Sleeping and Playing

I meant to write about this in my last post but I forgot and was reminded this morning. :) We have been struggling a little with Ethan's sleeping. He is doing somewhat better with naps. He usually likes to only do a 30 minute nap but will sometimes go longer. He is a bit of a "cat napper". I am slowly being able to depend on a morning nap, afternoon nap and a couple evening rests. However, the night time has been a bit frustrating! He will technically sleep through the night and does not usually need to get up to eat. However, he has been waking up very often screaming! I thought originally that he was waking up because his pacifier had fallen out but I do not think that is the case because he can sleep fine without it at other times. It is still a bit of a mystery why he is waking up! The nice thing is that he will go right back to sleep once the pacifier is in so I am only awake for a minute or two.

All the frustrations of the night are usually forgotten in the mornings because of how cute Ethan is! :) He will wake up and just hang out in his crib for a while. He doesn't cry or anything but will simply play or talk to himself. It is the most adorable thing!! A few recent mornings I have gotten up and thought I would just check in on him and he is actually awake and hanging out in his crib. The smile I get when he first sees me is the best thing in the world! Sometimes I wonder how we got soo lucky!! :)

Time is flying by!

This past week Ethan turned 5 months old! It is hard to believe that we are already there. In a way it seems like just yesterday he was born. I remember at the very beginning focusing on getting to 6 months old and so I can hardly believe we are only a month away from that milestone. :) He is doing wonderful. He continues to be a super good baby and is very fun. He laughs and smiles a ton and does lots of "talking". If you put him on his back he will roll onto his stomach and is trying to figure out how to get back over. :) He loves to hang out in his Bumbo and his exersaucer. Ethan has an oral fixation and wants to put EVERYTHING in his mouth! He is not teething yet (thankfully!) but loves chewing on things. We find him very entertaining and are having tons of fun with him!

We thankfully survived January and are glad to have the month behind us. Curt was extremely busy teaching his class and doing his normal work and so he wasn't home much to hang out with us. He really enjoyed teaching and was thankful to have the experience. We are looking forward to the start of the new semester and to establishing a routine. This weekend Curt had the opportunity to play in a pond hockey tournament on Reed's Lake so we had fun getting bundled up and watching him. Ethan could hardly move in his snow suit so I am not sure he had any idea what was going on! :)

I am doing well and staying busy. I truly love staying home with Ethan and am very thankful for the way God has blessed us so that I can stay home.

Holiday Celebrations

Happy New Year! It is hard to believe that Christmas is over and we are into 2011 already! I figured it was time to update on our celebrations and how our little man is doing.

We had a WONDERFUL first Christmas season with Ethan. I ended almost every night thanking God for such a great baby and such an amazing family. We had a number of family celebrations and he did great at them all! He is a spoiled, blessed little guy! :) We spent Christmas Eve with Curt's parents and had a very nice day of relaxing and playing games. Then we were with my family on Christmas day. It was such fun to incorporate Ethan into our traditions. He received lots of books and clothes and a fun activity center that he will be able to use at Grandpa and Grandma Norton's house.

Curt was a bit amazed at how many pictures my sister and I could take of

Ethan! :)

Curt's brother and his fiancée flew home from California on Christmas day so Ethan was finally able to meet Uncle Ty and Aunt Erin the day after Christmas. He loved them! He smiled and smiled for Uncle Ty and seemed to love hanging out with him! We were able to spend lots of time with them while they were home, which was wonderful. We are super excited for their wedding this summer!

We had our last Christmas celebration on Sunday and are looking forward to getting back into our routine. I am also looking forward to "normal" eating after all the goodies of the season!

We also had a great New Years Eve. Our dear friends, Zach and Rachel, moved back to Michigan from Hawaii and so we were able to hang out with them and our other great friends, John and Laura, for the night. We went to Curt's grandparents' cottage. Ethan loved it and I cannot wait to go up there this summer to swim and play. John and Laura brought their son, Judah, who is 2 along and it was great fun playing with him. The boys slept great and I was excited to know that Ethan will do fine sleeping there this summer!

January is going to be a very busy and stressful month for us! Curt has the opportunity to teach an interim class here at Calvin. For those of you that don't know, it is a class that lasts for 3 weeks and that he will teach every day for 3 hours. He is co-teaching it with another person and has about 30 students. It is called "Life Hacking" and will take a look at the self-help movement within the light of Scripture. I think he is really looking forward to it and to the opportunity to try something new and see what he thinks of teaching. It will mean very busy days as he will continue to do his RD work. January is usually a busy month for that as well since students have more free time than usual, which can sometimes mean they are creative in their use of that time. :) So, Ethan and I are going to be seeing a bit less of Daddy than we are used to this month.

Ethan is doing fantastic! He is 4 months old now, which is crazy. He is doing a great job of holding up his head and will sit while being held. He rolls onto his stomach a lot and loves hanging out in his exersaucer. He smiles and laughs a lot and is a very happy baby. He is still quite the talker and I often wish I knew what he is thinking and saying! We had been having some trouble with his sleeping and needing to put his pacifier in his mouth a lot at night (sometimes every 15 minutes!). I had been told by other mothers that once they started sleeping their babies on their stomachs they slept a lot better, so I decided to give it a try. It was a bit scary to lay him on his stomach at first and I would often check to make sure he was still breathing! However, it seems true and he has been sleeping much better! I hesitate to say this because it seems that every time I talk about how great he is sleeping he reverts backwards so hopefully that won't happen this time. :) He has consistently been getting up only once a night around 4:30 am. Over the last few nights he has been going longer and longer and last night he didn't wake up until he was ready to get up at 7:30. I can handle that!! He has also been taking better naps and is starting to get a bit more predictable. It is nice to have time to get things done.

We have loved our holiday season and really enjoyed the quiet around campus! I am sitting here looking at the beautiful trees with the new snow and somewhat dreading the return of students today! :) I am super excited about the months ahead and absolutely love witnessing Ethan's new discoveries!