It's Ethan time!!

Ethan has been doing some funny things lately so I'd thought I'd post them so I could remember them in the future. Two weeks ago I was in Moses Lake helping out with sports photos and my aunt Angie babysat the kids for me. It was Ali's birthday and we had gotten tons of pictures of her, but Ethan wouldn't look at the camera for the world. So I was shocked when I came home and Angie showed me this cute picture that he posed for for her. She took it with her iPhone. She told him to say "cheese" and he did and held it for her!! Isn't he just a cutie? And yes you can see little Ali in the background clutching her bear.
* While I was there one night I was taking Ethan to bed and told him to tell my parents "love you" and he totally said it. Of course it sounded a lot like "wub you", but hey it's a start!! I was so excited I kept making him say it over and over. Than I realized I probably shouldn't or else he'll get burned out from it and not want to say it for me much more.

* That following week I had set my alarm for 5AM so I could get up and do some work on the computer before the kids woke up. Well my alarm went off and immediately Ethan's eyes came open so I just laid there and tried to pretend like I went back to bed. Well I was peeking a little and he started to pull the covers over his face a little and then he popped out and said "BOO". It was too cute I couldn't stop laughing. I mean at 5AM there isn't anything like your little kid being hilarious when you're dead exhausted. Roger rolled over and said "honey it's early and I need sleep". Since I couldn't stop laughing Ethan said, "boo" and few more times pulling the blanket up and down each time and then I quickly got him back to sleep.

* He has been saying a lot more words. Some of my family members said it was normal for one of their boys to not talk until they were closer to three so I was beginning to accept it until my dad got his new job and he does a lot of well child checks and said Ethan should be saying atleast 30 words by now. Well he attempts 30 words but can't quite finish the ends of all words. The past couple weeks however he has been trying to say almost everything!! I love it!! And I've been trying to teach him colors so he's been saying those as well. I love when he says "lellow" for yellow. It's so cute!!

* Ethan has been so attached to me. You would think that I leave him all the time or something, but no I'm with him too much perhaps!! I don't think we'll ever be able to leave him alone in nursery. It's really hard because Roger and I really want to be able to stay in class and listen, but either one of us is either in there with Ethan or out in the hall with our on-the-go Ali.

* He loves the movie Wall-E now. It's so cute because he says Wall-E all robotic like Wall-E says it in the movie. We didn't know he knew how to do it until we were in Costco one day and walked by a TV that was playing it and he said it and Roger and I just busted up laughing. I guess my cousin Karissa taught him how to say it that way. Too funny.

* For some reason he's been fighting bath time the last couples weeks. He used to love it before so I'm not sure what his deal is. I almost wonder if it's because Ali hogs the faucet the whole time and that's where he used to play.

* He hit mom's nose with the hamper the other night and she has a bruise from it. I feel so bad for her. He's crazy though!! Such a boy! He also likes to call her "mom" for some reason!!

* He hates when things get on his hands such as food, play dough, etc that don't come off just by clapping them together so he's constantly holding his hands out sayings "hands" so I can wipe them for him.

I love this crazy little guy...and I can't get enough of him...I think I need another boy....:)

New Photography Site...

My mom and I have been working on getting up her new website...and we finally finished...well almost..I still have to add a part in about Mar Edits and Designs, but we are up and running for Julie Waites Photography and that is what matters the most. You can check it out at juliewaitesphotography.com My mom is an amazing photographer and if you know of anyone in the area that needs some done please don't be afraid to shout out her name!!!

*If you are having problems loading the website either there is an ActiveX download bar in yellow at the top of the page you need to allow or you need to download the flash player, but other than that the website should work on your computer. It might take a second to load because there are a lot of pictures on there for the computer to read.

Aliana's Birthday Party

Sunday we celebrated Ali's birthday. My parents, my grandparents, and my sister came up from Moses Lake. I made chicken enchiladas for lunch and might I add that they turned out delicious!! Aliana opened presents first. We had to wake her up from her nap so her hair is a little crazy in these pictures but she was so excited!!
Ethan couldn't help but help!!

My mom got her a couple dresses and she was so excited!!

She also got her a Belle doll.

She's getting so big!

This was her first reaction when she saw the cake!

My mom ordered a German chocolate cake and a little cake for Ali at Griffin's Bakery in Moses Lake. As you can see Ethan got to it and poked at the bottom layer and the frosting started to melt so the flowers were sliding down, but it still tasted good!

She's interested in that candle. We let Ethan blow it out for her.

At first she wasn't too sure about just diving in.....

And then she was looking around to see if everyone was watching...

And dove in...of course Ethan was upset it wasn't his so we had to let him get up and help!

