the heck did that happen? Wasn't he just 3lbs 9oz yesterday? How did 3 years go by so fast? His Dr was happy with his physical development. She had him tell her the colors of the blocks which he did beautifully on (he knows his colors). She asked him what his favorite animal is. Ethan decided that was the right time to talk through his teeth. He told her Pooh Bear for his favorite animal. I then asked him not to talk through his teeth so she could understand what he was saying so then he starts jumping up and down and tells her again. She still couldn't understand him so I had him tell her one more time and this time he stood still for it. She had no idea what a Pooh Bear was so I told her he was referring to Whinnie the Pooh. She asked him what he had for breakfast and he told her toast and fruit. She asked what kind of fruit and he told her oranges through his teeth. So I corrected him again and he answered properly. Then she asked what he liked to do for fun at home and he rapidly has to tell her that he watches the garbage men pick up dada's garbage. He said it faster than his little mouth can talk so I had him slow down and repeat it at a normal speed LOL. So after she was done checking him out she tells me that she doesn't feel that he is easy to understand when he talks and that she was strongly recommending we get an eval from a Speech Therapist. We got a few opinions from Papa Paul, Grammy B, and Grammy Judy and they all agree that he talks fine but yes at times can be hard to understand. Matt & I know that he has a problem with words like "Please" "Blue" "Cloud" "Black" ect. We also know that his V's and F's sound like B's. We both correct him all the time but these are common issues in toddlers. I think that it will work itself out by the time he starts school next year. So we have decided not to take him into Speech Therapy. We don't feel an eval will hurt but since it's not really a necessity we don't want to bother with it. I would rather see where he is at by the age of 4.

Tues Ethan had an appt with Dr Horner. His phe levels came back this week at 4.1 so he is still right in the target range of under 10. There have been no changes to his diet he is still at  40g of protein a day which right now works for him. In June they want to order a complete nutritional blood panel and then depending on the results of that they might order a Dexascan or they might wait until he is 5. Realistically with all the things he has crashed into and not gotten a broken bone from it I'd like to think he has pretty strong bones LOL. He is one tough little dude.

Busy Ethan!!

Ethan has had a busy 2 days this weekend. Yesterday we took him (& Finlay too) to Frankenmuth. We had a blast at Bronner's where I was in Christmas decoration heaven. We spent 3 hrs walking around and didn't begin to see the entire store. Poor Ethan was on Christmas overload. He didn't know where to begin. It took him 10 minutes and he broke an ornament. He spent the rest of the time strapped into the stroller where he could do less damage. He was pretty cute when Finlay started to fuss from his carrier. Ethan turned around and was giving his little brother hugs and kisses and then kept patting him on the head and holding his hands. That was getting him a lot of attention from some of the workers who were milling around. It is always nice to see him love all over his brother like that. He can be such a good big brother (when he wants to LOL)

Today I took him to see Happy Feet 2 while Finlay was stuck with his daddy. I treated Ethan to popcorn and a small drink (yea I know I spoiled him LOL). He was pretty good for the most part although in the middle of the movie he decided he wanted to crawl around on the nasty floor and try to eat the popcorn he dropped. I think the movie may have been a little long for his attention or they showed way too many previews. I'm going to go with way too many previews. There had to be at least 7 or 8 previews and IMO that is just way too many for a child's movie. Kids are not going to have the patience to sit through that many previews. Towards the end he calmed down a bit and sat and watched the rest of the movie. He liked all the singing and dancing. It was a nice little outing for the 2 of us. Before we left he wanted to bring Finlay with us. He wanted to watch the movie with his brother. Too cute. When we left the theaters he wanted to save the rest of the popcorn for his daddy so we took it home. I don't think Matt really wanted the popcorn but he ate some anyways b/c Ethan wanted him to have it. Ethan spent a little bit of the afternoon outside helping his daddy finish putting up the lights. Every time we try to get the outside lights up it rains. Go figure. Mother Nature must not want our house to look pretty for Christmas this year.

As I write this Ethan is wrestling with daddy. I hope Matt is able to wear that child out b/c he has more energy than he knows what to do with. I'm sure Matt will get worn out before Ethan does. Amongst all the noise Finlay is sleeping through it all. Fin is going to be a good sleeper since he has big brother Ethan to sleep through.

