Happy Halloween!!

Well, it's getting dark now and it's time for the annual Halloween festivities to begin! This past week have enjoyed:

* Carving pumpkins - Sean went the elaborate route and carved some beautiful designs from those stencil books. I don't have the patience for that! I went for the basic jack-o-latern vampire face.

* Eating yummy carmel apples.

* Finding 50% off toddler tees/socks for Ethan at Old Navy - he looks so cute today and I only spent $3.50!

* Making and eating 'Halloweenies' thanks to my friend Sara. (I stole both the idea and this picture off of her blog!)

And tonight we're off to the church Trunk-or-Treat where Ethan will be dressed as a BAT! After that... we're not sure! But we'll be sure to get some pictures of Ethan all dressed up!! Take care and everyone have a fun and safe Halloween. Make sure to avoid the 'crazies'! ;)

Answers From Both

As a change of pace I thought it would be fun if both Sean and I answered the questions from the two latest tags I received, since you don't hear from Sean very often. The first one is from Sara and the second from Shalene. Sean's answers are in blue on top and mine are in pink on the bottom of each question.

Four things I love about my spouse!
1. Her eyes

2. Her laugh

3. She likes to spend time with me
4. Her organization

*****

1. His sense of humor

2. His arms - always open and waiting with a hug!

3. He's easy to talk to, supportive and understanding

4. He's a great father and a wonderful husband

Four movies I would watch more than once:

1. Waiting for Guffman

2. Clue
3. Indiana Jones (I&III)
4. Hairspray

*****

1. While You Were Sleeping

2. Bourne Identity

3. Gaslight

4. Anne of Green Gables

Four TV shows I watch:

1. History Channel documentaries
2. Grey's Anatomy
3. Sci-Fi Shows (various, no favorite)
4. Handy Manny (with Ethan)

*****

1. Grey's Anatomy

2. Army Wives

3. iCarly (don't ask)

4. John & Kate Plus 8

Four Places I've Been:

1. Disney World
2. London
3. Brazil (Sao Paulo)
4. Mexico

*****

1. Hawaii

2. Mexico

3. Disneyland/Southern Cali

4. Utah

(Sean is much more travelled than I am)

Four Places I'd like to go:

1. Mainland Europe
2. New York
3. Alaska
4. Ireland/Scotland

*****

1. All of Europe

2. Caribbean

3. New York/East Coast

4. Back to Hawaii

(But pretty much anywhere as long as I'm with my family!)

Four people who email me regularly:

1. Jennifer
2. My Dad
3. My Sister
4. Some wealthy Nigerian widow who desperately needs my help getting to the USA

*****

1. Blogger comment alerts

2. Old Navy

3. Shelley Johnson (Stk YW Pres)

4. Sara, Shawna and Heather on Facebook

Four things I would like to eat:

1. Steak (BIG and juicy!)

2. Shrimp
3. Lobster
4. Ice Cream (Rocky Road or Mint Choc Chip)

*****

1. Brownies (no nuts, please!)

2. Turkey sandwiches

3. Baked spaghetti

4. Steak and a baked potato

Four things I look forward to next year:

1. Having the election over and done with
2. Watching Ethan grow and learn
3. Possible change of scenery
4. ????

*****

1. Possible move to Salem

2. Spending more time with Sean and Ethan

3. Watching Ethan grow, learn and develop

4. Losing some more of the pregnancy weight (I know, I know. I've said it before)

SIX things people might not know about me
1. I like pickles, but not on my burgers or sandwiches
2. I keep my desk at work VERY organized
3. I have a hereditary hairline
4. I repeated Kindergarten
5. I was prom king
6. I once shook hands with Ronald Reagan

********************************************

1. I cannot stand rice or corn in burritos or soups.

2. I ran out of math classes to take after my junior year in high school.

3. I collect smashed pennies.

4. I have worked with the same company for almost 9 years and have had at least 3 different job titles within that company.

5. I tried out for volleyball my freshman year of high school and didn't make the team - but I'd only previously played in 8th grade. The next season I tried out for the swim team and was bumped up to Varsity before the end of the first week of practice. I swam Varsity all 4 years of high school.

