I had to work for a few hours on Saturday and after that, Ethan and I took a trip to the Memphis Botanic Garden. It was such a gorgeous day, we couldn’t spend any more time indoors. The Memphis Botanic Garden has an amazing children’s garden called “My Big Backyard”. It is full of fun exhibits and activities for children of all ages. Ethan had so much fun running around and playing. I had fun chasing him around with my new camera.

Heading to work first thing in the morning

He had a little nap on the way to the garden and was pretty sleepy when we got there

Still a bit dazed

Now he’s starting to explore

Playing on one of the music exhibits

Playing with the little girls in the pixie house

Now he’s giving the little girls the evil eye

He’s not a fan of the camera these days

Demanding that I give him a snack

I could have sat in this swing all day, but Ethan had other plans.

Investigating the sunflowers

The beautiful fountain at the botanic garden

I am very happy to report a remarkable breakthrough this morning. Today was the first day EVER that Ethan went to daycare without trying to leave with me. I’ve probably mentioned it before but we LOVE his daycare here in Millington. They are really wonderful and Ethan and I will both miss all of his teachers and the administration at this daycare. It makes me so happy that Ethan is comfortable enough there that he gets excited about going and that he wants to stay there and play.

This morning I got him out of the car and we walked together to the center. He walked by himself all the way down the hallway and into the room where I drop him off. He didn’t cling to my leg, he didn’t cry, he didn’t try to run back down the hallway. I didn’t have to sneak away while someone held him and distracted him. He sat down on the floor with the other kids and told me bye bye. It was amazing!

Auntie Vicky came to visit this weekend! Yay! She was originally planning to come for many days but plans changed. Late last week she was offered a job as a teacher! Yay Yay!!!! The only downside to her new job is that it cut our visit short by a few days, but Ethan and I were really glad that she was able to visit us at all. Victoria got in late on Friday night and I let her wake up Ethan to say hi. He was so excited! He immediately stood up in the bed and yelled “RAAAAAAAWWWRRR” and threw his arms around like he was a lion! And then he spun around and jumped on the bed and went crazy. It was pretty awesome. We had trouble getting him to go back to bed.

The next day we went to lunch at Panera (yum) and then we spent the rest of the day in Memphis. First we spent several hours at Mud Island. If you haven’t been to Mud Island, I highly suggest it. The park has a scale model of the Mississippi River from Cairo, IL to NOLA. It even has a “Lake Pontchartrain” and it lets out into the Gulf of Mexico. You can play in the water, so it is tons of fun for kids. Ethan had an amazing time. As he got more and more wet and his pants sagged further, we stripped him of his clothes. By the time we made it to Lake Pontchartrain, he was down to his diaper!

After we played in the water for a while, we went to the grill and ate some french fries and ice cream. We took a paddle boat ride on the Gulf of Mexico and Ethan fell asleep with all the noise of the churning water. He had a nice long nap on the boat ride and in his stroller while Victoria and I enjoyed the rest of the park. When Ethan woke up from his nap he had a big surprise. We had another visitor!

Grandma Tina came to Memphis with some of her friends. We met them at the tram for Mud Island and walked to Beale Street in search of Elvises. We stopped for coffee and ice cream at the Peabody Place mall, and after that Ethan was ready to party. We strolled over to Beale to listen to music, eat dinner, watch the flipping dudes, and high five some Elvises. It was a really long and fun day. We slept until after 10 today!!!

Here are a few of the pictures from our day. Click on any of them to go to Flickr and view all the rest I took this weekend. There are way too many to post on the blog, but they are worth looking at on Flickr.

Also, I want to say 2 weeks down, 2 more to go. We are halfway done with the APPLY board and definitely ready to head home. Work is going very well, but I’m ready for it to be done so we can go home and see Aaron. I’m also hoping to have a bit of downtime at work this week so that I can redesign the blog with the photos from our family portrait session.

OK here are the pictures from Memphis.

I will start this post by updating everyone on how we’re doing in Memphis. Overall, pretty well. Busy but doing well. We’ve had a little bit of a problem with the people in the room above ours. They are smoking in their non-smoking room which shares an air system with my non-smoking room. The irritation from the smoke has helped Ethan develop a nasty cold and chest congestion. Luckily I brought the nebulizer and zyrtec. And after a phone call from the front desk, the people upstairs decided they would rather move to another room than quit smoking in the non-smoking room. I’m just glad they are gone.

Other than that, everything is going well. Ethan’s cold isn’t serious. Work is manageable. We miss Aaron and he misses us, but we’re almost halfway done with our trip. Ethan came to work with me for the first time this evening. He was pretty well behaved despite the fact that he feels like crap. He wasn’t in the mood to socialize, but one of the guys kidnapped him to play outside for a bit and gave him a lollipop. I think Ethan made one new friend today, ha. I’m sure he’ll warm up to everyone by the time we are done. Hopefully though we won’t have too many late nights at work.

We are really looking forward to the weekend. We’ll get to see Auntie Vicky on Friday and Grandma Tina and Pops on Saturday. If we’re really lucky all of the panels will finish their work by Friday and we won’t have to go to work on Saturday. if that happens, we are thinking about going to Graceland on Saturday morning for the Elvis Presley 5K. In case you didn’t know, its dead Elvis week here in Memphis and all the crazies are out!

Last, but certainly not least…. drum roll…..

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Family portraits!!!!

