Someone is two...

Ethan and Kari at the park
Ethan with his 'speedo' style suit on. Kari says its cute... I'm just thankful its too big.

Ethan and me at the park

Ethan going down the big boy slide by himself

Ethan enjoying the swing

Ethan and Kari on the swing

Reason #23 that Ethan should not be in the bathroom when Kari is getting ready.

Ethan goofing around in the tub

Opening a present(I decided that labeling with his name was ridiculous)

Eating cake.

The cake: GOOD. The frosting: BAD

There was a big day this week… someone named Ethan Robert… also known as the following:

• Booger
• DaBoogs
• MisterMister
• E-Rob
• Buddykins
• EthanEthanEthan(When he’s doing something wrong and you’re trying to stop him and he’s not listening)
• EefinRobert

Anyway… that person officially turned 2 this week! Yaayyy. On to the worst behaved years of his pre-teen life. If he’s anything like his mom anyway. Me on the other hand… angel from birth to this very day. Night in jail not withstanding…

Anyway… his birthday was Tuesday and prior to getting home from work it was a pretty normal day. After we got home from work Kari made chicken tacos for us and Chris and Sam. Ethan had his usual corn flakes and whatever else he requests and his mind wanders. While Kari was cooking I decided to take Ethan for a walk to kill time and try and take my mind off the fact I was starving and wasn’t going to be eating for a while. It was then that I realized I wear hats too much… now whenever we leave the first thing Ethan does, even before he gets his shoes now, is run and grab a hat for me. Its very thoughtful of him. J Anyway, we went for a walk around the harbor and shortly after we got back Sam and Chris got there and we had dinner. Ethan had some chips and a bowl of cheese. Actually, several bowls. Anytime someone grabbed the cheese bag Ethan would ask for more even if he still had some in his bowl. After dinner we opened some presents… 2 out of the 3 Ethan had already played with and after he opened him he kind of looked at them like… ehhh. Seen it. He wasn’t quite as OCD with the paper as he has been in the past. Apparently being around Jim brings out the best in him… J Anyway, we got him some beach toys and a new book. Though by the looks of it Sam was more excited about the beach toys than Ethan was. Apparently she’s itching to build a sand castle that Ethan will most certainly stomp. After presents we had some cake. There is a little shop down the street called BabyCakes and they make mini cupcakes and apparently giant cupcakes as well. We got one of the giant cupcakes. After a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday, minus the Louis family second verse, Ethan and Kari blew out the candles. The cake itself was really good… the frosting not much. It had a weird texture, was chewy and tasted kind of like play-doh. Yes, I know what play-doh tastes like. After that we hung out for a while before Ethan headed off to bed.

On to the rest of the week… Sunday was a pretty relaxed day. Nothing exciting to report. We went the grocery store in the morning, played in the pool in the afternoon and went to the park that night. The park was PACKED though. And one little kid kept trying to go up the slide while everyone else was going down and his mom did nothing to stop him. Nice work, lady. I’m not sure who I wanted to drop kick more… the kid or her. Anyway, Ethan spent some time on the slides, swings and playing in the sand. He also spent a lot of time just observing other kids play. He seems to do that quite a bit. As we were leaving he ran some hot laps in the grass to wear himself out. At one point I was trying to corral him and he was inside a roped off area and every time I’d get close to him he’d run to another side of it and laugh. Ha… ha Ethan. Then one time he remembered to laugh and forgot to look where he was going and clothes lined himself with the rope. HA! That was God punishing him for being naughty…

Monday was another really good day for him at daycare. They said he talked a bunch and was really starting to open up. So, that’s good. It makes it easier to leave him there when you know he’s not miserable. If only my parents had done the same when I was in day care… all that time I spent standing at the fence staring at our house thinking if I could just climb the fence I could run home and wait for mom and dad there. Sigh… Ha ha! Anyway… that night we went for a walk. I tried to fake an injury cause I was tired form being up late the night before watching the Nadal/Federer tennis match. Ethan was having none of it and did everything he could to pull me off the couch. I ask for so little…

Tuesday you know about so I have nothing further to add.

Wednesday was Ethan’s US birthday… I think that gives him almost as many birthday celebrations as Ellen gets each year. That day when I picked him up from daycare the lady told me he had been a ‘chatterbox’ all day long. Yeah… welcome to our world lady. He’s getting really good at putting sentences together now. They’re really basic, but they’re coming along. He’s a lot more understandable and he’s understanding almost everything we tell him now. That doesn’t mean he listens… but I know he understands. That day on my way home from work I saw three Yankees hats. Ridiculous. Apparently the ‘Yankee-Lemming Effect’ is world wide. Today I saw a t-shirt… what is wrong with these people?

Today was another normal day. Another great day at daycare… she said he laughed a ton.. and not just giggles but full out belly laughs. I’m pretty confident he’s made the adjustment at this point. As long as he and his homie Koala are side by side he’s golden. Though, Koala was inadvertently left at home yesterday and he did fine then as well. Tonight Kari went for drinks with some co-workers…. In fact she’s still there. Lush. Anyway, Ethan and I hung out in the pool and then did a lot of reading and sticker books with a little SpongeBob mixed in there.

More car stuff… feel free to skip. Yesterday in the Circular Quay(lots of bus, ferry and train stops near our office) there was a company displaying cars where you pay a yearly fee and can drive the cars. Unreal. There was a Lamborghini, Ferrari, AMG Mercedes, Porsche GT3, Bentley and Maserati. I went down to visit and decided the Porsche was the one I wanted. Kari wanted the Bentley... yawn. Last night, as I was in the cab to my first rugby practice, we drove by the Bentley, Maserati and Ferrari dealerships. The cabby was lucky he had my window down or he would have been cleaning my hand and face prints off the glass after I got out.

This week we started giving Ethan his daily vitamin that comes in a chewable form. He LOVES them. He thinks they are candy and asks for them several times a day. He’s very disappointed when we don’t follow through… but he will usually settle for a cookie. He’s too young to understand that if he eats the entire bottle, like Nick and I did, you have to go to the hospital in the middle of the night and have your stomachs pumped. Someday he’ll understand.

I had my first rugby practice last night and I’m surprisingly not that sore. I really wanted to try that while I was here and one of my new co-workers plays on a club team so he invited me along. I suck, but it was a lot of fun and all the guys were really nice. Every thing moved really fast for me and I don’t fully understand all the rules yet but hopefully that will come.

Lately, the phrase uttered most by Ethan is ‘Me go buh-bye’. It’s an all day/every day thing. He loves going on the walks and being outside… which is great. You just don’t need to say every 30 seconds. Sometimes he gets on a kick and says it over and over and over again. Take it easy Rainman. That reminds me of my new favorite website. He’s a sample… it’s a little crude(quite a bit of swearing), and a lot of the conversations are, but sometimes I’m in tears from laughing so hard.
http://www.overheardeverywhere.com/archives/004133.html

I recommend checking out the ‘Most Popular’. Classic.

Anyway… that’s enough for now. This weekend will probably be another day at the beach and Sunday there is a work bar-b-q. Its supposed to be oppressively hot. Yippee. Though I hear Des Moines is supposed to have a heat wave of its own… take yours x2 for our temps.

See ya.