Christmas!!

We were super excited to spend our first Christmas as a family. We had kind of a late night on Christmas Eve...we drove around to look at Christmas lights and then came home and had to bake some Monster Cookies for Santa. Thankfully, Ethan is still a little young to get up extra early because he is so excited for Christmas, so we got to sleep in a little.

Elephant p.j.s from Aunt Kelly, Uncle Justin and Anderson!

He loved opening presents, especially the books he received from both grandparents! He was actually more impressed with the gift wrap and liked crinkling it and trying to taste it.

Just relaxin' and watching a Christmas flick!!

He did enjoy the items that were in those packages once the unwrapping fun was over. His Grandma Bernard sent this elephant toy for him and once we introduced him to it he was not without it for the rest of the day! It's still one of his favorite toys right now! Even while watching a Christmas movie with his dad and me, he didn't let go of it!

Well, minus the drool it could have been a cute pic in front of our little Christmas forest! As you can see, he was still learning to hold up his big head, but he was getting so much better!!! We loved having Ethan as a part of our family this Christmas and look forward to many more fun memories!

Ethan's Fourth and Fifth month

My how time flies! I have been terrible at keeping up with the events during the holiday season! I have devoted myself to catching up, so here are some of the milestones Ethan has reached in the last couple of months:

We introduced Ethan to solid food right after he turned 5 months old. He has been pretty interested in anything that we happen to be holding, but he was especially interested in this bowl of food!

Getting ready for the first bite of solid food...

Not so sure about this new food...
After a few bites, he wanted to take over!

We did have some issues with the new texture...

and swallowing...
But in the end he was a happy boy! I bet he'll be really happy once he gets to start eating some foods with some flavor!

We took Ethan to the playground at our apartment complex to introduce him to the swing. I wasn't sure how he would like it considering that he hates his swing at home. But we were pleasantly surprised that he LOVED it and was cracking up most of the time!

As you know, tummy-time has been a dreaded event for Ethan from the beginning...we are finally making progress and he actually enjoys tummy-time now, especially since he can roll over to escape it now! We can't put him on his tummy without him rolling over within 5 seconds!

Five months old already!!! We can't believe how fast he's growing up!

Trip to Washington--Part 2

So, here we are for the second part of our trip home to visit our family. We were so excited when it started snowing while we were at church on Sunday! After church and a really nice family dinner with the Bernard family, we went to go see my family. We wanted to make sure to get some pictures in the snow since it was Ethan's first time seeing it. I have to say, he wasn't all that interested. I think he was just in climate shock!!

My parents with Ethan

He loved his new playmat that he got for Christmas.

Grandpa Walker lovin' on his grandson!
We took Ethan to see his Grandpa Bernard's grave while we were there visiting. Here are the Bernard boys!
Some of the Bernard family: Tristan, Ethan, Annette, Kelsey, and Desiree

We took the opportunity to take some family pictures while we were at the cemetery.

It was pretty cold out there!!
Here Ethan is, all bundled up with his Grandma Bernard!

This is a water feature at the cemetery which had completely frozen over. It was so neat to see it in solid ice!

We went down to the water front to check out the scenery. As you can tell, my body is not used to temperatures this cold any more!
We were so glad to take Ethan to meet his Uncle Kelsey, who just returned from his two-year mission in Argentina before he returned to college in January. After two years apart, these guys had a lot of lost goofing-off time to make up for!
Ethan loved getting to spend some time with all of his grandparents! We took a moment to get a picture of him with Grandma and Grandpa Walker in front of their Christmas tree. It was so wonderful to get to see our families so close to Christmas!

Trip to Washington--Part 1

This month we took Ethan on his first vacation and plane ride!! We went to Washington to visit both of our families for about 5 days. It was a short trip, and as always, not enough time to see everyone we wanted to see, but it was a great trip. There are so many pictures that I'm going to have to post it a little at a time. I was a little nervous about how he would handle the trip (and how I would!) Here we are, hanging out before take off.

By the time we took off, Ethan was already having a ball.
Sorry, a little blurry, but this epitomizes how he did. He was awesome. I know that everyone around us just dreaded us sitting next to them because they didn't know if he was going to scream the whole time. But by the time we landed they were all amazed at how great he did. Looks like we have a traveler on our hands (thank goodness!).

My mom got us this sling-type thing from the Sky Mall magazine on her way down to see us. The good news is it was SOOOO handy. He was satisfied and strapped in and we were much more comfortable. The bad news is, he is already a little too big for it. The next trip we will have to figure something else out!

We bundled Ethan up for his first jaunt out in the cold winter air...when we got where we were going we found him like this in the back seat, asleep. We felt kind of bad, but mostly just thought it was funny!
Grandma and Grandpa Walker got Ethan a new play mat for Christmas and let him try it out while we were there visiting. Tristan decided he better check it out with Ethan to see what it was all about.
He LOVED this giraffe attachment that came with it.
Exploring what his new friends can do!

On Saturday night we met up with our friends Rich and Allisha and their little boy, Skyler to go to the Zoolights event at Point Defiance Zoo. This picture cracks me up because this is the first time that Skyler got to meet Ethan...here Ethan is, screaming because he just got out of the nice, warm car where he was sleeping and Skyler is just looking at him like, "What's your problem?!" Hilarious!

So to make a long story short, we had to ride a shuttle from the parking lot to the zoo...actually we CHOSE to ride it and it was a bad choice--enough said. Here we are making the best of it!!

Rich, Allisha and Skyler

Poor Ethan was so bundled that he reminded me of Ralphie's little brother in that movie, A Christmas Story...you know, his arms stuck straight out to the side and he couldn't put them down. Well, since Ethan already had a cold, we didn't want him to get sicker...needless to say, he never got cold to the touch on any part of his body. Poor kid!

Had to get a picture in front of the elephants!

Group picture!

Where this desert scene was they were offering camel rides...at the risk of sounding too crazy, I kind of felt sad for the poor camels. There they were in the FREEZING cold (keep in mind they're desert animals) in the middle of the night walking the same loop over and over again. I just kept picturing exhausted camels with colds the next day...poor camels.

Family shot!

Mt. Ranier in Christmas lights!

This is a view of the mountain and the bridges...you'll notice the white lights on one side and the red on the other--head lights and tail lights. You can't really tell here, but there are blue lights underneath for the water.
One of our favorite things is the "pink tree". We stopped to get some couple shots in front of the awesome pink lights.

Ethan didn't get a break from his exercised while we were visiting our families (much to his dismay!). But he is definitely getting better at tummy-time!

I don't know what it is, but for the last few years Louisiana has gotten snow before Washington did! This year we just got a small sampling and Ethan was sleeping. I didn't dare wake up a baby with a cold for pictures in the snow, so I was a little disappointed. Luckily for us, it snowed while we were up in Washington! More pics to come!