18 month old catches on quickly!!!

I am almost embarrased to admit this but today my wonderful Seth 18 months old locked me out of the house...... I didn't know he knew how.  We were looking out the window and he was putting his hand on it and I thought oh, I'll go outside and put my hand on the other side of the window.  He loves doing it with me on the back window.  Then I had another thought, oh I need to take the garbage out, so I'll grab the garbage, take the 20 steps to the carport drop it in and then play with him at the window.  I do it quickly so he won't lose interest in the window, but in the 10 seconds it took he's not at the window.  So I go to the door, and find it locked.  My son moved away from the window, and in less than 10 seconds reached up to the handle, pushed the button and locked me out !!!!  But he can't turn the handle to let me in.  

No problem, Ethan who's 4 is watching a movie downstairs.  I'll ring the doorbell he'll come running and open the door..... Nope, he's too engrossed in the movie to even wonder why the doorbell keeps ringing, and someone is pounding on the door.  I finally have to pound on the window really hard right above him many times before he even bothers to notice and eventually come upstairs and let me in...  

I didn't even know my son knew how to lock the door.....  guess he does now. I'm much more aware of his ability now !!!!

Ann Arbor Michigan Here We Come

For Ellie's spring break from school on April 3rd we decided to visit for a week,my sister Andrea, her husband Tyler and their son Hayden who is only 4 days younger than Seth.  We were soooo excited to visit them and see where they live.  (originally we had planned to visit them in China... but it didn't work out)  

The trip began a little rough.  We left 1/2 hr. late because they had to de-ice the plane, which we are certainly glad they did it so we didn't fall out of the sky like a meteor, but it was longer for the kids. Seth was very tired however he found the energy to fight for 45 minutes trying everything he could do to not sleep!!!!!  

When we arrived the car rental agency had issues galore !!!! After listening to three customer complaints ranging from a tire blowout to additional charges we recieved our car, the one with the large chunk of plastic missing from the trunk handle cover.  An hour later we finally get our van, got moving, only to stop in Chicago traffic (aparrently it's always there). Moving about 5-10 mph for another 1 1/2 hours we finally said hello to the open highway, Indiana then Michigan.   Three hours later than planned we arrived at Andrea's townhouse in Ann Arbor, about midnight... They were so sweet and said they didn't mind.  All throughout the trip we really appreciated their wonderful hospitality, accomodations, and FABULOUS food.  What more could you ask?

Here we are in front of their townhome before Tyler left for 

St. Louis, Missouri to look for housing during his summer internship 

Saturday morning we started our exploration of Ann Arbor.  We visited Tyler's school and saw the "Harry Potter looking" law building, along with a few other sites on campus.  The hit of the morning was "The CUBE" for the kids and Steve. It's 15 feet tall, weighs 2,400 lbs, yet will spin with a gentle push.  Everyone took turns spinning it, even Seth and Hayden  (no pictures however, we forgot the camera).   

After that we had a cold picnic at the park where the wind kept blowing  and the kids were more interested in playing than eating. Tyler and Steve then enjoyed a golf game (since it was going to be the only good weather day at a balmy 52 degrees) with Ellie who was THRILLED to join daddy for her first golf game driving lesson!!! 

The next day we went to a delicious brunch at Andrea's friend Natalie's home, wow they can cook !!!! We watched conference online  and then had fun spending time together.  We especially had fun playing the game Alhambra.  I'd never even heard of it, but now LOVE it !!!

On Monday we were joined by our new friend Christie and even Tyler joined us.  We made the 2 hour drive to Sandusky, OH for Kalahari, an ENORMOUS indoor waterpark.  It's the biggest indoor waterpark in America.  We were amazed when we walked through the door, and it only got better !!!!!

This is just one kiddie section and part of the water roller coaster

We loved the 4 person tube slides, body slides, a water roller coaster, and a huge wave pool.   The large kiddie area with tons of small slides and things to climb on was a bit hit with Ethan Seth and Hayden, and Ellie even enjoyed it for awhile.   

Boogie Boarding here we come !!!

Steve and Tyler decided to try the flow rider.  They were standing in line, when Ethan joined them and the lifeguards said he could try it.  Ethan shocked us all by being the first one of our group to try boogie boarding on the flow rider (and of course we wouldn't have the camera)!!!!   He did really well, which shocked us that he would even want to do it, because there are kiddie slides that Seth does, but Ethan won't.....?  who knows?  Ellie followed him and then Steve and Tyler took their chance.  So after that Andrea and Annalyn decided they couldn't miss this opportunity, and  found it  to be quite fun, and Ellie must have liked it, because she even did it again, but got swept up much quicker the second time. 

We'd have more pictures of Kalahari, but we were trying to take one and someone ran by and bumped hard into Steve and the camera slipped out of his hands and onto the cement, not to open or close again..... nor take any more pictures.... aaaarrggghhh!   It was still quite the fun day!!

On Wednesday we went to the Exhibit Museum of Natural History on the University of Michigan campus.

The kids loved climbing all over this boat, and of course they go out opposite sides.

And a rare moment, all smiling, having fun in the boat,  and in close proximity to each other (easier picture opp) !!!

Ellie liked a lot of the interactive computer screens in the space rooms.  We also enjoyed the rocks, a wide variety of taxidermy animals and all the dinosaur bones.

            It was either too much fun for Ethan,... or not enough fun.....

Thursday we ventured out to the Hands on Museum. 

