Lots happened

Lots happened in the past month and a half. I can't believe that it has been that long since last time I wrote a post.

We took Ethan to the Potawatomi Zoo in South Bend. It was Ethan's first zoo trip, and I think he enjoyed it. He was pointing at animals with smiles.

Then we went camping two weekends in a row; once without Ethan and once with Ethan. We went to the Potato Creek state park with our friends over our anniversary and the following week was the church camping at the Chain o' Lakes state park. We had a lot of fun both weekends, and Ethan did amazing at his first camping! He woke up a little earlier both morning, but did great overall (and I guess waking up at 6:45 isn't that much earlier than his usual 7:15).

Over the labor day our friends from college, Jason and Lisa, came in town. We were able to visit with them which made me realize how much I miss them. I get to see Lisa and other girl friends in October for our annual girls' get together, which is really nice to have something to look forward to. But I don't mind if my girls friends came back in Goshen :-)

I worked more in the early September as September 15 is another busy time for us public accountants. Thankfully Grandma Claassen was flexible and watched Ethan 4 days a week. It is nice to have loving grandparents who are willing to watch Ethan (and also a child who loves his grandparents so much)!

We were able to fit in another camping trip with our small group at the Dunes. I had been wanting to go to the Dunes with Ethan, so it was a treat. Unfortunately the weather did not cooperate and rained until Saturday evening (we did not go up until Saturday late morning due to Jeff's studying and the weather). It was miserable. It was fun to be around friends, but sure is not fun to camp in rain. At night it got cold enough that it woke Ethan up. We tried to wrap him up in a blanket but it only made him curious (because he had never seen a blanket) that it didn't work. We ended up putting him in our sleeping bag and he slept well in it. We kept saying that we'd never let Ethan sleep in our bed, so I don't know if this broke that attempt...

Last weekend we were planning to go up to Michigan City for the outlet mall, but our little guy woke up with a fever. He had 100-102 degrees for three to four days, but other than fever and being tired, he was fine. He was getting 5 teeth (2 of them being molars) so we thought maybe it was related to that... but as soon as his fever went down on Tuesday, his face started getting some spots. Luckily I had read in Japanese magazines for young mothers that there is a thing called "roseola" and is very common (I think something like 90% of Japanese get this). So I looked it up and it sure did sound like Ethan had roseola. It is not harmful other than the high fever possibly triggering seizures, and once the spots appear it is almost done and not too contagious (and it mainly affects kids). It gives a life time immunity, so we are thankful that Ethan had a very mild case of it (his spots were gone already by Thursday).

This weekend we went to the relief sale both on Saturday and Sunday. It was fun walking around with Ethan :-) They had an elephant ride and a pony ride, but we opted out yet. Maybe next year. We had a haystacks dinner, pancake and sausage breakfast, some eggrolls, soft served ice cream, donuts, apple fritters, cheese, and tamales. We missed the pulled pork sandwich this year though. I think this was the first time I've missed it :-( I also think this was the first relief sale I've been where there was no rain! It sure was a lot of fun visiting with friends and families there. We bought a toy from the ten thousand villages for Ethan that was a hit! It is a wire framed person riding a bicycle and the tires spin when you push it around. Ethan fell in love with it there, and managed to drive the bicycle in front of him everywhere we went after that.

Pfew, I think this is all the update for the past few weeks. I do need to try to keep it up a little better than this next time!

Jeff's birthday

Yesterday, July 31, was Jeff's 28th birthday. To celebrate, we went to Shedd Aquarium and IKEA in Chicago. Sadly I forgot to take our camera with us, so no pictures. But we had such a wonderful time! Shedd was very busy and we waited about half an hour in a line to get in. Since we took the stroller with us we went through the handicap entrance, and I think the line for the actual entrance was about an hour.

It was really hard to maneuver the stroller in a packed, dark aquarium with bunch of kids running around, but we managed to show Ethan most of the exhibits. He loved the dolphins and pointed at them every time they came closer to us. It was fun showing him the fish and dolphins now that he is reacting to what he sees! We are hoping to go to the zoo yet this summer.