6. I never had a swim meet at my home pool in high school. The roof started to collapse the week before my first meet my freshman year. The pool that we practiced at was did not meet regulation size - too short and too shallow. And then the original pool opened up for meets the year after I graduated. Pretty sad, huh?

18-month Check-up

Yesterday I got off work early to take Ethan to his 18-month check-up (even though he's closer to 19 months than he is 18 months, but whatever). Here are the stats:

Height: 32 1/2 inches - 50th per.

Weight: 22lbs. 14oz. - 11th per.

Head: 18 1/2 inches - 25th per.

He doubled his weight percentile since his 1 year appointment. It's still low, but he'd been in the 5th percentile for over a year! And it's not bad considering when he was SUPER sick in late April/early May he dropped down to a little over 17lbs. and was only in the 2nd percentile!!

Other than that the doctor said he was doing really well. He thought it was interesting how the breath-holding spells had worsened when Ethan was teething so bad - made notes in his chart. And, actually, Ethan nearly had a breath-holding spell when he got his shots. Poor guy!!

Finally, Dr. Hemsley was impressed with Ethan's vocabulary and communication skills. Apparently verbal development is different in boys and girls and starts to show even at this young age. He said it was normal for a girl to put words together, but not so common in boys his age. Pretty cool. We're always impressed with our little boy. I thought it was interesting that the doctor had picked up on this because we had been noticing it as well. His vocab has more than doubled in the last couple months. In fact, I've even been keeping track of his growing vocab on the right side of our blog. He's learning 2-3 new words a week and has been continuing to use them once he learns them. We get a couple of one-time copy cat words, but most he understands and adds to his list. He's one smart cookie!

Overall: clean bill of health and continuing to grow and develop just as he should.

I just LOVE this little guy!!

This Morning

This was my conversation with Ethan this morning when I went to get him up.

Ethan: Momma!
Me: Good morning!
Ethan: Daddy?
Me: Daddy's at work already.
Did you sleep good?
Ethan: No.
Hmmm... (yes, he really said hmmm....)
[This was funny because I really am not sure how well he slept last night. He woke up once at about 4:30am and was still really tired when I went to get him up.]

The rest of our conversation was a little more one sided, except when he realized he was going to play at the Wrights' today. "Abbie?!" She's there little 3 1/2 year and Isaac is Ethan's age. He hasn't quite gotten that name down yet. It comes out a little more like "Ike". We're working on it. :) We go in for his 18-month wellness check-up today, so we'll see how that goes. I'm taking the rest of the afternoon off (his appointment's at 1:45pm).

Thanks everyone!

Thank you to everyone who left comments on the "Trauma on the Playground" post. It was definitely nice to vent about the incident and even nicer to know I was heard! Your comments were very appreciated. As far as I can see, no permanent scars on his cute, little face. :)

Good Times At The Pumpkin Patch

So, I'm still catching up on the events of our weekend two weeks ago. There was a lot that happened in 48 hours. We had the mold discovery, the football game, my hair appointment, the plumber to fix the leak that started the mold and our visit to the farm. This will be the last post from that week - then I can finally move on to last weekend!

We (meaning Sean, Ethan, my sisters and I) made our annual pilgrimage to Lone Pine Farms in search of the 'perfect pumpkin'. I'll admit, Lone Pine has gotten very commerical over the years, but I still love it and it's a great tradition to share with Ethan. Highlights of our visit include:

* Feeding the goats and sheep. Ethan absolutely loved this. No hesitations at all. I think he really liked that the animals' faces were right at eye level with his. And it was neat for him to see and hear the animals in person because we have been working a lot on animal sounds - he's got cow, sheep, duck, dog, pig and horse down (that video will come later!)
* Sharing a bag of freshly made kettle corn. YUMMY!! Mmm... my family and I are all big fans of kettle corn and buy a bag whenever we have the opportunity to get it fresh.
* NOT paying for the hayride out to the pumpkin patch. We always grab a wheelbarrow and just walk out there. The rides are nice, but too expensive. Plus, I'm extremely allergic to horses, so we'd have to be sure to get one pulled by a tractor.
* Ethan picking out his own pumpkin and taking possession of it.
* Everyone else finding their 'perfect pumpkin'.
* Getting cute pumpkin pictures (sorry, Christi) of Ethan and a new fall family picture.
* Enjoying ice cream cones from a local dairy and getting some farm fresh produce.

