Taking Some Time Off

So I will be taking some time off of blogging for the week. We're staying at Ry's parent's rental house while they're away at conference. They just moved in so cable and internet are not available at the moment. So hopefully while I'm taking time off I can come up with some good material for when I get back. See you in a week!

Cleaning Days

Ethan has found a new toy that he loves more than any toy he's ever owned...the vacuum. Every time we open the pantry he's pushing the vacuum around. Monday is cleaning day around here and every Monday you can find Ethan chasing my mom or me as we're vacuuming the floors. When I was a youngster I was scared to death of the vacuum way until I was at least 6! My mom had to warn me that she was vacuuming and I would run up to my room or jump up on the couch so I wouldn't get sucked up. Ethan isn't scared at all, he loves it! In the video you can even hear him trying to make vacuum cleaner noises. It's hilarious!

Back By Popular Request

I had a lot of people say that they loved the video clip of Ethan laughing in his high chair from back in April or May so here's a more recent laughing clip. This video was just after we had family home evening tonight and boy was he happy. Once you get him going, he will laugh so hard and so loud. He also just got out of the tub so that's why his hair looks all curly. I swear it is getting so thick! It's time for another hair cut. Anyway...I hope you enjoy the laughs.

Boot Scootin' Boogie

We had our first visitor come to see us in Texas. Actually, he was here for the Chiropractic Olympics, but he did come hang out with us. Friday night some of "the fam" and our friend Mike went out to Traildust. It's a real Texan steakhouse with a dance floor and live country band. Ethan loved the music and dancing with his mom and Grandma. I just wished Emily and Alivia were there to enjoy the festivities, maybe next time. I'll have more pictures to post once Suz e-mails them to me. These pictures are of Grandma and Ethan kickin' up their heels on the dance floor and then Ethan with his Uncle Matt and Cousin Tyler enjoying the music.

Pinata Part II

So I painted the pinata and now I'm putting tissue paper on it. This stupid thing is taking me FOREVER! At least it looks somewhat cool. I finished the invitations and now I'm looking for my cake ideas. We ordered his car seat online from Graco last week so that should be coming for him soon. I'm excited for him to actually be able to face forward now. Hallelujah! So that's about all on the party front.

It's Pinata Time!

This is just me making my own pinata, that's right, I'm making a pinata. I'm starting to plan out Ethan's 1st birthday extravaganza. His birthday is November 1st and since it's so close to Halloween, I think I'm going to do a pumpkin theme. He's going to be a pumpkin for Halloween so I figure he can wear his outfit for his party and for trick-or-treating (double the use). I'm trying to make a lot of the stuff like invitations, pinata, the cake, decorations, games, etc. I've been using creativity that I never knew I had! Anyway... so the pinata is going to be a pull string pinata. Instead of having little children swinging a bat around, I'm making a trap door in the bottom and attatching a string to it. Then you add 20 more strings just like it to the bottom and each child gets a turn to pull a string and see what happens. Hopefully I can engineer this so it actually works and when someone pulls the right string...CANDY!!! We'll just have to see. Things are going well with the party planning so far. I've been able to find a lot of things on sale and you all know how I feel about getting a deal. So mark October 28th on your calendar for Ethan's Pumpkin Extravaganza!

Weaning

It's weaning time in the Elmer household. Say good bye to my "nursing buddies" and hello to formula in a cup! I wanted to breastfeed for the first year and just be able to switch to whole milk on his 1st birthday, but things just weren't working out since Ethan got 4 teeth. Need I say more?! (ouch) Anyway...It's been so weird how my hormones have changed now that I'm weaning him. You're emotional when you start breastfeeding, you're emotional when you stop. Can a woman ever win? Well, at least I got this far and it was a good experience. Breastfeeding is not the easiest thing to take on, but worth it. As for weaning, Ethan has been doing very well. He doesn't mind how he gets his food, as long as he gets it. Ethan's so good with change. I'm so lucky that I don't have to deal with a kid screaming and clawing on my shirt while I'm at church or at the grocery store. So here is the end of breastfeeding chapter for Ethan and I really feel a great sense of accomplishment. It will be nice to not worry about wearing "easy access" clothes and just have my body to myself again. Hooray!

Look Who's Walking!

That's my boy! He's been taking a step here or there on his own for the past two weeks, but starting on Monday, he's been taking 4 or more! He's even started letting go of things and walking. Sorry the videos are so dark, I've been using my digital camera for videos. My computer isn't reading anything from my firewire so I can't input video from my fancy video camera. It has been driving me nuts! It was working before we left California and now it's not! Plus, the Compaq guru told me that it's something with my configuration and that it would cost $60 to talk to a tech support person for 10-20 minutes! Crazy! Well, if any of you have any idea what I can do with this issue or know anyone that can help me, please let me know!

