So Ethan turned 2 the other day....

And I finally have a few minutes to blog about it!

Ethan had a really great birthday party on Saturday night. Nothing big, just a few family and friends that came over for the shindig. About a week before, I didn't really have a theme, but found a cool dumptruck cake to make so "dump truck" ended up being the theme. I even made invitations (how crafty of me!). They don't sell dump truck balloons at the store, so we also had a little Thomas and Sesame Street theme going on. Anyway, Ethan liked it all.

The cake didn't turn out exactly like the picture, but Ethan was able to tell it was a dump truck, so that's all that mattered.

Doug, Lynette, Ada, Laura, and my mom came into town during the day on Saturday and we made some brisket for dinner and then got to dive into the cake and ice cream. Ethan loved that it was his birthday and people were singing to him. And he loved trying to blow out the candle all during the song.

He didn't so much like that the cake got cut up and demolished, but got over that.

He got some cool presents - a bowling set, some light up trucks, a soccer ball and goal, and a Virginia Tech bean bag chair that is supposed to go in his room, but is still sitting in the middle of our living room (since both kids love to sit on it).

Blythe and her friends spent about 3 straight hours playing dress up and them coming down to show us each of their outfits. Some of the time we would play Miley Cyrus and the girls would "dance" to it by holding hands in a circle and jumping up and down.

So it was a good party. We seem to luck out on weather each year on Ethan's birthday (except the day he was born), so were able to spend some quality time outdoors. Sunday we finally got to break out the Jeep the kids got for Christmas. Ethan took Ada for a little spin and then Blythe drove for a bit too. Ethan got to practice his soccer skills too with his new ball and net. He's got a ways to go as far as practice goes.

Now on to Ethan's stats and what he's up to these days.

Dang if I didn't already lose the papers they gave me with his stats. I remember them mostly though:

• 34.5 inches long (about 50th percentile)
• About 27 pounds (around 40th percentile)
• Can't remember the head circumference, but I remember it was around 75th percentile (no wonder it's hard to put shirts on him lately).
• So overall, pretty average stats as he has been most of his life so far
• These days Ethan is quite the little guy to be around. He's learning so much and he appears to learn very quickly. He knows most of his ABC's (in song, not by recognizing the letter), he knows most of his colors and uses them all the time to identify things. He can count to 14. He knows several shapes (circle, triangle, square, star).
• He loves singing songs and knows itsy bitsy spider, wheels on the bus, the hokey pokey, E-I-E-I-O, and probably a few more I can't think of.
• He loves to pretend he's swimming all the time. In the bathtub, on the ground, wherever. I think he's ready for summer and the pool to open.
• He's quite good at throwing a ball and throws both right-handed and left-handed. Usually his left-handed throw is a little better.
• He still is a very neat little boy and picks up after himself very well
• He loves to help in any way he can so I try to give him little tasks to help me. He fills the dog bowl with water when I give him a cup to pour in there. After I fill the bowl with dog food, he likes to take it and go put it down (which is nice because bending over gets harder by the day for me).
• LOVES bathtime and loves to make a watery mess in the bathroom. And he loves the "rain", which is what it's called when Braden turns the shower on after bathtime in the tub is over.
• He's very ready to be potty-trained, but I'm not quite ready. We have some travel coming up and Braden's got more travel for work and so I just need him to hold out for a little longer. For now, I'm content with rarely having to change his diaper because he sits on the potty first thing in the morning and does his business and sits on the potty at night and does his business then too. Next step - teaching him how to pee standing up. I think that's Braden's territory since I too have no idea about that. And he also currently has to be completely naked when he sits on the potty, so we'll have to get him past that too as I don't think that would go over too well in the regular world.

Anyway, happy 2nd birthday Ethan! Sorry it took me so long to get it on here!