Here's the pictures (and videos) from the day. There are a lot.

Our first stop was feeding the goats.





























This goat got a little over-anxious for his pellets and was a somewhat impatient with Ethan's one-pellet-at-a-time technique!

















Then, like I said, we didn't take the hayride out to the pumpkin patch. Besides, the horse dander from this one would have made me really sick. So, we walked.

First we went to the 'little' pumpkin patch. It was a lot closer and had lots of little pumpkins - just the right size for toddlers.

"I want that pumpkin over there."
















"Follow me!"
















"Here it is!"
















"Ok, I've got mine."
















Then we continued our quest for front porch pumpkins and walked out to the BIG pumpkin patch. We split up to search for our pumpkins.
Christine and I found this football shaped pumpkin.


















As usual, Elisabeth tried to take one that was too big for her. We stick with the rule 'you have to be able to carry your pumpkin'.

Here's Sean and I with all of the pumpkins.














Ethan thought he'd try to help.















And here's some more random pictures from the rest of the afternoon.

I know the family picture is already on our blog, but I figured I'd include it for journal purposes since I won't keep that header forever.
And... if you're really interested, he's another video from Ethan feeding the goats.

Copper Highlights and the Morning Off

I guess, technically I probably got blonde highlights and copper lowlights, but whatever. Here's the new hair - I had it done about 2 weeks ago. I kept it a little longer this time because I liked the option of straightening it or wearing it curly. I also needed to be able to just put it in a ponytail if I was running short on time in the mornings. You can't really tell in this picture, but she had put some nice, soft curls in my hair - now I just need to train myself to be coordinated enough to use a curling iron!

So after my hair appointment in the morning I headed over to the mall. Ahhhh... the freedom!! No cranky toddler or husband trying to rush me along. It was so nice just to take my time browsing and also not to have to deal with a stroller. Heaven!! Of course, I pretty much just bought Ethan some much-needed long-sleeve shirts - including a cute, new Oregon sweatshirt to wear for Duck Football Saturdays! But I also replenished a few cosmetic items for me - I was pretty desperate for a new blush and concealer which was enough to get me the Clinique gift with purchase. Hey, I'm all for a free gift - especially when it includes a cute new make-up bag!

It was so, so nice to have the morning to myself - I made sure to thank Sean and surprised him with some of his favorite See's chocolates. And to top it all off, it meant that I didn't have to be home while the plumber was here. Wohoo!

Trauma on the Playground

Well, it's official. We've had our first run-in with a playground bully. And it started out as such a nice day... sort of.

I'm working this Saturday, so I had yesterday off. I decided to take advantage of the extra time and took Ethan in to get some fall pictures done with the studio's rustic barn backdrop and pumpkin, leaves and hay props. Good idea in theory, but I failed to remember how active and uncooperative 18-month olds tend to be. We got a few good shots in and called it a day. Meanwhile, my friend Heather and her little girl, Kaitlyn, had met us at the portrait studio. We packed up our stuff and headed to the indoor playground for the kids to play. No real problems this time, except Ethan kept crawling up on the bench and trying to drink from some woman's soda cup. After the kids had ran around for a bit, we decided it was time for some lunch and headed to the food court. It was pretty cute to see Ethan and Kaitlyn both interested in what the other was eating for lunch. In the end, they both shared.

Once everyone was good and full, we headed back over to the playground to really tired them out. Well, we were only there a few minutes when the first round of crying started. Some little boy had stopped Kaitlyn and for no apparent reason gave her a smack - I think in the back. It wasn't very hard, but it was still enough to make her cry. So Kaitlyn was already sitting on her mom's lap and it wasn't more than a few minutes later that I hear Ethan start screaming! I jumped up and ran to where he was on the steps leading up to the slide and recognize the same kid that had pushed Kaitlyn. As I get closer I see that he has Ethan's fingers in his mouth and he's ready chomp down!! You've got to be kidding! I yank Ethan out of there and yell at the kid, "NO BITING!" Well, by then I'm pretty sure we had everyone's attention. All of the other parents there had mouths gaping. I sat down with Ethan, trying to comfort him. At this point, I just figured Ethan had been pushed down the slide stairs and I had caught the almost-biting just in the nick of time. No such luck. Ethan's still screaming and it's then that I see it. On the side of his cheek, right up next to his ear is a HUGE bite mark! It was already bruising green and purple and I could see both upper and lower DEEP teeth marks clear back to the first set of molars. Without even thinking I cried out, "Oh my gosh!!" and jumped up again.

