BABY DADA!!!!

I have officially caught Eli's cold. So far it hasn't been too bad...I'm in the stuffy head stage. Now I have two noses to wipe :-) Another glorious day today. We took a lovely walk and Brandon later took Eli to play at the playground to give me a break. Last night we were laughing so hard. While we were putting Eli's pajamas on he got really mad and all he could think to say to vent his frustration was yell really loud, "BABY DADA" at us. It was so funny! It seriously sounded like he was cussing at us. We put up his little basketball goal that Will gave him for Christmas, and he's enjoyed learning the game. He loves us to make baskets and likes us to pick him up to dunk it. He loves anything that involves a ball. Crap...that probably means he's going to like sports. Darn the luck!

Sometimes they are a little weird....

Eli has been really sick. I've never seen so much snot in my life. Friday night he was up again every hour, but at one point he was boiling up (and his temp was only 100.4). He looked horrible. I put him in lighter pajamas and gave him some Tylenol and he seemed to feel a little better. For some strange reason, thanks to God, I haven't even been tired at all the past few days even though I've been up a lot. Before bed last night he had a low fever again, so we gave him some Tylenol and he almost slept through the night!!!! It was the best he's slept in months. He finally was able to breathe better and got some much needed rest. Even though he's been sick, he still has been acting pretty much the same during the day (unless he's had a fever, then he gets really whiny). Yesterday was probably the most beautiful day we've had in months (70 degrees) and we were outside playing all day with walks, finishing up our leaf raking, and just letting Eli run around. He LOVES LOVES LOVES the outdoors. He sometimes starts to cry when we bring him in, and he'll run back to the door. Little boys were definitely not made to be indoors. I'm so glad that he's become an expert walker (barely ever falls) right on the verge of spring. I can't wait to see him running down the beach in Santa Barbara in a few weeks and playing outside on my parent's farm. Fun times!

Sticks are for throwing....not eating!

Well we had a wonderful day yesterday taking walks, playing in front and back yard etc. Eli even walked half the way down the block on his own with me trailing. He learned a valuable lesson: Sticks are for throwing, not eating! :-) He brought home a little stick as a treasure. He threw it down the sidewalk the whole walk home. We even went to the park last night and he had a blast running around, watching geese fly by, swinging, and playing in a "fort" he discovered under some playground equipment. Unfortunately, last night he started waking up an hour after I put him down with congestion. I wanted to scream NO NO NO!!! He has a runny nose today. He was up every hour last night (even with the steamer on) crying because he was congested. Usually the first night he gets a cold is bad until he gets used to breathing out of his mouth instead. Luckily we have a week for recovery before my birthday trip up to Minneapolis. Ugh!

Welcome Jesse!

Yesterday was an eventful day. On a whim, I just decided to take Starbucks over to my friend Tanya's house because I thought she might be a little down from passing her due date without any action. She was really hoping to not have to be induced this time around. I just jumped in the car with Eli and took off headed to her house which is really close to ours. Her mom happened to be there too with Tanya's nephews ages 1 1/2 and 3, so Eli had a blast playing with all the boys. You'd think for a kid who hasn't been in day care or babysat much with other kids that he'd be shy or hold back, but he definitely doesn't. When we go to someone else's house he just gets right down and starts playing and running around. We were all talking about how much Tanya was hoping to go into labor soon and then she goes to the restroom and comes back and says that she thinks she's in labor. She called the hospital and her husband and they took off to have a baby! It was such a God thing that I happened to go over because I was able to stay and babysit all the kids for an hour or so while her mom went and picked up her neice from school clear in Haysville. Poor Eli was so tired, but just kept on playing and was such a trooper. It was so cute to see all the kids together eating their crackers. Eli enjoyed being one of the big boys. Tanya had a horrible pregnancy and birth experience with Seth (he also had heart problems), so we'd all been praying like crazy that this time around would be better and it was. I can't wait to visit them all in the hospital tonight and meet baby Jesse! I forgot to mention the other day that for the superbowl (since we don't have tv) we went to our friend's house (who bought our old house) and enjoyed an awesome dinner. He had made homemade lasagna noodles and this delicious wine sauce he'd been cooking all day. Fabulous! Eli just played ball and had fun running around our old house. It was neat to see our old house and how great it looks.

It has been so fun trying new foods with Eli. A lot of the time he can just eat what we're eating, which has made things a lot easier. As of this week all of the food I'd previously made and frozen will be gone, so he'll be completely off baby food. His second top tooth finally has broken through, so we can tell he's feeling so much better and sleeping better. I've been spending his naps doing booking for our band...making calls, sending applications etc. I don't want to play too often because even if we just play twice a month, the rest of the weekends are spent practicing, or Brandon leading worship, so it can get time consuming and take up our family time. So far, I've just booked one show a month. Eli is just a blast lately. We just love coming into the toddler stage. He is so much fun. Between books, exploring, snuggling/hugging/kissing, playing ball, going to see the gorilla, taking a walk, snacks, wrestling, etc. the day goes by much quicker than it used to. Brandon and I were mentioning how we kind of dread having a "boring" newborn again someday. The weather is supposed to warm up again to the 60's this weekend, so I'm so excited to get back outside and let Eli play in the grass/leaves. I guess influenza has hit Wichita bad this week because my friend called me to tell me that her doctor told her to keep her kids out of the church nursery/Walmart etc. because they are seeing a ton of cases of the flu these past few days. This is exactly when it hit last year and why we had to keep Eli out of public crowds for two LONG months. He had two flu shots, so hopefully they guessed the correct strains this year. We're having bible study here tomorrow, Brandon's leading worship this weekend and then my friend will be induced Friday if she doesn't go into labor this week, so I'm looking forward to all the fun.

Park fun!

This is at at one of the parks near our house...we live in a triangle of 3 parks within a couple blocks! We LOVE it!

Happy Birthday Juliah!

My uncle from Texas (who is the choir director at Odessa College) and his son brought some students up to see Friends University, so all the Cormans came over to our house to visit. Eli loved having everyone around and was overjoyed to see his Grandpa. Later I joined everyone at Friends after Eli went to sleep and got into a huge political discussion/battle, which was a blast. I love politics, but Brandon hates it so it was a treat for me! We had a gorgeous day here yesterday and took a walk to the park and played. Eli had fun running around, swinging with Brandon, and going down the slide. He would go down the slide then point his finger and do his sign for "more" (shaking one or both hands). He loved seeing other dogs as well. He gets so excited if dogs even go walking by our house. Later in the day we headed to El Dorado (40 minutes away) for a birthday party. Eli's friend Juliah was turning 2 (they are in our bible study and church). All of Eli's friends were there, and he had a GREAT time! I had a blast because Brandon took over chasing Eli around the house/yard and let me visit with all of my girl friends. Rare occasion that we're all together at once, since all of us have kids. I'm really fortunate that most of our friends have kids, so Eli can have "friends" and people to play with and learn from. At the party, Eli weeded out every ball out of the stack of Juliah's dolls. I tried to give him a doll and he hit it away :-) Definitely a boy. We were there for almost 3 hours and Eli was SO good the entire time. He just ran around and played with balloons/balls and watched other kids. He slept on the way there, but was awake and happy on the way home. I made the mistake of starting to sing him songs, and then of course he would do the his sign for "more" every time I tried to stop. I'm just glad he is communicating what he wants. It makes our life so much easier.