Moving to a Big Boy Bed

When your child starts doing this:

You know it's time to move to a toddler bed. Ethan started climbing out of his crib when we moved here in June. But once his crib from Louisiana got here it stopped being an issue and even though he could climb out he didn't all that often. Well in January it started becoming a regular thing again and since we have been talking about it for a long time we just decided to take the plunge!

This is Ethan's last morning waking up in a crib. As you can see, he's really happy about it. When he's mad he purposely hits his head on his crib (I guess he didn't realize that even when you do it on purpose it still hurts!). I can't remember what he was mad about...he's 2 1/2, he's mad all the time! ;)
That night he and Tristan got to work, converting his crib into a toddler bed. Ethan even got his drill out to help!
All snuggled up in his new bed!
The really funny thing was that in order to get out he kept climbing over the little guard rail instead of just climbing out the open part at the bottom. I guess old habits die hard!
Now, as excited as he was about his bed he was even more excited about sleeping on the floor. In fact, 8 out of 10 nights he asks to sleep on the floor! It's so funny. This is the scene we found after nap one day. I you are having a hard time finding him, his head is on the elephant blanket. I especially love how his left foot is up in the air!

Ethan has done really well transitioning to his new bed. He rarely comes out of his room once he's been put to bed and during nap time even if he doesn't fall asleep he doesn't come out. We are officially a one-crib household now!

While The Cat's Away...

So things can be pretty interesting (a.k.a. crazy) around here when Tristan is not around...When there is one of me and two boys who need attention, sometimes mayhem ensues! During the snow I had put all of our food into a cooler with snow to preserve it and the egg carton fell apart. So I moved the eggs into a tupperware container to store them. Well, for some reason Ethan was fascinated with the eggs and kept asking to play with them. One afternoon I came out from putting Carter down and saw that the refrigerator door was propped open with the mayo jar. At first I thought Ethan was just messing around in the fridge (as he often does) but I came around the corner to find this:

And, yes, he was driving his cars through the egg! Only a boy!!! I couldn't help but laugh and laugh.

If Tristan isn't here when I'm putting the boys down, I usually do our bedtime baths and clean up and leave Ethan to play quietly while I put Carter down. Then I read to Ethan and put him down. He's been really good not to disturb me while I'm doing this and can often be found lingering silently in the hallway or rolling on the floor waiting for me to read books to him.

Well, one night I walk out to find this:
In case your wondering, that's a pencil pouch mowhawk.
I especially love how you can see his real hair through the clear window! Where does this kid come up with these things?!

Sometimes hanging out at home all day leads to some cute cuddle time like this:

Ethan loves to lay in his bed or Carter's bed with Carter. Carter has even started enjoying it, too, and just laughs and laughs at Ethan as they lay by each other. These two are going to be such good buddies!

But most of the time, things look like this around here when Tristan isn't home:
Yup, that Hershey's chocolate syrup all over my floor. What you can't see is that he poured it in the kitchen sink as well...this day I didn't get up early enough to take a shower before he got up, so I left him watching cartoons while I jumped in real quick during one of Carter's cat naps. Yeah, not so sure that shower was worth it...

After all that playing, Ethan is worn out. Sometimes, I just can't get him down for a nap (he's growing out of them anyway)...but this day he fell asleep on the floor. Poor guy.
Needless to say, I'm always glad to have back up to help clean up these crazy boy's messes! We love our crazy boy, messes and all!

The Big Snow--January 2012

Sunday morning we awoke to SNOW!!! We still had church, but barely made it out of our parking lot since it's a steep hill to get out either entrance. On Monday Tristan and Ethan couldn't wait to get out and play! You can tell we just moved back from warm climate since all we had to play in the snow with were beach tools!!! Ethan scooping it up!

Building another snowman
Grandma Bernard, Aunt Tennille and Aunt Desiree brought over this awesome sled for us on Sunday night. Ethan kept calling it a "boat" and loved sitting in it (both inside the house and outside).
Later that day I decided to venture out with the boys and introduce Carter to the snow. He didn't really like the cold, so we were only out for about 15 minutes, but we tried!
Ethan talking to me all about the boat as we head to a small hill nearby.
Tristan pulling Ethan through the parking lot
WIPEOUT!!!
All smiles and ready to go again!
Heading up the hill
Tristan and Ethan
Beautiful scenery

Ethan making a run on his own
Eating the snow
Giving Ethan a snow angel tutorial
Ethan trying it out
Fun times!
Ethan loves the snow! I'm so glad he got to experience it with his dad here so he could do some playing while I took care of Carter.