I headed over to the mother, who was already busy putting the (ahem... evil) boy's shoes on. She wouldn't even look at me. I was in "mother bear" mode, but I was still so preoccupied with making sure Ethan was OK that I couldn't even think of what to say to her. Of course, I thought of plenty to say once we got home. She's just lucky her kid's biting didn't break the skin on Ethan's cheek. Then I wouldn't have let her off so easy.

So, in the end, we survived. The reality of the whole ordeal hit me again later in the day as I realized that this monster child would have had to hold down Ethan's head in order to clamp down like that. As a mother, that was really hard to picture and the trauma of the event - especially through Ethan's eyes, was more clear. The bruising has gone down quite a bit now, but you can still see two distinct red marks by Ethan's ear.

Friday Night Football

SHS vs. THS

This proved to be quite the conflict of interest. You see, I am a proud Springfield High alumni - class of 2000. However, Sean, Ethan and I now live out in the Thurston area of Springfield and most (if not all, now that Tory is gone) of the youth at our church go to Thurston High school. Of course, Sean and I both work with the youth so we root for them whenever possible. Sean couldn't go to the football game because he was still in Salem after his 2-day conference (yep, this was the same weekend as the mold incident) so it was just Ethan and I.

I donned an old SHS swimming sweatshirt and blue puffy vest for the big game, but I put Ethan in a both-crowd-pleasing navy blue sweatshirt and the red side of his puffy vest. Done. Both sides equally represented!!

Springfield definitely doesn't have the best record for football wins. When I was going to school, their band program was huge and one of the best around. It's still good, but not nearly as big. So I would usually go to the games to be with friends and also to support all of my friends in the marching band. My little sister, Christine, was also a proud member of the SHS marching band when she was in high school. And I'm sure Elisabeth will join right in with her sax playing! Anyway... Ethan was definitely a marching band supporter - I think his favorite part of being out in the cold was hearing the music through his muffled ears!

In the end, we were FREEZING. Springfield got CRUSHED - 41 to 0. Ouch. But my Thurston kids were happy! We even ended up leaving early because we were cold and hungry sore losers - my mom and Elisabeth had saved us a seat. We met up with Sean, my dad, Christine and her friend Matt at Roaring Rapids pizza to ease the pain of defeat!

Ethan loved it when his auntie "Lisbeth" took him to pretend to drive the car on the car racing game in the arcade. Just before we left, we got in one ride on the carousel. I was very happy to see that Ethan was laughing this time instead of crying!!

Maybe, just maybe, next year Springfield will finally beat Thurston's 18-year winning streak against their cross-town rivals. Maybe.

Our Little Swimmer

I've been meaning to post this for a while, but hadn't been able to upload the videos. Of course, me being the perfectionist that I am couldn't post just the pictures. No way! So this post has been sitting in edit mode with just pictures for over a month!

So, as you can see, we went swimming! We have only been able to take Ethan a few other times. He was only mildly entertained by the kiddie pool at Splash, but I think he was still too young to really appreciate it! As a random, last-minute request, we joined my sister Elisabeth and her friend at the pool while Christine was working that night.

Ethan LOVED it!! We bobbed around in the shallow side of the pool for quite a while and did a few quick dunks to get him used to the water. Then auntie 'Lisbeth' took him down the slide a couple of times - which he also loved. Just before it was time to get out, Sean and I started tossing Ethan back and forth in the water. We would say, "One... Two... Three... Go!" and then toss him back. Talk about non-stop giggles. So cute. It was fun to see him enjoy it so much!

