Happy Thanksgiving!

So today was Ethan's first thanksgiving. He was all geared up and ready to help me cook lunch.




I decided this year that I wanted to make a turkey and my favorite thanksgiving side dishes just for my house for leftovers so we could have them whenever we wanted. I got to work planning exactly how I wanted to cook the turkey. In the end, I had a handful of people decide that they wanted to come over for lunch so I ended up buying two small turkeys instead of just one small turkey for Martin. I brined the first turkey in salt, rosemary, peppercorns and garlic and then had it smoked. I roasted the second turkey with an herb butter rubbed under the skin and all over the skin with spices all over and fresh herbs in the cavity to make it more aromatic. I have to say, I am really proud of my first turkey ever! Martin said it was pretty good too, I wouldn't know. I don't eat meat. :)




So Ethan had a rather big lunch, a little herb turkey, sour cream and chive mashed potatos, green beans, a roll, some stuffing and then played until he just couldn't play anymore. I went in to check on him about a half hour later and this is what I found.

Poor baby was so worn out, and he had learned the after-effects of thanksgiving turkey. He was really funny... after I took pictures we said his name and woke him up and as soon as his eyes opened he started jumping around like crazy as though he hadn't fallen asleep at all. He was really funny, it made us all laugh.

Ethan has also discovered another joy of being little ...

He, like all little kids, LOVES boxes!

He was so sweet today and I'm so thankful to have him in my life this year. I am also thankful for Martin, for everything he does for Ethan and me, and for the home we have to live in. We are so blessed.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Happy Birthday!

Well today marks the last November birthday in my family (besides myself), it is the 8th one. What a crazy month! Lili, happy birthday. I am so glad that you are in my life, and I miss seeing you as much as I used to. I know you are happy being back in New Mexico, I just wish we could both visit more often. I hope that you have a fantastic birthday, I'll be thinking of you. (Be glad yours isn't on Thanksgiving this year ... you know as well as I do that having it that day is no fun). I hope you have a great day! I love you.

New tricks

I guess I better start with my weekly November shout out, and say Happy birthday to Ber! Thanks for all your help over the last couple weeks, I really appreciated you taking the time to come and watch Ethan while I worked. I know he loved it and I loved that you got to know him better. Also, thanks for taking us seriously and coming around more. We weren't lying when we told you to drop by anytime. :) Well anyway, Happy birthday again!




So Ethan has discovered the joys of watching movies. I turned one on for him the other day for noise and what I hoped would be a little entertainment while I got some things done. I went to check on him and he was sitting in the middle of the room staring at the TV. I think he is starting to like movies more. It was funny to see him just sitting there.

He also has learned how to pull himself up on the couch and let go and stand all by himself! I can't believe how big he's getting. I love watching him learn new things. He started out standing for less than a second and now depending on how distracted he is, he can stand for probably a good 10 seconds.

And for his final new trick of the week, he has learned how to clap! It is so cute, he gets a huge grin on his face and just starts clapping away. He also really likes (now that he's better at standing) to stand by himself and clap at the same time.

Before I know it, he'll be cruising all over the house and I won't be able to do anything anymore. But until then, I love watching him learn new things and become very excited about them. He's so sweet and the best baby I've ever been around. I have a theory on that though ... I tell people that God gave me the best baby now because if he would have given me a really difficult baby at first, I would have never had another one. :)

Poor Baby

Monday morning when Ethan woke up and I was changing him, I noticed his body had a handful of red spots covering his skin. I thought for sure he had gotten the chicken pox somehow. As the day went on, the spots started to spread, and they spread really fast. By the end of the day, the poor kid was completely covered with red spots. We were worried that he would start scratching them so we rubbed calamine lotion all over where we could. Poor boy was all pink.





Tuesday after he woke up his spots were turning really splotchy and getting awfully big making me think they weren't the chicken pox after all. He had gotten something like this once before but not nearly as bad as this time. It went from small spots to splotchy big marks and then a few days later they went away completely. Poor baby was completely covered.


Today when we woke up the spots were giant! It looked like he had been hit in the face about 50 times with a golf ball. His eye was starting to swell up as well. I started to get really worried because if he got an infection around his eye, he wouldn't be able to fight it off. I gave in and took him to instacare.


(Click to see this picture better)

Well it turns out that it's not roseola, chicken pox, or a heat rash ... my poor baby has hives. This is his second time with the same exact thing, only worse this time and we can't figure out what he's allergic to so we can prevent it next time. The good news is, after two doses of benadryl, his face looks so much better. It's not nearly as noticeable and he doesn't look like someone beat him up. I am glad I know what these are now so if it happens again, I know it's hives and to just give him benedryl and to figure out what was different about that day.