The Big Snow--Snowing Double Digits

Tristan had to fly out Wednesday morning to head back to work. The same Wednesday morning that the 12+ inches of snow was supposed to come...I was NOT looking forward to driving an hour to the air port and 3 a.m. in the horrible, snowy conditions with two kids in the backseat. Thankfully, our friend, Rich, offered to take him. Tristan stayed the night with them on Tuesday and they headed out around 7 the next morning (his flight ended up getting delayed). It took them almost three hours to make the normally one-hour drive and they saw multiple cars off in the ditch on the way up. I'm so glad I didn't have to make that drive (especially since we couldn't even get our car out of the parking lot). This was the scene on Wednesday morning when I woke up.

Since Carter wasn't too much of a fan of the cold, I got Ethan in his gear and let him play on the porch. Thankfully, there was enough accumulated snow on our porch to keep him entertained for a little while.

Later that afternoon, we had the pleasure of a front-row seat to some "tractor" action! This little Bobcat kept coming through to clear the snow in our parking lot, which was fascinating to Ethan!
Since we were all cooped up, I took the opportunity to take some 4-month pictures of this little man. He turned 4 months old right in the middle of the crazy snow.
Cheerful and happy!
Carter it obsessed with his tongue right now. He is constantly playing with it!

We also took advantage of being stuck inside to do some tummy time practice.
By the end of the day on Wednesday quite a bit of snow had collected on everything!
By Thursday morning, not only was it snowy but also incredible icy as well. In fact, the snow had a thick layer of ice over the top of it. You can see on the carports how saturated and heavy the snow was. There were actually 4 (maybe 5) carports in our apartment complex that collapsed due to the weight.
Trying to get a picture of the ice (about 1/4 inch thick) on top of the snow.
It has been so long since Western Washington has seen snow like this. I was bummed that Tristan left right as the fun was starting. Being snowed in would have been so much more fun with him here. But I was grateful that he got out and down to Louisiana o.k. His flight was one of the last ones that got out that morning, so I'm thankful for his safety--and friends who helped us get him there!

The Big Snow--Coming Down Off the Mountain

Our power finally went out around 2:00 p.m. on Thursday afternoon. After debating about what I wanted to do, my parents finally decided to come up and get me and the boys so we could go stay with them. Their power was out also, but they have a generator and a gas water heater so we would have a way to be clean, warm and fed. It was nice to see some other adults after a 24 hrs. cooped up by myself!

There was a lot of damage to trees all over the place. This is the large magnolia in my parents' backyard. It lost 2 rather large branches.

Some of the snow accumulation at my parents' house
Ethan was being silly and found my Dad's reading glasses and decided to wear them. I thought he looked so funny!
My parents have 5 Japanese Cherry Blossom trees along the side of their house. They completely lost the one up front and lost half of two of the others.
The branches were completely encrusted in ice. It was pretty, but so damaging to the trees!
The Japanese Maple in their front yard lost a large branch.
Ethan and I shared a fold out bed and Carter had a pack and play to sleep in. Ethan kept climbing in to lay with Carter. It was really cute!
Friday my dad went out to try to do some damage control. The snow was done, we just had to wait for it to go away and power to come back on. Here he was trying to get some of the snow and ice off of the branches to prevent any further breakage.
Ethan went out to get some fresh air, too. The snow was ice on top but snow underneath so he kept punching through the top layer and falling. Then he couldn't get footing to stand back up again. I felt so bad for him. I think he looks like a sad little seal pup in this picture!

Papa to the rescue!

Carter and I just snuggled up inside. Carter has gotten really roll-y poll-y and likes to put EVERYTHING in his mouth.
My parents regained power in the middle of the night on Friday. We got power later in the day on Saturday. I was grateful to be more comfortable at my parents' house, but I was glad to get home and settle in again! It was quite an adventure and the snow stuck around for weeks afterward. I was glad when we could start getting around normally again and things returned to a normal pace again!