My little man is not so little anymore!

Yesterday (March 9), Ethan finally got his first tooth! It's still a tiny dot, but it definitely is through his gum! Yay! It actually is bitter sweet since it took him so long to get a tooth. Now I can't see his gummy smile anymore :-( And I have to worry about cavities and brushing teeth and him chewing on things. But it is a big milestone and I sure am excited to see his growth! Jeff was in Chicago for a conference for his work yesterday, so we didn't get to celebrate it together. Good thing it didn't disappear over night :-)

This evening we were playing on the floor and Ethan suddenly started playing his trumpet! I had a little trumpet growing up so when he turned 6 months I ordered one from Japan. You just blow in it and it makes a noise (I've never seen one in the States). He always drooled in it or chewed on it, but tonight he suddenly started blowing in it and made noise! We quickly got our digital camera and took some videos. I don't know how to put a video on yet, so I'll post it once I figure that out.

But oh boy, he is growing! He loves standing up and just the other day he started pulling up on his knees, and grandma thinks she saw Ethan getting up to a sitting position from his tummy today, too. It is always all of a sudden he starts doing things. We still don't have his crib mattress at the lowest position yet, and I really am hoping that I don't find him falling over the crib one day... Now that he's starting to pull up on things, we'll need to lower the crib as low as possible this weekend!

Oh, another thing. We finally bought tickets to Japan! We are leaving on April 24 and come back on May 8. We are already scared of our travel (13 hr flights with him on our laps), but who knows, he may surprise us as he always does! We, along with Grandma Kiyomi, are all excited for our trip :-) We received his passport a few weeks ago in the mail, so we are as ready as we can be!

Spoke too early... or jinxed myself :-(

So... Ethan got his first ear infection today :-( Last night he was woke up a few times and went back to sleep on his own, so I thought maybe his teeth were hurting him. But this morning a little after 5:30 he was crying pretty loud so I decided to go check on him. When I picked him up to get him out of the crib, he felt pretty warm to me, so I took the temperature quick. Sure enough, he had his first fever! It was 102.3 under arm, which is pretty high. So we gave him a Tylenol and hoped that it would go down some so we could wait until the morning to call the doctor's office.

He finally went back to sleep around 7:30, and I called the doctor at 8:40. We couldn't get in until 1:30, and he was waking up on and off again, so I gave him some Motrin and kept him up for a while. I think he did some 30-45 minute cycles of waking up and falling asleep. And when he was awake he wasn't too happy most of the time. He ate ok though.

So at 1:30 we went in to the doctor's office, and of course she said that he had an ear infection! I was honestly surprised that he lasted this long without one though. I used to get them all the time when I was little. She prescribed him an antibiotic, so hopefully he's not allergic to that. So now we've been giving him Tylenol and Motrin staggered, and it seems like Motrin definitely works a lot better than Tylenol. His temp seems to be lower and he has gotten some of his spunk back. We'll see how tonight goes...

I'm definitely kicking myself for jinxing though!

When is Ethan's 9 months birthday?

So, February having only 28 days and Ethan's birthday being on 30th, we don't quite know when Ethan's 9 month birthday falls... Well, funny thing is that Jeff mentioned about it last week being some what concerned. So I reminded him that his birthday is on the 31st so he missed more monthly birthdays than Ethan would.

Olympics has been keeping me up a lot later than usual. It has been a lot of fun though! Sadly Japan did not get any gold medal, but I am proud of all their performances. I have to proudly point out the fact that many short track speed skaters and womens' figure skaters are Asians, even Americans :-) I was really looking forward to the womens' figure skates, and they sure didn't let me down! I knew Mao, Japanese silver medalist, was good, but I had never seen Kim, Korean gold medalist, so it was great that I could finally see her perform. She really was the best! I was sad that Mao didn't win gold, but Kim sure was awesome. And the American skater, Mirai Nagasu, was such a cutie and I am looking forward to see her grow (she is only 16).

Ethan still has no teeth, but doing really well. He had his 9 month check up last Monday, and he still is a small guy but very healthy. I have to say that we are quite happy that our household hasn't had any major sickness yet. He has had a few runny noses but never had real cold or ear infections. It helps when he only goes to Grandma's for a daycare.

Ethan experienced his first day care visit last Thursday. Mel and Lorna are in Florida until this Wednesday, so Ethan goes to Audrey Oosland's, a friend from our church. It sounds like he did great. I was excited to hear that he interacted with other kids well and still stuck with his routine.

My work has gotten busier, and now I am really feeling that I made a right choice by going part time. My hours are capped around 45 hours a week (it's been more like 46-47, but I also didn't have 45 hours a week in January for a few weeks). I still love what I do, and every year I get more responsibilities and I really enjoy the feeling that they are "my clients".

Lately his favorite thing to do is standing up and drinking milk on his belly. He can't quite pull up to stand on his own yet, but we'll see how long that lasts. He can pull up to his knees already, so it shouldn't be too long before he gets up by himself. Him drinking milk while he is on his belly is a little tricky because then he doesn't get much milk. He gets 2 sippy cups a day now, so he loves drinking sitting up also. He also started army crawling backwards occasionally. He still doesn't like being on his belly too much, but I think he enjoys being able to look around better when he is doing it. So he is rolly-polly most of the time.

I am attaching a few pictures from the past 2 weeks. We just got a new camera (Canon S90) so we have been taking a lot more pictures now!

Happy Valentine's!

