Carrots, Bowls and Computer Viruses...Oh My!

Life has become comical in the Strain household as of late. I haven't had a lot of free time to update this blog (in case you hadn't noticed!) or do much of anything besides take care of Ethan during the day and work until I crawl into bed at night, so this is my attempt at remembering everything that has been going on around here lately. I want to capture each moment, because I'm realizing just how quickly time is flying by and how grown up our little guy has already become. I found myself reading through some of what I wrote while I was pregnant, and I'm so glad that I have this "journal" to read through when I want to remember the details of this very special time in our lives.

Ethan has become quite demanding lately. He wants what he wants when he wants it, that's for sure! The best example of this is at feeding time. He loves to "help" feed himself, and I will let him hold the spoon for a few minutes (how else is he going to learn, right?) but a few days ago he decided that helping with the spoon just wasn't good enough and he wanted to hold his bowl too. Ummm, his bowl full of food. I kept it just out of his reach which did not go over well. He let out a wail! I compromised and got an empty bowl out of the cabinet and he was once again content. I had to repeat this at the following feeding, and when I went to put the extra bowl away following his meal he again wailed. I figured it wasn't hurting anything to let him carry around his extra bowl, and so for the past several days that bowl is always by his side. Some kids have a blankie, some have a pacifier, and mine? He has a plastic Gerber bowl. He carries it around, ensures that it is always in his line of sight, and notices when I try to take it away. Can a bowl count as his first friend? He has definitely formed a strong bond to it. He's borderline ridiculous, my child!

Speaking of friends, Ethan's girlfriend is in town visiting. Faith and Ethan were due on the exact same day, and Faith was born right on time (with Ethan following behind two days later.) It was sooo cute watching the two of them together this time. Faith is good at getting herself into the crawling position, and when she made the move to get up from her sitting position she ended up in Ethan's lap! Ethan proceeded to put his arm around her - it was priceless! I wish I had a picture from that angle to show just how cute the two of them were in that moment...I'll have to get copies of Nikki's pictures. They also managed to play a quick game of footsie. It's a good thing Faith's daddy didn't make the trip down this time, or Ethan might have gotten his first talking to from an overprotective father. In the pictures, you'll see that Ethan brought his bowl over to visit Faith (what is up with this bowl obsession?!?!?) They also swapped toys for a bit - Ethan played with Faith's butterfly rattle and she played with his crab rattle. There is nothing cuter than watching babies play together!

So on to "carrot-gate." I've written about Ethan's desire to become very involved in his feeding process...the other day I realized after I strapped him into his high chair that I hadn't grabbed a spoon for him yet. The bowl of carrots was on his tray where I thought it was out of reach. I turned to get the spoon for a split second, and when I looked back all I saw was orange. Yes, he had managed to get ahold of his bowl, tip over its entire contents and was happily smearing orange all over his tray. There were carrots in his hair, all over the sleeves of his shirt, on his pants, in every crevice of the high chair, all over the chair the high chair sits on, puddles on the floor, the wall (how? Not sure on that one!) and even in the cat's food bowl. I have deemed this incident "carrot-gate." Ethan was in heaven. No, I had not yet given him his extra bowl so perhaps I bear some responsibility for this fiasco. (Okay, I bear all the responsibility since it was my oversight that led to this, but I digress...) It took a solid 45 minutes to get everything cleaned up.

My computer got some sort of virus this past week as well, so following some frantic phone calls I took my diseased laptop to the Geek Squad so that they could perform their magic and bring my computer back to life. It's home safe and sound with me again ($200 later I might add) and I hope that we do not have to be separated again. It sure was hard to work on the spare laptop, which is probably older than me (well, not really, but picture it that way for dramatic effect.) I've been pretty busy with work lately, and I'm looking forward to a "day off" where I don't have a ton to accomplish while Ethan naps or when he goes to bed. I really need a day for me sometime soon or I might go nuts. And on that note, it is off to bed for me so that I'll be ready to feed Ethan when he wakes up at 4:30 am (he does go back down until around 7 most of the time, but that early morning wake up call is BRUTAL!) At least he still insists on going to bed around 6:30 pm so Patrick and I have some free time in the evenings. (And no, keeping him up later, feeding him later, etc. etc. does nothing to curb that early morning need to feed - we've tried it all!)