I got Ethan's mobigo ordered. I found a decent deal on amazon.com. Every one is selling it for $60 but I got it for $50. Santa is working on finding a decent DVD player for Ethan's playroom. We don't want to end up with one like we had a while back where it played the DVD's but half the time it wouldn't eject them or it scratched them up. Ethan is going to have a electronic Christmas this year LOL. I am really excited to be getting him the mobigo. It's pretty cool, his friend Killian has it and he learned his alphabet in a couple days and now is already adding and subtracting (he's only 4) so it's going to be a great thing for Ethan. As much as Ethan loves the ABC game on Matt's Ipod he will love this.

We've been getting a lot of inquires of what Ethan needs or wants for Christmas. He really doesn't need anything. He's getting the mobigo from us and a DVD player and I've already suggested the games for the mobigo to someone else. He has become picky about his clothes so I don't need anymore clothes for him that are just going to hang in his closet and never get worn. He is more than good on jammies and I am going to be buying him snow boots in the next couple weeks. Board games were already suggested to someone and I don't need any more toys to add to the already overflowing toybox. He is specific on what toys he wants to play with the rest just get thrown out of the way and just make a big mess for me to have to clean up. I don't have a lot of storage space and the living room is being cluttered with Finlay's things. He's really into trucks. Lately he has taken an obsession to excavators. He has a book that he loves that is all about bulldozers, excavators, and dump trucks. He loves to sit and look at that book. He will sit and teach Finlay all about them (because Finlay cares oh so much about them LOL). There isn't much to suggest for him (or Finlay) They both have everything that they need and want. Ethan has a piggy bank and loves to put money in it. When it gets full we make a trip to the bank and he get's to deposit it to his college fund. Otherwise I don't have much to suggest.

Prematurity Awareness Month

Just to make you aware, November is Prematurity Awareness Month. Each year 1 in 8 babies will be born prematurely. Both Ethan and Finlay were born prematurely. Ethan was 30 weeks 1 day and he weighed 3lbs 9oz. Finlay was 35 weeks 4 days and he weighed 5lbs 12oz. Please help the March of Dimes raise money. If you would like to make a donation you can do so at the following link:
https://www.marchofdimes.com/giving/support_general.html?src=mod11_EDDpamFT_111101
It all goes for a good cause. The March of Dimes is also selling special Awareness products as well to raise money. You can go to the following link to purchase those products if you are interested:
http://www.awarenessproductsonline.com/mod_individual

Now that I got my sales pitch (LOL) out of the way onto other things.

Ethan is loving being a big brother. Finlay is very lucky to have Ethan for his big brother. Ethan likes to hold his little brother, help feed him, and is very loving. He likes to give him kisses and hugs all the time. Ethan is always talking about "When Finlay gets bigger....." and then tells us what they are going to do together. Last night it was "When Finlay gets bigger he is going to go trick or treating with me!" It was very cute that he is looking forward to going trick or treating with Finny.

Speaking of trick or treating, Ethan had a blast last night. Matt took him this year (although I really wanted to do it b/c I wanted the time with Ethan) and they went with Aunt Robin, Uncle Seamus, and kids. Ethan dressed as Spiderman (like every other toddler in the neighborhood LOL). They were gone for about an hour and when he got back he was having fun passing out candy to all the little spooks who came up our driveway. He was very generous giving out handfuls of candy to the little spooks. A few times the groups were just too large for Ethan to handle on his own so Matt had to help. If Ethan didn't get to give candy to some of the kids he would get very upset and throw the candy that was in his hands onto the ground and then put his hands over his face before picking the candy up. He just really wanted to give out the candy. It was pretty cute. He was telling me all about the houses he went to and the people he saw. He was so excited. We had a pretty good turn out of kids last night. I'd say we probably had 100-120 kids come to the door. Unfortunately I bought a ton of candy this year so we wouldn't run out (the last few years we have run out by like 7 at night and that's only giving 1-2 pieces of candy to each kid!). Unfortunately I bought a few bags too many and now we have a ton of left over candy LOL. We'll go through it all and Matt can take some to the vultures at work :-) Today Ethan doesn't want to take off his Spiderman costume. He has been running around all day with it on. I guess he isn't ready for Halloween to be over with.