My work has picked up some as it is mid February. Only 2 more months to go! Since Ethan was born, I became part time at work, so even during the busy season I work 45 hours a week. So far it has been manageable. I take Mondays off, work 7 am - 6pm for four days, and work 5-6 hours on Saturday. I sometimes bring work home so I can put an hour or two on Monday, so I can leave before 6pm a few times a week. It is nice that I could go part time as some work would not give the flexibility. I do feel like I don't get enough time with Ethan Tuesday to Friday, but now I make sure to have some quality time when I am home instead.

For Valentine's, Paul and Anita kindly watched Ethan in the evening on Saturday so Jeff and I could go watch a movie and out for a dinner... except the movie was sold out! I wanted to watch the Valentine's Day, but I guess so did every other ladies in town. So we decided to go out for a nice dinner instead. We walked in to Kelly Jae's, a Tapas restaurant in downtown, and it looked pretty empty as it was only a few minutes passed 5. But apparently they were all full with reservations and the earliest we could get in was at 7:45. We said no thank you and walked over to Il Forno, a pizza place. I think their pizza is the best one in the world, so even though it was not as romantic as I hoped, it worked out fine. Then we went to Target, Meijer and Wal-Mart, and went back to pick Ethan up. It was nice to be able to walk around the store without a child trying to reach for something, or run into stores without carrying a huge baby carrier. Oh, I forgot to mention that Jeff sent me flowers at work on Thursday, too! I don't know exactly what they are, but I think they are some kind of lilies.

Ethan just last week started to reach for things farther and put one foot behind him. So it looks like he's trying to go on his four but his arms aren't the strongest so he ends up on his face. But it is exciting to see him trying, finally! He continues to hate being on his tumy, but at least now he rolls over onto his tummy for a second or two. He still doesn't have his teeth yet though. A few weeks ago he kind of stopped drooling for a week or two, but now his drool is back again. We bought a few more bibs last night in hope of the drooling to stop just in time for some new bibs. (You know, kind of like not raining if you have an umbrella...)

So, no medals yet for Japan... hoping for one for the women's figure skate!

Spontaneous & Gravity

It's a new year, and I'm going to do something new. Since this is my blog, along with Mariko, here's my first blog post.

My how time flies. I can't believe it's February already. We had a great time with Kiyomi here over New Year's. It was great to see that Ethan could spend time with another Grandma. It's also good for him to hear Japanese, since I don't speak very well. While she was here, she and Mariko did some shopping, and we ate lots of good Japanese food.

Last weekend, before church Mariko asked me "Do you want to go to Chicago today? Take some time to think about it, I know you're not a fan of spontaneous events." Well, Ethan and I were already dressed for church, and it would mean missing the Colt's game, but I Chicago sounded fun, and I didn't think there'd be a better time, so off we went. It didn't take much to convince me.

In Chicago, we did our usual. A stop at Ikea, and load up on Japanese groceries at Mitsuwa. However, this was the first time that we had Ethan along for a day trip. What can I say, the little guy's amazing! He slept nearly all the way to Ikea, then ate his lunch with us in the food court. He even enjoyed riding around in the shopping cart, and just looked around at all the sights and sounds.

His other achievement this month is discovering gravity. Unfortunately, this means if we give him toys in his high chair, in know time they're on the floor, with him leaning over looking at them. This is fine when we're at home, but in public the floor isn't the best place for his toys. So we pick them up, wipe them off, and down they go again. It's quite a fun game!

Merry Christmas!

It was a lot of fun celebrating Christmas with Ethan this year! He continues to amaze us by being such a great baby. On Christmas Eve, we got together with Mel and Lorna and had a Christmas dinner. He was great there, and enjoyed the activity table/walker he got from his Grandpa and Grandma. Then we went to Bert and Regina's to have a Christmas fondue dinner with my host family. He got to meet Byard, Judy, Jeremy and Jonathan who came from PA, and also Adrienne who flew in from Seattle for the first time. Fondue always take quite a while to eat, but Ethan sat in a high chair and played with his toys, occasionally smiling at everyone.

Christmas morning we opened gifts with Ethan, had him take a nap, and went to Paul and Anita's for lunch for a Christmas dinner. Again he did amazing there and even let us stay until 10:30 to finish watching a movie (he fell asleep around 7:30 and stayed asleep until we woke him up). He was as happy as he could be most of the day.

It was great being able to see family from distance, and this coming Tuesday my mom is coming for 10 days! My mom hasn't seen him since early June, so it will be great to have her here (not to mention I'll have a built-in baby sitter!). I am sure she'll enjoy seeing him again.

Coldest day of Ethan's life!

Today was so bitter cold outside that I felt very fortunate to stay at home with Ethan all day. Usually I work on Thursdays but this week I had a meeting on Monday so I worked Monday to Wednesday instead. Yay for a 5 day weekend!

So lots happened in the past few weeks. We went to New York for Thanksgiving, Ethan turned 6 months old, I had a scrapbooking retreat last weekend, and Ethan suddenly started sitting up tonight! He has been very close for a while, but he seemed not too interested in it. I asked the doctor at his 6 months check up, and we both decided that Ethan was just too content to try something new. He is always happy and smily, and it's been a lot of fun hanging out with him. But I did want him to try sitting up or roll over more often, so this afternoon I decided to put him on a sitting up position and put a ring stacking toy in front of him, hoping that he would at least prop against the toy. He not only sat up by himself, but tried to balance when he was half falling off! I guess something clicked and he got a hang of it. He was sitting up on my lap for the past few weeks, but never did it on the floor. So it was great to see him sitting up and playing. But he likes standing up or jumping in the jumperoo a lot better, so it may take a while until it gets more stable.