Happy Thanksgiving!

We had such a lovely holiday! It started with the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, which, as it turns out, no one in my house is interested in besides me (I know, it's absolutely un-American, but those boys of mine are total party poopers). Ethan was mildly interested when the Buzz Lightyear balloon floated by, but outside of that he was much more into playing with his wooden train tracks. And, while we're on the subject of the Macy's Parade, can we digress for a moment and talk about the fact that Newsies is now on Broadway?!?! What?!?! I was ridiculously obsessed with that movie back in the day. The performance of "King of New York" alone was enough to make watching the parade worth it. My boys don't know what they're missing.

Given that we're exactly two weeks away from meeting baby brother, I kind of cheated my way out of cooking this year. I cooked a turkey, but most of the side dishes were purchased from our local boutique supermarket already prepared. Call me crazy, but spending hours in the kitchen peeling/boiling/mashing potatoes and making complicated recipes from scratch does not jive with the big baby belly and end-of-pregnancy pains and fatigue.

We did most of the cooking preparing while Ethan was napping, but once he woke we pulled a stool up to the counter and let him "bake the bread" (roll up all of the crescent rolls and put them on the baking sheet). We set the table with "fancy" plates and real silverware, dimmed the lights, and lit candles. Music played in the background as we talked about holidays and family, and I almost burst into happy tears several times. I was too busy enjoying the moment to take any photos, which is a testament to how absolutely wonderful the evening was.

However, a Notch blog post would not be a Notch blog post without *some* pictures. As per usual, I'm horribly behind in posting (It's been over a month! Yikes!), so I have a few catching up photos cued up and ready to go.

Here's Ethan as a scary green dinosaur (don't let that goofy grin fool you - he's a vicious beast).

He began asking for a dinosaur costume back in August, I broke down and bought it for him in September, and he intermittently wore it around the house all through October. We got some serious mileage out of that zip up dinosaur suit.

While this was taken with an iPhone camera in my office, and not with one of Ryan's fancy cameras in just-the-right setting, I figured I should post it anyway. This year for Halloween I dressed up as Mother Nature (ba dum ching!). My amazing friend Stacie spent hours with me coming up with the concept and making the skirt and headpiece. I also wore it to Ryan's office Halloween party and when we took Ethan trick-or-treating, so I suppose I got some good mileage out of this costume as well!
I will do my best to post once more before baby brother arrives - I have some recent(ish) belly shots to show you, and should do so while they're still relevant!

A November Post (that's actually about Halloween)

Ethan "helped" me carve a pumpkin. His version of helping was digging around in the bowl with his shovel after I scooped out the pumpkin guts. As I predicted, he wanted nothing to do with the scooping process. He was, however, super into playing with the shovel. He was not so into sharing the shovel with me so that I didn't have to use my hands.
Ethan: 1, Mama: 0


Ethan also "helped" me with the actual carving process. Sort of. He really wanted to use the sharp, serrated tools, but with some slight of hand and clever distraction tactics (and a little bit of bold-faced lying), I convinced him that the sharp tools were boring, and that this dull plastic punch was where it's at.
Ethan: 1, Mama: 1


I agonized for weeks and weeks over what to do for Ethan's costume. I was looking for a robot, but struck out on all of my searches. I thought about making a robot costume, but that plan had two fatal flaws: 1) All of my ideas involved things like dryer vent hose for arms and cardboard boxes for the body, which Ethan would probably not keep on (if he even let me put them on in the first place), and 2) As much as I love being crafty, I'm crazy busy right now and simply didn't have enough time. Ethan took matters into his own hands by choosing his Tigger costume on an unrelated outing to Babies R Us. He saw it, shouted, "Tigger!!!" and gave it lots of hugs and kisses. Problem solved. Win-win.
Ethan: 2, Mama: 2


After suiting up in both costume and glow bracelets, we headed out to score some free candy. Our neighborhood was filled with trick-or-treaters, and Ethan seemed confused by all of the ninjas, princesses, and pirates walking down the street. With a bit of hesitation, we were able to get him to walk up to doors, though he usually asked me to knock on them.


Can you see the hesitation on his face? I blame it on the Grim Reaper door knocker that had flashing red eyes and an evil "Mwah ha ha" kind of laugh that we encountered at the first house. Towards the end of our night, Ethan insisted on riding on my back, burying his head in my shoulders whenever a door would open. He'd quickly become brave when he caught sight of the candy bowl, and would dart his hand out to grab some goodies.


We had to work on the "thank you" response to being given a treat - he wanted to eat his candy right away and defaulted to excited shouts of, "Open! Open!" followed quickly by a singsongy, "Bye!" to the person/creature at the door. Learning a lesson from countless other "firsts" we decided to head home while we were still on top (and tantrum-free), and turned around after about five or six houses. Our Tigger became very ♫ Bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun! ♫ after we let him finish all of his non-peanut butter, non-choking hazard pieces of candy before going to bed. And after he went to bed, I may or may not have finished the ones deemed too hazardous for toddler consumption. We both came out on top in the candy department.
Ethan: 3, Mama: 3
By all accounts, Halloween was officially a success.