I'm sure by tomorrow his face and body will be mostly cleared up and my heart won't break everytime I look at him.

Martin

I have this weird thing where I can't clean during the day (unless I have to). I have to clean at night while everyone is asleep and out of my way. I put my headphones on and get to work. Everytime I scrub down my kitchen I always always always admire my countertops. I know that is a funny thing to do, but I really do. Martin works at a granite shop and fabricates counters for a living. He loves his job so much. He had to switch jobs a few months ago from a granite shop to a shop that did some of everything, but mostly quartz. He didn't like the switch because all the stone looks the same in quartz because it is man made (stone glued together instead of cut straight out of the mountain) so every job looked identical. Well he was laid off from that job and moved back to a granite shop. He loves granite more than anybody I've ever met. He admires every piece of granite he ever comes across, he even has a stone subscription magazine. (What a nerd, I know. =D) Well he did my kitchen counters for me, and I pretty much gave him free reign on what he wanted to do. He did the counters along with three custom shelves (which I love!) He did my counters one color and my island and splash a different color. Having your island a different color from your main counters is not that uncommon anymore, but he had never done splash a different color before.

I seriously love my kitchen and I love the splash the same color as the island. I think it makes the rest of my kitchen counters pop. I just wanted to show you some of the awesome work he does!

While he was working on my kitchen, he also ripped up the carpet and tile in my living room and entry and put new floors in my living room and a custom granite tile job in my entry. I thought this was awesome too, so I thought I would show this off as well. (The colors are the same as my kitchen ... they match. :] )

I guess that is my bragging for the night. You do awesome work Martin, keep it up!

Picture

I was just looking through my many many pictures looking for a picture of George to post for his birthday and ran across this one of Ethan. This picture made me laugh to myself thinking of the day we took this. He was playing all day and he must have worn himself out and we look over to his play thing he was in, and he had fallen asleep while playing. Poor baby.

I thought it was funny, maybe it'll bring a smile to you as well.

Have a great Sunday!

There are just too many ...

In November I think between Martin's family and my family we have way too many birthdays this month. We have at least one, sometimes up to three birthdays per week during November.

I just want to wish George, my brother in law a happy birthday today. He hasn't been a huge part of our lives for the last few years, but he is back now and I've been getting to know him a lot better. He sure loves Ethan and it's fun to watch them together. Ethan now knows who he is when he comes over and gets really excited to see him.

Anyway, I'm glad you're back George. Stay out of trouble so you can stay home, and most of all:

Happy Birthday!

(Ethan and George like to play the Wii together)

Tag I'm It

This is what you do:

1. Open up your picture file

2. Go to the fourth folder

3. Select the fourth picture

4. Post the picture on your blog and write about it

This is me last halloween, feeling extremely huge but only part of the way there. Martin and I had decided to dress up for halloween, and I made us both costumes. I made Martin a penguin costume and me a pregnant bee costume. We went as the birds and the bees. :) It made me laugh everytime I thought about that and looked down at my belly.

Now it's your turn. If you want to show us your 4th picture in the 4th folder of your pictures file, I'd love to see it.

Also, today (well yesterday as in the 6th) was Martin's birthday! He had to work all day long and got home about 10:30 at night so we didn't get to spend the day together, but he took the entire day off tomorrow so that we can hang out! Happy Birthday Martin, I'm so glad you are part of my life. Thanks for all you do for Ethan and me. We love you so much.

(P.S. Thanks Traves for this awesome picture!)

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! I love halloween, it is one of my favorite holidays. It's not quite as fun as it used to be when all the little kids around went trick or treating instead of the new trunk or treat ... Martin doesn't support trunk or treating at all. =D He's funny like that. I'm not a fan, we like the good old fashioned door to door fun instead. Well four years ago today I got engaged, and now I look back at everything that's happened since and it's pretty neat.

I have already posted Ethan's super cute turtle halloween costume, so I won't do that again even though it is halloween. Instead, I will show you another cute picture of him ... he's getting so big so fast. He is already 9 months. I can't believe it. What a sweet baby. He's so fun, and I'm so glad that I have him in my life.

I hope you all had a very happy halloween!

Good News

Monday Martin was offered a temp job working for a countertop company in Providence for the week. The way the owner made it sound without actually saying it was that he wanted Martin to go in and work with the people there and see how he does. We think he wanted to see if he could do everything he said he could do. I'm happy to announce that today the owner offered him a full time job there! (that's something big because there is only 1 other full time employee there, the rest are part time). I am so relieved. I got my house payment in the mail a few days ago and I didn't know what we were going to do.

In other news, today is my Grandma's birthday! Happy birthday Grandma! We love you.