Head over to the Life In Motion Photography blog and check out the selection of amazing pictures that Lyndsay posted to her blog last night. She posted the sneak peek of Ethan the day after our session, and yesterday she posted a whole bunch more! They are fantastic and we couldn’t be more pleased with the way they turned out. If you aren’t already familiar with Lyndsay’s work, go check out her site and blog. Leave some comments and tell her how awesome she is!

Well that is all for now. Tomorrow is another busy day. At least the time passes quickly when I stay this busy. We’ll be home in no time!

Ethan is 22 months old today. I can’t believe that he will be 2 in 2 very short months. That is crazy!!!

I don’t really have a whole lot to say right now, but I did want to share some pictures of Ethan that I took yesterday afternoon. We found a nice park in a neighboring town. Ethan ran around like a crazy little boy and I attempted to get him to look at the camera. He wasn’t in the mood for pictures.

This one is totally out of focus, but it is hilarious. He was so tired of the camera and mad at me for insisting on taking his picture that he screamed the instant I put it up to my face

Ethan had another great day at his new daycare. I had another great day at work. Ethan got to watch Blue’s Clues and other fun shows this morning. I found the fitness center at work and had a quick workout. We stayed around the hotel tonight, swam in the pool, cooked dinner, watched a movie, and went to bed early. It was a good day.

I was wondering when the lack of sleep would catch up with Ethan. He’s been wild at night and staying up late even though we have to get up early in the morning. He hasn’t been getting much rest the past few days. I guess it finally caught up with him tonight because by 7:30 he was ready for bed. We brushed our teeth, watched a bedtime story DVD, called daddy and told him nighty night, and Ethan was asleep by 8:05. That is at least 2 hours earlier than last night. I’m so glad he went to bed early. Now I can get caught up with a few things and get to bed pretty early myself.

Once again, Ethan and I are spending a month in Memphis. Every year I come to Millington to work for a month at the Navy base. This is the SEVENTH time I have made this trip. Wow. Crazy! It almost feels like a second home at this point. Usually I travel up to the area the weekend before work begins and Aaron and I spend time with Uncle John and family. Unfortunately, we were too busy to come up early this year. The weekend was filled to the brim with activity. One of our weekend activities stands out above the others…… We had family portraits taken! YAY!!!!

One of my favorite photographers, Lyndsay of Life in Motion Photography, arrived in town JUST before we left for Memphis. She was offering photography sessions in Slidell yesterday morning. I snagged one of those sessions as soon as she announced it (seriously, I probably emailed her the very instant he announced it on facebook) and rearranged our travel plans to accommodate. I’m so glad we were able to work something out! We all had a lot of fun, even Aaron. We all nearly sweat to death, even at 7 in the morning, but it was worth it. I can’t wait to see all of the images, but for now, she has posted a sneak peek image of Ethan on her blog. Go check it out and leave Lyndsay some blog love. I don’t know if I can wait to see more. I might have a nervous fit. We were all dressed so cute and Ethan being his usual flirtatious self, it will probably make your head explode.

Sooo, after driving to Slidell at 7am yesterday morning for our pictures, we came home and packed. And packed… and packed…. and packed… Ethan and I got on the road a bit later than planned and drove straight to Millington. He did so well in the car. I was impressed! Just one short nap between Collins and Richland, and he was awake and happy the entire way there. The downside to leaving late is that Aaron couldn’t come with us to help us move in this time. It was too much traveling in a short amount of time, so it was better for him to stay home.

We checked into our hotel last night and we started our new routine this morning. It was tough getting to sleep in a new, strange bed and waking up extra early. I had a very productive day at work today and Ethan had a great day at his daycare. It is the same place he went last year and I just love it. He cried when I dropped him off, but they said that he cheered up quickly and had a good day. As a reward for being such a good boy, I took him to the Build A Bear Workshop at Wolfchase Galleria.

Ethan was not really thrilled with going in the store. We stood outside and I asked if he wanted to go in and he said “noooooo”. I think it was pretty overwhelming at first. Once he figured out what was going on, though, he had a great time. He picked out a cute bunny as his new friend. At first he picked an owl, but then he refused to touch it, so he opted for the bunny instead. After the bear builder stuffed the bunny, Ethan kissed the bunny’s new heart and put it in the bunny’s chest. He couldn’t wait to give his new friend a hug. We spent another 30 minutes running around the store, giving the bunny a “bath” and brushing his fur, picking out clothes and shoes, and terrorizing the computer terminals. Ethan finally decided on a Cardinal’s baseball player outfit for his bunny. And we named the bunny “Buddy” since that is one of the few names that Ethan can say. And he likes to say it a lot. He really does love his new “buddy” and insisted on carrying him out of the mall and he insisted on bringing him to the restaurant with us as well.

So we are all settled in to our hotel for the next month. We miss daddy already, but we’ll try to stay busy and make the time pass quickly. I shouldn’t have to work late hours this week, so I’d like to try to take Ethan out for some pictures one evening this week. I can’t get enough pictures of him and he seems to be entertained by running from my camera, so it should be a fun activity. I’ll post some pictures if we are successful in our adventure.

Here are a couple cell phone pictures of Ethan and his new pal

Look at how proud he is of his new bunny!

Cute boy with a cute bunny

Well that is all for now. I’ll try to blog regularly while we are away. I update facebook so often that I don’t bother coming over to post here too. I will make an effort to get better about it!