Also while we were in the water, I was trying to help Ethan get a feel for floating. I would hold him at water level with my hand under his belly. I couldn't believe it when he started kicking his legs and doing almost armstrokes! I'm not sure where he picked that up because we hadn't been swimming in over 5-6 months. Maybe it was all of the Olympic swimming we watched, but I was sure impressed. Elisabeth is convinced we may have the next Michael Phelps. Umm... let's wait until he eats spaghetti with a fork and not his hands before we start making any future plans for him!

Anyway. It was a fun time and I've realized I definitely need to go get myself a new swimsuit so we can make this a more regular family activity!




Enjoy the videos. It took me long enough to get them! The first is Ethan going down the slide with Elisabeth and the second one is him being tossed between Sean and I.

Leaky Toilet = Mold

We noticed a slight leak in our bathroom a couple of months ago, but couldn't tell where it was coming from. In fact, we weren't even sure if it was a leak because we only noticed water behind the toilet when we were bathing Ethan - I just figured it was due to too much splashing and would mop it up. No big deal. Well, a month ago Sean cleaned off the small accumulation of mold on the wall behind the toilet and we finally determined where the leak was coming from - the pipe near the back of the toilet with the water shut-off knob. It still didn't seem to be producing much water and we weren't too worried about it. Then about a week ago we realized the mold had all come back - much quicker than it had taken to build up last time. The drip was more constant and beginning to quickly fill the container we had set underneath it. Time to call the landlord. Thursday night, disaster struck. I was looking for something I thought may have fallen down the side of the filing cabinet in the dining room. I pulled it back from the wall and this is what I found (see picture at right).
Mold up to my knee!! GROSS!!! Of course, Sean was in Salem still for a 2-day conference he was in charge of and I was just getting ready to go to bed. Dang it! So out came the bucket with hot, soapy bleach water, a scrub brush and a towel around the face for me - I wasn't going to breathe in those nasty mold spores. I got everything all cleaned up - luckily it came off the wall quite easily. Everything seemed to be exterior damage and the walls were solid - not even a slight give, so that was a good sign. I decided to move on to the bathroom since I already had all the cleaning supplies out. I got all of that mold cleaned up - again, exterior only and solid walls, and then it donned on me that a utility closet also shared that wall. Sure enough, when I went to check in the carpeted closet, I found more mold once I moved a couple of (plastic) storage boxes aside. By the time I got all of that cleaned up and the contents of the closet stacked in the dining room in case the landlord set someone over the next day, it was 1am and I was exhausted!

So... Friday morning I called the landlord, who called the owners, who called their usual plumber, who called me to set up an appointment. Luckily he works Saturdays, so we were able to schedule a 10am (which, in plumber time meant 10:45am) appointment. I was gone getting my hair done, so Sean and Ethan were there to greet him. He got the leak fixed (yay!) and then inspected the walls and checked the pictures I had taken. It seems that we caught the leak pretty early because I was right about the damage only being exterior. Other than keeping a fan on in the closet for a couple days to make sure everything was dried out, it doesn't look like there will have to be any additional repairs. Thank goodness. That was enough excitement for us.

Memory Lane: Round 2

Alright. Next up on the picture CD...

Sean's Mission
Dates Served: October 2000 - September 2002
Where: Brasil, Sao Paolo














My handsome white-shirt-and-tie-wearing missionary.








































He looks so young!



















I like this picture and if you look close, you can seen that the flag in the back is the Brasil flag.



















Soooo gross! He has reassured me that this was strictly for the sake of the picture - no cockroaches were actually eaten!

Yay! Cute missionaries and future RMs.

I am so grateful for a wornderful return missionary who made me laugh, became my best friend, asked me to marry him and then was worthy to take me to the temple to be sealed together for time and all eternity! He met my TOM requirements:
T: Taller - though I have to be careful not to wear too high of heels. Luckily, I'm a flats and flip-flops kind of a girl, so that's not usually a problem!
O: Older - got me beat by almost a full two years, which I occasionally remind him of. "Less than two years 'til you're 30, sweetie!"
M: Mormon - though this was Mormon in the broad sense. It stood for active, worthy, return missionary, etc., etc.