A Halloween Post (that's not about Halloween)

Of course it's not, because in order for the post on Halloween to be about Halloween, I would have to be up to date with my blogging. Which we all know is just not the case. At least this post is about events that happened in the month of October.

Or, as I have renamed it, the month that Sarah was wrong about everything. Allow me to explain.

1) I stated with authority that the San Francisco Giants would not make it to the World Series. Wrong.

2) My dad and I took Ethan to the zoo, sure of the fact that he would love the animals. Wrong. The morning was spent deflecting shouts of, "No [insert animal name here]! Bye bye, [seriously, insert ANY animal name here]!" He did love the petting zoo, so technically I was only half wrong.

3) I thought that Ethan would get a kick out of the planes during Fleet Week. Super wrong. He was terrified. Thankfully, Ethan did get a kick out of splashing in the frigid waters of the Pacific while Ryan and my dad watched the air show, which distracted him from crying every time a plane zoomed and sonic boomed overhead.


Despite being full of failed predictions, October was a really great month! My dad came to visit for a week, and stayed with us for the first time. Ethan was able to wake up to his Pa-Pa every morning and see him until the minute he went to bed. As usual when we have visitors in town, we packed the week full of activities. One of my favorites was a trip to the pumpkin patch. As my long time readers may remember, I've been waiting years for Ethan to be old enough to enjoy Halloween. From dressing him up when he was itty bitty, to taking him to a pumpkin patch when he wasn't even old enough to sit up on his own, and the trick or treating plans that were ruined by a nasty bout of H1N1, Halloween has always been filled with good intentions, most of which just didn't work out for us.

I don't want to jinx it, but this year may be different. The pumpkin patch trip started us off on the right foot. Ethan had a blast "splashing" in a pool full of beans
and running through the hay mazes and tunnels.



Ethan picked his own costume this year, and we're going trick or treating for the first time ever tonight. If we're lucky, all will go well and Ethan will have a fantastic time. If you're lucky, I'll have fodder for another post about Halloween mishaps. No matter how it shakes down, it's kind of a win-win situation.

And unlike the over/under on the Giants winning the World Series, I like those odds.

Boo!

One more Halloween photo for your viewing pleasure... enjoy!

Happy Halloween!

We're very excited about Ethan's first holiday! Sure, he won't know the difference between the 30th and the 31st, but it's still fun to celebrate. Though he won't remember, we're looking forward to starting our holiday family traditions. Sarah is also looking forward to getting free candy again... babies who go Trick-or-Treating do get candy, right?

We used all of the goodies we got from the pumpkin patch to shoot Ethan's three month photos. He wasn't a big fan of being stuck inside of the slimy pumpkin, but was much more content once we lined it with a blanket. We can't believe that he's already three months old! He's about sixteen pounds now, and has gained a lot of strength and skills in the last month. Sarah was shocked to find Ethan on his belly when he woke up about a week ago. It's official - he can roll over - but it's about a 20 minute process that usually only happens when he's agitated. He loves sleeping on his side, and can hold himself in that position for a loooooong time. He's able to hold up his head for much longer periods now, too. No propping necessary for this photo shoot... he got a great neck muscle workout supporting himself the entire time!


He's losing his hair, which is both sad and exciting. We hate to see his baby locks go, but can't wait to discover what color his "new" hair will be. Do you think it will be dark like his Daddy's? Ryan's hair was actually blond until he was about three years old, so who knows if this new batch that grows in will be his true hair color.

We couldn't resist getting him a Halloween costume. Usually there aren't many options for a baby his age, but since he's so huge he was able to fit into a 6 month-sized costume, which opened a lot more possibilities. We chose (what else?) the cutest little monkey costume we could find. Actually, we chose the cutest little monkey costume that Aunt Mary found!


Ethan sends his love to all of his grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends that are far, far away. He also sends instructions to mail all of your leftover candy to our house, addressed to him in care of Sarah. Happy Halloween!

Punkin' Pickin'

We took Ethan to his first pumpkin patch over the weekend. He 1) had just woken up from a nap and was still drowsy, and 2) is far too young to appreciate holidays, so you can definitely tell in the pictures that we were enjoying it much more than he was. There was a petting zoo with pigs, goats, and bunnies that we observed from outside of the fence (Sarah wasn't sure that she wanted the baby to get too close to the critters). It turns out that Ethan is just as interested in farm animals as he is in Max... he barely even gave them a glance. He'll love that kind of stuff when he gets older, but for this outing he was largely unimpressed. That didn't keep us from having fun with it, though!




In other news from the weekend, we're happy to report that the swaddle-free sleeping is going really well. We had expected to wake up a lot to a crying baby, but Ethan (as always) is sleeping through the night. He's actually sleeping longer than he ever has - almost twelve straight hours on average! Yes, we're well aware that we're spoiled, and are prepared to pay the price for our good fortune with a super fussy baby the next time around!