Two weekends ago we went to Buffalo, NY, for a graduation party for Jeff's cousins, Rachel and Brice. Although it does seem like a long time after the graduation to the people in Indiana, their schools went until the end of June so it hasn't been that long since they graduated. And it is always fun to see the family! Ethan has a second cousin, Maddie, that he gets to play with only a few times a year, but they played really well together... well, compared to the last time they saw each other which was last Thanksgiving. On the way to Buffalo we stopped at the Niagara Falls in Canada (we drove through Canada to get there this time). It was beautiful! I've been to the falls a few times but never on Canadian side, and it was a lot better! Ethan seemed to enjoy it too. And he's such a world traveler, isn't he :-)

Ethan liked the American side fall better than the horse shoe one

At Jeff's uncle's dairy farm

Ethan and his second cousin, Maddie

They have the same curls

Our basement is finally finished! Well, sort of! We still have a few things we need to paint and a few more rooms to finish, but we are done with the family room! It has been very nice to have a big room for Ethan to run around without too many things to worry about him touching. We took our sectional couch and the entertainment center downstairs, so the upstairs looked like we were robbed. Thankfully we had a TV that I won at my company's christmas party a few years ago and we picked up a TV stand at IKEA this weekend, so it's looking very nice upstairs also. Here are a few pictures of freshly finished basement. I will take a few more pictures once we have it decorated.

Guest bedroom

Basement bathroom

I finally gave Ethan a first haircut... it did not go too well. He has so little hair that I don't know how to cut the bangs without making it straight or obviously uneven. So I picked uneven over straight. But there is one spot that's clearly too short. However his hair is always messy and never straight down, it is not very noticeable... or maybe I'm just used to it now. But I may take him to one of my friends who is a hair stylist and see if she can do her magic next time!

Before

During

After... and it is not as bad as it looks here...

Already mid July

I can't believe it's already mid July! It is amazing how fast time passes.

In the past month Ethan started walking. Jeff and I had a bet going on when he would start walking, and I had mid June and he had July 4. Ethan started walking at the end of June. For the past few weeks it was more like taking a few steps and fall or dive into our arms, but the past weekend we realized that he suddenly started taking lots of steps without falling, picking up his toys on the floor and getting back up, and today I saw him turning around without holding onto a furniture. I think the only time he crawls now is to get to something to get back up. We will finally get our basement done (partially) so it will be nice to have a bigger space for him to practice walking/ running.

Oreo and Ethan are getting along better now also. Ethan plays fetch with Oreo (even though he can't slow the ball too far and Oreo does not think he needs to get the ball), pets him nicely, and cuddles up with him when Oreo is laying by me. I think Oreo likes the attention he gets from Ethan also. Oreo sure loves Ethan during a meal time because Ethan tends to throw food off of his plate/ tray if he does not like it. He used to do this whenever he was full, but we taught him "all done!" sign and he shows that he is done pretty well.

It has been fun teaching Ethan signs and seeing him communicating with us using signs. He can do milk, more, all done, and up so far. I'm trying to teach him thank you and please but we'll see how quickly he picks these up. Verbally he is still working on saying mommy and daddy. Some days he is good at it, but some days he calls everything daddy. He sure is a chatter box though. Only if we understand his language!

This weekend we will be headed to Buffalo, NY again for Jeff's cousins', Rachel and Brice's, graduation party. It will be fun to see everyone especially Maddie, Ethan's second cousin who is 3 weeks younger than Ethan. Last time they saw each other was at Thanksgiving when they were only 5 months old. Ethan started interacting with his church friends, so I'm excited to see him play with his second cousin!

Oh, and here are pictures of him playing with his buddies, Lacy and Carson. They are about 6 months older than Ethan. Now that Ethan can finally walk he was excited to follow them around (or try to follow but fall far behind).

Ethan's favorite toys right now are baseball caps. He wears an adult size Buffalo Bisons' cap and an infant size Nebraska Huskers' cap. He also loves drinking out of/ playing with a cup (not a sippy, cup!). I sure am glad that it's summer now so he could be without a shirt and drinking out of a cup without getting cold.

Ethan is 1 now!

Ethan turned 1 on Sunday, May 30. I can't believe it has been one year since he was born! This past year went so fast and he has grown so much in one year. He is not quite walking yet but working hard at it. He loves pulling up on anything and walks holding on to furnitures or our fingers. I thought he'd be walking by mid June, but I think it'd be a little longer yet. Jeff thought by July 4th. We'll see.

I took Ethan to the Portrait Innovation, a professional photo studio a few days before his birthday. We've never taken him to a studio, and it will be the only one he'll get before his senior pictures :-) They turned out really good though! The photographer was so nice and fun, made him smile and laugh as she took pictures. I bought a CD of all the pictures she took, which has over 80 pictures! These are the few.