My Little Pumpkin

A girl from Kiddie Kandids stopped me in the mall today and asked me if she could take some pictures of Ethan for their studio. She told me it would be totally free and I could get a free 8x10 out of it. I was returning Ethan's Halloween costume at the time (it was too small) so I told her I would finish my errands and be back. I'm so glad I had his costume since it was so hilarious to have him get pictures done in his first Halloween costume. It was so cute! I had so much fun and they let me pick what pose I wanted for my 8x10. I didn't have to buy anything or pay for the sitting. I totally lucked out! I did give consent for them to use the pictures for promotional stuff at the studio, but I didn't mind. So if you want to check out the pics here's the address so check them out! So fun!

Nurses 1 - Deadbeat Robber 0

My dad found this ER nurse article today in our local paper. I found it to be quite interesting and I'm sure Barbie would love to read about how working in the ER can give you some pretty great skills. Now I'm not all about nurses going around and strangling people, but man, if I could defend myself like that...score nurses!

Texas Adventures

So I've been up to quite a bit lately. I haven't been doing so hot with updating stuff on a regular basis and I'm sure some of you want to know what we've been doing since our big move. First of all my mom and I have been involved in some crazy experiences the past few weeks. Two weeks ago we went down to Fort Worth so I could get fingerprinted for my nursing license. As we were leaving the building to come home, we got stuck in the elevator! The lights went out, the elevator turned off, and Ethan was screaming! We had to use the light of my cell phone to try to find anything. Of course the elevator was old school and didn't have any help buttons or an alarm. Nobody even knew we were in there! I kept pressing buttons and eventually it turned back on and we got the heck out of there! A couple days later we were driving down the highway and saw 2 helicopters hovering. I was wondering if there was possibly an accident and it was life flight or it could have been some kind of helicopter flight school. So we drove underneath the helicopters and on to our destination. Later that night I saw a high speed chase that went on near Dallas on CNN. I checked out more on the internet and found out that the helicopters were recording the high speed chase! We were right ahead of the whole police pursuit and didn't have a clue! The guy was stopped for "mental health issues" and tried to run over a police officer. They shot him to get him to stop, but he just kept on going. He drove through all these cities, over spike strips, and past police barricades. He ended up crashing into a Budweiser truck at a gas station 2 streets down from where we were! So so weird! Crazy things usually happen in 3's so I'm wondering what crazy adventure we're getting ourselves into next time!

Snakes on a Birthday!

I don't know what the deal is with that stupid movie "Snakes on a Plane" and it has nothing to do with this post, but I thought it was a good title. Anyway, It's my mom's birthday today so my Dad wanted to make her a special cake. We asked her what kind of cake she would like for her "special day" and this is what she said..."I just want a yellow cake with chocolate frosting and have it decorated really cool." So we took what she said and made a beautiful creation. You have to understand. My mom HATES snakes! I think it stems from a horrible childhood exprience with a snake in a paper bag. So we thought up this great idea (with a little help from the internet) and created the "Birthday Snake" yesterday. We took two bundt cakes, cut them in half and connected them together in a snake pattern, used M&Ms for decoration, and fruit by the foot for the tongue. As you can see from the pictures, it was a big hit.

Feelin' Weird

I can't really describe how I feel right now. The only word I can get around it is...weird. I feel sad since I'm missing the companionship of my buddies back in Cali. I really miss the ability to just call someone up and go out for an afternoon. I think going out with friends is therapeutic for me. Call me strange, but it's true. I'm also stressed because of this whole house hunting situation. I want to find the best house for our needs, in the right price range, in the right area, close to ry's work, with good schools, and near family. Sad to say there isn't a house out there that we've found that fits the bill. I've been driving around the area looking at houses or floorplans every stickin' day and talking about it every night. I just want something to materialize and be done with it. Then again, once we buy a house...that's just the beginning. There's walls to be painted, stuff to install, addresses to change, appliances to buy, the whole shabang. This whole house thing is really getting to me. It's consuming my life right now but I'm tired of it consuming my life. It doesn't help that every person I meet has to ask me the "housing" questions and I have to give the same exact schpiel every single time. I'm tired of talking about it. I just want to crawl in a whole and be left alone. But on the other hand, if I were back in Cali I would want a girls days to happen. Plus, it's just one of those days that I feel frumpy. Have you ever had one of those days? I'm not going to go through a put down session on myself, but I feel like it. So yeah, I basically feel a combination of being sad, stressed, frumpy, and a litte mad. It's not good. All I can say in my head is BLAH! Boo to feeling weird!