That green frosting was everywhere!!

I told Ethan to say "cheese" and got this!!

But then I caught this as well!!

Wow look at that face full of cake!

Both of them stuffing their faces at the same time!

What E?

Sneaky Sneaky...trying to take it when she's not looking..

Can you tell that the men are watching the football game in the background? For some reason they weren't into watching Ali and Ethan demolish the cake!! Grandma and Poppy gave her some money to get a gift and we're still looking forward to getting her something...I was thinking about some more 14 kt. gold earrings...one fell out and we can't find it anywhere!!

Sorry if this was a picture overload but it was so hard for me to narrow it down from all the others I had!! These two make me smile all day...well almost all day! :)

He got accepted!!

Man I'm so happy there was a good outcome!! Yesterday after Roger's interview he wasn't feeling good about it at all because as soon as they asked if he was going to school as well as trying to take this course he said it's like the interview went in a completely different direction. She started telling him he should look into other places to take the course because it was really hard to go to school and do the course because of the time changes once they switch to their clinical work schedule and that he would need to be completely committed and that others in the past have tried it and it hasn't worked. So he came out totally bummed and thought for sure he didn't get in. (One secret I do know about my husband is that he always predicts the worst so then if it comes out bad it's not as bad to deal with, but outcomes almost always come out in his favor. Especially lately!!) We celebrated anyways and went to Olive Garden cause we figured maybe it just wasn't meant to be and dang it's been a long time since we went out!!

Well today about 3:45PM he gets a call and they say, "We're really excited for you, because you got in to the Phlebotomy course!!" Man was he so relieved!! I told him it was just an answer to my prayers!! So Monday he has to go fill out some more paper work for financial aid and he'll start the course on February 16th!! Wahooooo!!! Good Job BABE!!

Roger has an interview...

This fall we found out about the Phlebotomy course you can take through one of the community colleges here in Spokane so we checked into it for Roger so that he could have a good opportunity working in the medical field before he applies to PA school after this year. It is only offered twice a year and they have anywhere from 75-100 people sign up for the orientation. From those people they only have spots for 20 so he went to the orientation two weeks ago and today he got a call from them telling him he has an interview tomorrow to see if he gets in. While he was at the orientation they had him fill out an application and it asked him a lot of questions about himself and how he has come to be a hard worker. He said he wrote down the most important things he has learned from working at many different places and while serving his mission in Texas. He feels that what he wrote is what got him an interview, because he thought that a lot of people asked random weird questions not even pertaining to the course while at the orientation so it didn't seem like they were all too interested in what the course had in store for them. This week has been a good one for him and I'm hoping he gets accepted. If he gets in he will start the course the second full week of February and the first four weeks are intense with 4 hour classes M-Th from 5-9pm. On top of this course he is taking a full load with two government classes for his major and the second quarter of A&P. He is an extremely hard worker and puts a lot of work into providing for this family. I'm so proud of him....I love you Rog. Keep up the hard work!!

Basketball Pictures

Last week my mom and I did the boys basketball and girls basketball for Moses Lake High School. Kaitlin is on the girls varsity team and so we took the kids with us in the stroller since we didn't have a sitter. They did so good for all of the girls' teams except for the varsity which worked out fine because the girls loved the kids. Ali walked over to Kaitlin while she was getting her individual take and my mom capture this. Doesn't Ali look so small compared to Kait? That's my little girl!!

Happy Birthday...

to Aliana!! Yes she is a year old and I am having a hard time believing it. This year has gone by too fast. The following still images were taken today by my mom in five minutes while I worked on our new website that will soon be completed so stay tuned. We wanted to capture her on her special day and I finally figured out that she can have back side pigtails. I have done them in the front and even a little braid, but never in the back. She looks so grown up. I can't believe my BABY is one!!! You can tell by these pictures that she is one busy girl. She went from the living room to the window, from the window to the stairs, from the stairs to the couch, from the couch to the window again, and then to play with blaze. I love her beautiful smile!!!

Sorry that the video quality is so low. If you want to see the high quality version you can go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLSWmBwYpT4&feature=channel_page and underneath the video click on watch in high quality. Some of the pictures cut off on the side too, but I can't change it...

My Ham

Aliana is my ham!! Oh my heck she smiles all the time...The funniest was when I wanted to take these pictures because she hasn't done this before, but as soon as she noticed I was taking pictures of her she smiled. The first picture below is when she started to realize I was taking a picture and then the next two were what followed. She loves the camera now and I'm lucky, because Ethan is not liking it anymore!! He refuses to look in my direction if he knows I'm holding it.
Cheesy!!!

