ET's 1st Ice Skating Lesson...

ET had his first ice skating lesson on Saturday, January 8th. He was very excited, but we were a little nervous. We knew from the first time we took him on the ice, that he had a hard time staying up. I wondered if he might be a little embarrassed if he fell and was in front of other kids. Well, Jay and I were amazed at how well he did. By the end of the lesson, he was doing as well as all the other kids. He learned how to fall down and then get back up again by pushing off of one knee. He also practiced stomping his feet without holding on to anything. :)


It was so comforting to see a familiar face there! His friend Mary from daycare takes lessons on the same ice rink as ET, just in a separate class.


They warmed up off the ice first.

They escorted them one-by-one out to the center of the ice. ET was the last one out. I think he was happy to be patient and watch the other kids go out first.

Whoops! He took a fall right away.


They did a few exercises around a long bench while holding on. Then the instructors slowly inched the kids backwards from the bench and eventually removed the bench entirely.


ET was thrilled and is happy to go back again! :) Our only complaint was that we wished they would spread the kids out more. When one kid fell, it was kind of like Dominoes on ice. ET accidentally made one sensitive kid fall twice, and the kid didn't stop crying for a while after. :(

Caught being cute...

It is really hard to catch a pic of Nate smiling directly at the camera. I just wanted to blog these two pics, because they show just how adorable Nate is. :)

Nate Update...

Since Nate has starting walking, he is really starting to get into even more areas of the house. As of yesterday, he has mastered the step down into the living room. Until now, he has never gone into that room because he was too afraid of attempting the step. Now that he knows he can, he loves being over there.
This morning, we took our eyes off of him for two minutes - not smart, I know. I found him in the bathroom. He had crawled up the step stool and was reaching for the sink. He looked at me with such a proud smile, it was hard not to laugh. Super cute, but super scary. Nate will be 1 year old in a week and a half and we are truly entering the toddler year - temper tantrums and all! :)

Nate is WALKING!!!!

Yesterday, Nate took approximately 5 steps on two different occasions during daycare hours. Then later in the evening, I was able to stand him up and walk back about 4-5 feet and he would "walk to mommy." He would do it for me over and over again last night.
Today during daycare hours, he would walk a few feet to me if I stood him up (same as the night before). Then this evening Nate walked all on his own from the ottoman to the chair....from the chair to the kitchen table...and from the fridge to the chair in the living room!!!! He is really very good as maintaining his balance already. We have known for a while that he can walk, he just needed to trust himself enough to do it.

As you can imagine, Jay, ET and I are exploding with excitement!

Happy New Year!

We celebrated the New Year with our good friends; Steve, Andra and their kids yesterday. This was our third year being together on New Year's. This year was obviously low key because we both have babies. We enjoyed ourselves and the kids had a great time playing together.

Apparently Addie and Nate missed each other greatly. They had a long endearing hug when they first saw each other. :)




Once again another attempt at a cute pics of the boys...




He has his daddy's sense of humor. :)

Cheers!


One tired boy! Steve and Andra left by 8:30pm to get their little one in bed. We got Nate to bed by 8:45pm. For the first time since Jay and I have been together, we sat down to watch the Times Square New Year's celebration on TV. We were in bed by 10:30 (another first for us). The moment our heads hit the pillow, Nate woke up crying...he didn't stop until 1:30am. So, I guess we have yet to have a New Year's where we go to bed before the ball drops. :) (Nate has been crying in the middle of the night because of a lingering cough from a cold he had last week. He is usually such a good sleeper and hasn't woke up in the middle of the night since he was 6 weeks old!)

ET's 1st Time Ice Skating!

We purchased ET his first pair of ice skates last week and took him skating at the high-school ice arena on Thursday, Dec. 30th. We have an outdoor ice rink in our neighborhood, but Jay and I both wanted to be there to watch ET skate for the first time and it would have been too cold outside for Nate. ET was all revved up and ready to go skate and play hockey. Jay and I tried to get him to understand just how slippery it would be and that he probably would not need his hockey stick because it will be hard enough to keep from falling down. He didn't want to believe us of course, and so when he finally made it out on to the ice and he fell over and over again, he looked up at me with tears in his eyes. He was so frustrated because he genuinely thought he would just be able to go out and skate and play hockey like the big kids. With a lot of encouragement and help, ET practiced for about 20 minutes before wanting a break.

We watched a practice taking place on the other rink, and ET did not want to leave. He also asked us if he could stay in the warming room because he wanted to play with the kids in there. Jay and I agreed ET would have more fun skating with friends and so we signed him up for skating lessons. He will skate every Saturday through February starting January 8th. Along with music, skating and hockey seems to be one of his "loves" right now. With a three year old though, anything can change with the blink of an eye. :)





We gave him a five gallon bucket to use to push along and hold on to. It was a little short for him, and so luckily the rink had a net the perfect size for him to use.

ET graduated from speech therapy!

This post is a little overdue. I wanted to proudly announce that ET has graduated from speech therapy as of December 9th, 2010. It is hard to believe that he started back in July (July 1st to be exact). Time has flown by! We are so fortunate to have had a great teacher for him. When ET first started therapy, he was not able to make any hard K, C, or G sound. He also could not make the L sound or speak words that started with a the letter S (ex: "swing" sounded like "wing"). The last thing he mastered was the TH sound. His teacher, Becky stated week after week, that she has never had a child improve as quickly as ET has. :)