 

The kids loved it.  One of the first fun things was the beginning stairs each were a different musical note that played when you stepped on the stair. It was cool !!!  

It was crazy at first because they had several huge school groups, so we made the kids unhappy and took a lunch break and came back later to have the place mostly to ourselves..... much more enjoyable.  

Ellie loved being able to help Hayden do things, and Hayden of course loved the water.

We thought this bike was cool, as you pedaled you could see the bones of a skeleton moving against your own reflection, as if you were seeing your own bones moving.  It was neat. Here are some other fun photos.

We thought this was neat, a harp, that the strings were light beams, and whenever something broke the beam of light it played the note. Ellie thought it was quite fun to play.

Seth and Hayden loved putting the ball at the top of the ramp and watching it roll back and forth, down to the bottom.

This was definitely a big hit with everyone.  We loved seeing their smiles showing how much fun it was to stick their faces in it !!!

The boys loved playing with sticks outside Andrea's house.

Friday came and it was our last day together.  We decided to go to the Detroit Zoo.  It was a little chilly, but it was a big place so it kept us movin, trying to see it all quickly.

We saw....

Birds

Butterflies

Cute Kids

Frogs (blue seemed so cool.. but very poisonous)

...and more frogs

Anteaters

Peacocks

Giraffes

Metal Elephants (aren't they so lovable?)

Female Lions 

Male Lions

even metal lions (Ellie's always wanted to snuggle with a lion...?)

We were also among the privileged few to see a sloth (very rare to see... they sleep 15-20 hours a day)  We even got to see it climbing the underside of this tree.

Seals ( we loved this clear tunnel underneath the water)  

Ethan loved the huge ice wall at the end, that you could put your hand into and make a handprint

We had a fabulous trip and so many fun memories.  Thank you Andrea, Tyler and Hayden for sharing it with us !!!!

He Made the Bed !!!

Today is an exciting day !!!!  

Ethan was doing his chores and usually he will start on his bed and then come and get me so I can sit on the corner of the sheet so it doesn't move as he pulls it hard towards the other side of the bed.  

Today he came out and said he was all done,  and I didn't have to help !!  He was so excited and had a huge smile, which is wonderful to see!!   YEAA!!!!!  We are soooo excited and very proud that today he was wonderful about all his chores and doing it by himself.  He even emptied the dishwasher without complaint and he didn't play for hours inbetween each dish. Today is starting out great !!!!!  

( Days aren't always like this so I thought I'd put it here for all to know how proud of Ethan I am ( today) and a reminder to me later that there are days when Ethan chooses to willingly be wonderful) 

Crawling Fun

I'm trying to get better at posting more often and I thought I would share something that happened, since I found it so cute and funny, and maybe someone else will also enjoy it.

Today Ellie was trying to get Seth to climb on her back so she could give him a piggy back ride, but he didn't understand what she wanted, so he got onto all fours, following her example and he started crawling around in front of Ellie and calling her name (well more like yelling it). He was trying to get her to follow him. Which he doesn't crawl around anymore so it seemed so out of the ordinary.  Then Ellie gave up on her ideas and crawled around after him, which he giggled so cutely sounding like pure joy. It was so fun to watch. I LOVE moments like this !!!!

Snuggles

We are a family of snugglers. Ellie loves it when Seth cooperates and wants to snuggle, sometimes he does sometimes not.

Ethan and Seth also like to be together and I thought this was such a cute picture (minus the food in Ethan's mouth)

Discovery Gateway here we come !!!

This is my first attempt to add a post, so we'll see how it goes. We were very graciously given a membership to the Discovery Gateway.... Thank you MOM !!!!! Anyhow we were so excited to use it, and did so very quickly after Christmas. The kids LOVE IT !!!!! Here are a few pictures to enjoy. Seth's favorites include the water play area, which he loves to stand on the stool so he can reach higher and access more water and stuff (he also gets more wet...) He also loves the balls. He's happy if he has a ball in each hand. 

Ethan loves to try a little of everything everytime we go. Sometimes he will spend quite a while in one spot, but then other times he bounces around quickly everywhere. I'm never sure which day it's going to be. He loves to get on and off the very high horse (and make me nervous, because he likes to go off the wrong side!). He also likes to make buildings and then watch them crash all over on the earthquake table. We also had a hard time trying to pull him out of the helicopter outside, even thought it was pretty cold, and we had been out there FOREVER...

They decided to do a play for me. They had sooo much fun using the different costumes and the screen sets, and the stage lights, yet it was a very strange play, they announced that it was Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but the title and the curly wig were about all that related to the story I grew up with....but they had fun just being themselves... and acting silly. 

Ellie and Livy (her best friend) who we brought with us this time, they were being postal workers delivering letters all over. This is one of Ellie's favorite things to do. When we don't bring a friend with us Ellie usually makes a new friend quickly and then they go all over doing things together. 

This is seth enjoying one section of the water area. He is usually drenched by the time we leave. He loves to put the balls into one part of the pipe, then grab it after it flows down a little and put it back in.

Livy loves to play with Seth and make him laugh, which he seems to enjoy playing with her just as much. Right now he's having fun trying to run to the very edge  with the doll stroller and tempt mom to catch him, then run away, yet getting very close to the edge most times....  This is in the construction area, which is another of Ellie's favorite places to play. Ethan loves to use the pretend cranes to lift the big building blocks up where Ellie can build the houses with them.

Christmas Letter