Thanksgiving in Grand Rapids

So we decided to have Christmas just as a family in Long Beach this year and went to visit Liz' folks for Thanksgiving. We were greeted with two different snow storms dumping six inches or so which was great for sledding and snowman (and snow-dinosaur) making. I also went hiking around Oma and Opa's house and took some nice landscapes in between snow dumpings.

We went to the Grand Rapids Children's Museum where Ethan had fun with lots of things, most notably filling a shopping cart to the brim with plastic fruits and vegatables. We also went to the Kalamazoo Air Zoo where we saw some pretty cool airplanes up close, Ethan got to go on some rides, and I got to do barrel rolls and flips in a flight simulator with Liz.

Click here or the photo above to go to the photo album.

We can't breathe!

Fires sprung up east of Long Beach yesterday and filled the sky with smoke. It smelled like ash everywhere and the sunlight was very orange all day like a very long sunset. Later in the day we had piles of ash around the house and car. Ethan and Daddy are having a rough time with coughs and stuffed noses.

Recent Ethan Quote

"Daddy, do you want to watch football with me?" --Ethan

(Uttered while I was washing dishes with Thursday Night Football on the TV so I could watch my fantasy players. I'm sure Liz is thrilled I'm exposing him early.)

Watch out David Beckham

Ethan has been taking Saturday soccer classes by an outfit called Kids Love Soccer. They do a good job of coming up with different learning drills about colors, animals, etc. to mask the fact that they're just making the kids dribble aka 'little kicks' from cone to cone. They do get to knock down cones and score goals. Liz came recently and got to play "lion jumps out and scares the giraffe" which I believe is getting them accustomed to stealing the ball from others. When I told Ethan "You need to not kick the ball too far when dribbling because when you play real soccer there's only one ball and the other kids will try to take it away" he responded, not suprisingly, "Why?". I think soccer with multiple balls could actually be pretty cool.

School Update

Ethan no longer whiles about going to school and is past his crying spells about missing mommy. We are getting a steady stream of craft projects coming home. We've been told that Ethan really like singing and going to Chapel once a month. There have been some noticeable changes in his behavior. He has picked up some mean phrases that he unleashes on us when he's getting in trouble. He's also gotten into trouble some times by pushing which is a bummer because he's always been very nonviolent with all the kids at Stroller Strides. Apparently one incident involved him taking a ball from a girl to give to another girl who'd said that she wanted it. The girl who had the ball initially took it back and Ethan shoved her. Chivalrous and mean at the same time.

The other wacky thing is how Ethan has started asking very philosophical questions about God lately. Questions include: Does God have a body? Did he lose it? Where is God? Did God make it so Oma & Opa live far away? Before I was born, was I with God?

Pretty weighty stuff.

Vegetables! Yummmmmm.

Anneliese has graduated from rice cereal with formula to fruits and vegetables. Liz is trying home-made stuff to save money, using the Cuisinart to mush sweet potatoes, peas, bananas, green beans, and even cauliflower. She freezes them in ice cube trays and then we just microwave a cube or two for 20 seconds. So far everything's been a hit though green beans get the most grimaces.

Halloween!

Well, after eleven months of Ethan wanting to be a triggerfish, his dream came true. It all started when he received a nature magazine that had a green triggerfish and for whatever reason he fell in love with it over all the other fish. He wanted to be a triggerfish in the Christmas pageant but we told him that there was no triggerfish in the manger scene. As the months went by he never wavered so Liz had to come up with a plan.

She got a pattern off the internet and asked Ethan what kind of triggerfish he wanted to be. As luck would have it, he wanted to be a clown triggerfish which of course doubled the amount of work we had to do because of it's complexity (that'll teach us to ask). Liz bought black fabric, batting, paint, etc. It took many nights of Liz sewing and me painting and finished the night before Halloween. Liz made a mermaid costume for Anneliese even though Ethan wanted her to be a pink cat.

Click here or the photo to go to the October photo album to see more Halloween pictures!