Just like every other month, we are still really into dressing up and dancing. Here is Ethan after dressing himself up! As always, he has on his beaded necklaces, but today we added in not just one, but two headbands!
Another new addition toward the end of August was our bears. He has always had a couple of bears in his room. One was from Mike on his first Valentine's day, another from the Relay for Life benefit auction, and the third is one we have out for Christmas. Ethan has now made them his friends. He reads them stories (notice the bear has to have his own book), gives them hugs and kisses, and apparently sleeps with them too. After a couple of days sleeping with them (and waking up scared of them in the middle of the night) he made the decision that they were better off sleeping in his rocking chair.
Now that Ethan is a little older, he is also getting to try out some of the "treats" we like to eat. On Kelly's birthday, we had some ice cream. The kids got their own bowls of ice cream and had fun eating it at their kid's table outside.
I'd say he liked it, what do you think?
Another new love is STICKERS!! We had some Disney stickers come in the mail and he loved them! Well, I guess he mostly loved sticking them all over himself but either way, he had lots of fun with them.
Right around the same time he really started getting into all of the Mickey characters. He knows who Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Daisy, Pete, Pluto (he calls puppy), and Giant are. As time goes on, he seems to be starting to like Mickey even better than his Little Einsteins. On September 11th, we spent the day with Mike's family. This is an important day for the family. We looked back on not only the attack on the twin towers 10 years ago, but also the passing of Mike's dad 3 years ago. Although it was in part a sad day, we made sure there was some fun too! We started it off with going to an outdoor church service and something called First Fest. They had a big pot luck and games for the kids. Ethan got to play a few games and jump around in a bounce castle before his I need a nap crabbiness started. We were pretty surprised he could jump around and stay upright with all of the bigger kids jumping around him.
After nap, we headed first to Kevin's grave site then out to the cabin and even got to go on a boat ride. This was a special boat ride because Kevin's best friend Ken and his wife Chris came out with us. They are moving to Las Vegas later this month so they came out to have one last visit. As you can probably tell, all of the cousins are starting to get along a little better now that Ethan can play with them and isn't quite as baby-like.
Group shot...
Another cabin event this month was the celebration of Lainey turning three! Happy Birthday Lainey!
While Lainey was busy opening presents, Ethan was having fun hamming it up for everyone (like usual) wearing the glasses he got in his gift bag from Lainey's party.
Our final big activity this month was a trip up to Minneapolis with my dad and Pam. We started the trip on Friday morning. The ride went pretty smoothly with the addition of a DVD player in the back seat. I don't think he has watched that much Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Little Einsteins! But, at least we had a nice, peaceful ride up.After a quick nap, we headed off to the Mall of America! Ethan loved all of the people watching. They even had a whole Nickelodeon area with rides, toys, and candy. Although he was too little to enjoy most of it, he did like watching all of the activity.
Saturday morning we started the day off with a trip to the zoo! The MN Zoo is super cool! They have a whole underwater area with sharks, turtles, and even a dolphin show. Right when we walked in we were greeted by this sea turtle that Ethan wanted to grab and take home. Luckily he was a pretty tolerant little turtle.
He also really liked looking up at the dolphins from the underwater area. 
His other favorites of the day were all of the animals he knew. Although they didn't have any elephants, giraffes, or lions, he really liked the wolf and monkey exhibits. He could huff and puff at the wolves and watch them walk around in the trees. He even got to ride this wolf!
Here he is hanging out in front of the wolf exhibit, he didn't want to leave!
Another favorite of the day was the farm. They have a whole farm with goats and cows for the kids to look at and pet. Here he is with Pam making the long walk out to the farm.
And running down the ramp...
The goats were probably the highlight of the day. He liked when they came close, but would scream and laugh anytime they touched him.
Another highlight of the farm was the fresh sweet corn. It was amazing! Ethan even got to try out his skills with eating the corn right off the cob, he did really well!
After leaving the zoo and catching another nap, we went to the place where they make the famous Juicy Lucy burger (a burger with lots of cheese melted in it). It was very yummy!Although we had lots of fun running here and there in Minneapolis, I think Ethan's favorite part of the trip was all of the time he got to spend with his grandpa and grandma. He got to play the fishy face game with grandpa...
Read lots of stories with grandma, and spend lots of time giggling, running, and playing!
When we got back, we had my mom and Kileigh over for dinner. They must have missed each other because they played pretty well together without much fighting or screaming!
Over the past month we have had sooo much fun watching Ethan's vocabulary grow. At the beginning of September we were amazed when he started talking in phrases. Some of his favorites were "What my daddy doing?" and "Where my daddy go?" Over the past two or three weeks we have watched those few phrases turn into constant, and I mean constant, talking! He can communicate pretty much anything he needs to and talks almost entirely in phrases now. He can also repeat anything you ask him to say (so as you can imagine we have to be careful with what we say now). Ethan also knows everyone's names in the family now and can figure out who's house we are going to by the combination of people in them.Perhaps most impressive is that he has a truck book and knows which trucks are which throughout the entire book. And those trucks aren't only the simple ones, some of his favorites include: backhoe, tractor, roller, garbage truck, cement crusher, ATV, van, giant excavator, dump truck, and crane.
He also has grown quite the obsession with the evil characters on his Little Einsteins. The biggest obsession has transitioned from the giant to the witch. Only problem is that we have also developed a bit of fear of the witch. He has woken up a few nights with the witch on his mind. Although at times his growing personality and words can make it a bit challenging, it is so fun watching him and his vocabulary grow day by day!
