Thankful

I'm running a little late for Thanksgiving, but I am certainly thankful for these two little guys. They LOVE to play "night night", where they retrieve blankets and pillows and lay on the floor and say "nigh nigh" over and over again. Ezra's becoming quite the bookworm! He wears me out before bed sometimes with 9-10 books he gets lined up. Luckily we're going to the homeland for Christmas and the relatives can take some turns reading about Spot the dog and Maisy the mouse.

We had a lovely Thanksgiving, and I regret taking absolutely no photos! Some other people did and they said that they would email me them, so the Thanksgiving post will have to trickle in over the next few weeks. We went over to Jason's house, the same place we celebrated Thanksgiving last year. It was a potluck and we brought oyster stuffing and corn bread stuffing, which were both delicious. Other food highlights included: a smoke house turkey, mushroom gravy, fresh baked bread, brussel sprouts, and my personal favorite sake coconuts to drink. They didn't tell us there was sake in the coconuts at first and we were all just amazed at how delicious the coconut milk was. Then it came out, and we all were getting a little buzzy.

Our good friends Molly and Joe flew in from Chicago that night and stopped by Jason's for desert. The next day I had to work (a good thing!) so they hung out with Kate during the day and then when I got off from work we took the train downtown. We checked out Jason's super futuristic architecture school and then went out to eat at the Thai Peacock. I was tired at the end of this day, but it's always fun to show people around Portland.

The next day, Saturday, we took off to Champoeg (that's pronounced Sham-poo-ey, yes there are some REALLY strange pronunciations around here) State Park where I had reserved a cabin for the night. They bought tons of groceries and we cooked pasta dinner on the cook stove under the light of the moon. Ezra found the cabin to be very fun, and loves anytime that he can hang out with Jason. He was really liking to play with Molly too! We saw some sheep and he still talks about the baa baas. Everything is the sound it makes right now. There are buck bucks (chickens), baa baas (sheep), sssshweeem (airplanes), and bum bums (church bells).

He's so cute, and he's really coming along with the potty training. He went like 6 times today! Dang. I thought I had done something stupid by offering him a cookie everytime he went, but at this point it seems as though the satisfaction of the deed is fulfilling enough and he doesn't even want a cookie! More for Mama, great.

We came back on Sunday and had a relaxing day at home. It's the week before finals week so this week will not be relaxing, but the end is in sight! Winter break here I come.

The following videos are for the devoted Ezra fans only. There's not too much "action", but he's really into this little green haired doll that came with a defective school bus toy I procured from my work. Both videos show him putting the little green haired man "nigh nigh", using gold beads as a blanket. Both Ezra and Usiah love putting the little green haired man to bed. It's pretty freaking adorable.

Ok I guess the second video is too long for the Blogger. Boo hoo. For those that are willing to travel to another website, find it over here. You may need more! I understand. I always do.

More photos coming soon!

Gym Dandies!

Tis the second to the last day of Ezra's gym dandies class, so I crammed in the picture taking and video making. I must apologize for the blurry lens, I guess I need to clean it.

In the first series we see Ezra engaging in the activity of climbing the whale and jumping off. He did this several times, and was enjoying himself immensely. Here we go:

He thinks Why I could do that...

And he does.

Popular whale.

Leap!

Kaboom on the butt. This looked like it hurt but he kept doing it so it must have been OK.
Here's the whole sequence in video form to give you an even better idea of what was going on:

He ran over to spend some time rocking on his favorite dog rocker with Maya, who was not thrilled about the non rocking whale. The little girl you see in the background with the leotard on is the most serious child of the class. There were some pom poms out today and she grabbed two. Her mom snapped, "This isn't cheer leading class, this is gymnastics." I have been thinking about getting Ezra a leotard...

And the grand finale, the most exciting part of class every week (except for the stickers everyone gets at the end), the parachute!

And he did eventually go and sit in the middle.

Bath Babies

Ezra never wants to wear clothes. Nudie butt nudie butt nudie butt. And now that our house has heat his dreams can be realized. We had heat before but it was oil and very inefficient, so we didn't use it much. Now we have gas heat, and it even has a timer! So it's not 50 degrees in the house when we wake up, but rather a balmy 62. It's lovely. Last weekend we hardly left the house because it was just so cozy. Of course we went to gymnastics class on Saturday, and then we snuck in to an art class where we made some arts and crafts. I sent one of the creations off to Great Grandma today. She's gonna love it!

Sunday we read books in the morning and then took a walk to the park, regardless of the misty rain. We watched some teenage boys skateboard (and use expletives) and a bunch of crazy people play ultimate frisbee in the mud. Ezra loved it. Then we walked home and he took a 2 hour nap, during which I made banana bread, chicken salad, and any other task I could find to avoid my Chinese Literature homework. I do like that class I just have a hard time making myself do it.

Today we got a package in the mail from Grandpa Rak and Uncle Nate. They were so kind as to lend us a cell phone since mine is kaput. A wallet exchange size school photo was included of Uncle Nate, and Ezra held it closely to his chest in between looking at it deeply, saying "Yeah Uncle". He really likes his uncle. Good thing he gets to see him soon for Christmas! He even wanted to take the picture to bed with him. Sweetie pie.

Other big news: Ezra has successfully gone number one and number two in the potty twice, on his own accord. I have put him there and he has done it before, but this is the first time that he saddled up and did the deed. He is enjoying cookies and stickers as rewards, and we're making baby steps towards no more bulging diapers. Onward! The cookie reward system is working well, because they're designated for Ezra's potty training, it keeps me from eating them (until after he goes to bed). No seriously I haven't eaten so much as one.

Hope you are all having a good week. I keep thinking that this week is Thanksgiving, but it's not. Oh and one last thing: I got a 97 on my test in Native American History! Woop woop.

Halloween Bonus Shots

More shots of Ezra in his costume, thank you Cayce. Here we pose. I was originally going to be Mother Nature, but then just settled on wearing a lot of flowers. I was a field of flowers?

He was keeping hydrated. Had to wash down the sucker:

He would not put that thing down! Oh man, so much sugar.

Here's a shot of the post trick or treating scene. The prom queen is on the couch, Usiah and Marcel go through their loot (stuffing candy in their mouths, literally), and we pose for a shot.

Here's Ezra and Maya playing with the favorite noisy chair gifted to Ezra from his first child care provider, Lleny. I waited to put on the bear suit until just before we left because it got pretty hot in there.

Bath Buddies & Video Vault

Maya came over for dinner last night and then they had a bath. Ezra went through a few emotional roller coasters.

And here's some videos from long ago and recently. The first is Ezra playing with his new trains and stacking blocks that his grandma got for him.

Here's one from when we were in Guatemala, poolside. So warm, so tropical. It's raining here.

Ezra loves to feed Big Bird his breakfast. Here they share french toast.

And this is from this morning at gymnastics class. These dog is rocking.