On Sunday we had a few family over for Ethan's birthday; Mel and Lorna, Bert and Regina and Grandma Yoder (Ethan's Great Grandma!). I made the "hungry caterpillar" cake which was easy and cute. We've been feeding him some yogurt and milk now and it seems like his tolerance to dairy has increased yet not completely allergy-free so I made a non-dairy cupcakes with non-dairy frosting. He did not care for the cake but loved the frosting! After licking off his frosting he offered to trade with my cupcake that I hadn't started eating yet.

On Monday then we had our friends over for the Memorial day cook out/ Ethan's birthday. Unfortunately it rained so we couldn't be outside but we had a great time playing some games inside. A few of them enjoyed playing with Ethan's birthday gifts too :-) For Monday I baked a batch of cupcakes again and added onto my caterpillar from the day before (we kept the head). So it was an economical cake also :-)

Ethan's 1st year check up was last Friday, and he is now at the middle of the pack. I think his weight is still on the lighter side, but his height is at the middle. He had grown 3 inches in the past 3 months! I wish I had that kind of a growthspart. Next check up is at 18 months, which was too far ahead to schedule. Wow, finally we can take a little break from going to the doctors!

We continue to work on our basement. Jeff had some help painting over the past few weeks and it looks so nice now! We went out and picked out our carpet too, so we only need to put some trims up before putting the carpet down! Then it's all done! ... for now! We still have a room unfinished which we'd love to finish in the next year or so. Then it'll all be done! Ethan is starting to be more mobile each day so a big family room in the basement will be really nice. If everything goes well the family room should be done by the end of the month. I will post some pictures when it's finished!

Trip to Japan

Lots happened in the past month. We went to Japan for two weeks, had a mother's day and my birthday, now we are getting ready for Ethan's birthday!

The trip to Japan was a lot of fun. It started out with an accident though... A flight from South Bend was delayed for an hour because the oxygen tank needed to be filled (when was it used? I don't know...). So we timed Ethan's snack time to be when we take off so he could have a bottle and it'd be good for his ears... that didn't work. But he had no problem with his ears.

As we approached to Atlanta (we went through Atlanta on the way to Japan because the tickets were cheaper), the pilot announced that there was a severe storm in Atlanta and sooner we get there was better. Of course as we got closer the weather got worse and we flew over Virginia for a while to see if there is any window for us to land there. The fuel was getting low and there was no sign of the weather clearing up, so we ended up landing in South Carolina. We were not even connected to the airport there, we had to wait 2-3 hours in the plane. Ethan was starting to fuss a little due to a dirty diaper and being tired, so we changed his diaper (on our laps because there was no changing table in the bathroom, suggested by the flight attendant) and tried to put him to sleep.

So by the time we got to Atlanta our flight to Japan was long gone. Luckily they recognized this as a "maintenance issue" rather than a "weather issue" because had we left on time we would have made it, so they paid for our food and lodging. It worked out ok except that this was right after the Europe problem with the volcano, so the airport was a little hectic and getting to the ticket counter took an hour and going through the security took another hour. But at least we made the flight this time.

This time in Tokyo we rented a monthly apartment for two weeks in downtown Tokyo. It was only 10 minutes from my mom's place so we either went there or she stopped by every day. And it was nice to be in downtown so we could go see a few things, come back for a nap, and then go out again. Jeff and Ethan went out by themselves a few times also.

Lot of highlights for me; showing Ethan off to my family, eating great food, new haircut, shopping with my mom, etc. Definitely the hardest thing hands down was adjusting to Japan time. You can not force a baby to stay awake or sleep! It took Ethan 2 weeks to adjust to Japan time, and when we came back, it took him a week. That was the hardest week! Jeff and I both went to work that week with just a few hours of sleep. We were woken up once or twice (although each time we were up for 1-2 hrs). I can not imagine doing that for a year or something. Thank goodness Ethan started sleeping through the night at 4 weeks, as soon as we started letting him.

Here are a few pictures from the trip. I will write more if I remember what I want to write about...

This is how they slept the entire way over there... good job Jeff!

And when he woke up he was always sweaty

We happened to be in Japn on the "boys' day" and this is one of the displays.

Yes, we put our son in the closet to sleep...

On our balcony on the 24th floor

This was another display for the boys' day. They were all over the country!

My Grandpa and Ethan

My too excited Grandma and Ethan

My aunt who wanted to hold him so bad but Ethan was not sure

My uncle. Ethan looks like when my uncle was little

At the park near my mom's

Many restaurants hada high chair and brought utencils and a menu out for Ethan

My tradition: with a panda

Packing

Ethan loved playing hide an seek (he says it in Japanese) and it was the "boo!" face

Another picture from our balcony. You can see the Mt. Fuji (the white triangle at the back)

Jetlagged child at home