Ali has been getting into more now that she walks everywhere. And she climbs up anything. She climbed up her crib rails tonight and into Ethan's toddler bed and she will just somersault to get out. It's too funny. I didn't know she could get down from the couch either but she turned right around and slid off. It amazes me at how once these little babies reach a certain age they just go and go!! And they get so determined to do something and they'll finally accomplish it. Over the Christmas break she started really walking just about everywhere and now she's really trying to run because her brother just attacks her all the time so she grabs things and takes off as fast as she can so he can't get her. I love seeing her in a dress at church now because you can actually see it when she walks around and she hated getting all caught up in it when she would crawl. It drove her crazy!! Sunday at church while she was walking around she kept holding her dress up like she was about to curtsy.

Whenever I catch her in something or if she sees me coming (because sometimes I don't realize she's even done anything wrong) and she's getting into something it's like she knows she's going to be in trouble so she babbles and whines at me like, "please mom I'm really not trying to be bad" and than she'll proceed to move away, but as soon as I turn my back she's back into it and just waiting for my return. She gets into way more stuff than Ethan did and he always adds to her mischief. I just caught her getting into the plastic forks and the dish towel drawers. She knew she was caught too!! Earlier she got into Ethan's drawers and pulled out all of his clothes.

Two days ago I was telling Ethan to give me a kiss and he ignored me, but Aliana walked right over to me and kissed me. It was so dang cute! She started giving kisses when we would say "muah" but now kisses when asked for a kiss or beso.

When she walks around she makes this "zzz" sound. It's so cute!! She also holds out her pointing finger like she's pointing at something. Her first word was last week (besides "mama" and "dada") was "car". If she didn't have an older brother obsessed with cars who knows what it would've been. It's so funny because she'll steal the cars from Ethan and book it so he can't get them from her.

My little ham is so fun and cute. She is such a bright little girl already and I can't wait to see the new things she is going to do this next month!! Her birthday is Thursday! Wow I can't believe she'll be a year!!

My Cuddle Bug

Ethan is definitely my cuddle bug. I have been in Moses Lake for the last three weeks and wishing I could get home to help get my son used to his own bed and room. (Spokane and Cheney have been getting really bad snow storms for those of you who haven't heard so my husband pretty forbid me from coming back for a while until it was cleared up more and now I know why. Our apartment complex's parking lot has piles of snow ten feet tall from them attempting to clear some out and our neon is covered in three feet of snow.) Since we were all previously in one room he would go to bed in his own bed but wake up in the middle of the night crying and I think part of it was because we were in there and he knew it. He would always end up in bed with us. He loves to cuddle and grab hold of my hair when he's tired. This has been going on since he was born and is really starting to annoy me just because he does it at weird times. For instance, while we're watching a movie he'll just stand up on the couch next to me and put his hand in my hair and turn it around his fingers. He is so cute though that I tolerate it for a while but eventually tell him to stop and sit still.

Well last night I got him all ready for bed and read him a book a couple times and turned off the light. He whined a little but soon fell asleep. Instead of putting his hand in my hair which he kept trying to do but just couldn't quite reach it he decided to hold my hand and if he let go to cover himself more with the blanket he would immediately say, "hand" so that I would give him my hand back to hold. While I was doing this Roger came home from work and a friend stopped by so when I slid out of the room he heard them talking and immediately woke up. So Roger said he would help get him back to sleep. One of our New Year's Resolutions was to read scriptures and pray together as a family. I know that this might not work with all of us because Ali goes to bed usually before Roger gets home, but we will try our best. I read a couple of scriptures to Ethan and then we went back to his room again and Roger and I knelt by his bed. He wasn't too sure about that and stayed on his couch. I told him to fold his arms and close his eyes so we could pray. He did so and I started the prayer. Halfway through the prayer he decided he wanted to be by us so he came and knelt down right next to Roger. It was so dang cute. After the prayer we put him back in bed and this time it wasn't just my hand he had to hold it was both of ours. You probably can't imagine this but Roger and I were both cuddled together as close as we could to the bed just so he could hold our hands. This time he fell asleep even faster. I think it was because he had already done it so it wasn't a big deal. I was so proud of him because he didn't cry or throw a fit he just layed there. It was so awesome to have him in his own room and bed. Now I do have to admit that at about 5 AM he ended up back in our bed because he woke up crying, but went calmly back to sleep. Roger and I atleast got to sleep together for a little bit well not really because Ali woke up soon after we went to bed and would not go back to sleep!! Atleast we're working on it!!

I love these two kids and although I'm extremely exhausted at the end of the day I smile when I see their faces! I am so thankful that there is a plan for all of us and having children is part of that plan because without these kids I wouldn't be as happy. They really make me who I am!