The faces of Eli - *edited*

Eli makes a lot of (what I think are) cute faces. The only one I've taught him is the "look surprised" face. I would say that by his lack of excitement when doing it, it's his least favorite. He much prefers coming up with his own material. I'm not nearly as cool as he is. He gets more attention in a day than I've received in my entire life!

This is the first "face" we ever saw him make. This picture was sent to us by Gladney when he was still in the care center. As soon as we opened the e-mail we both died laughing. Eli now has a tendency to make this face when he's in trouble. He's already learning how to redirect me when he's doing something he shouldn't be doing. (I thought that's what I was supposed to be doing to him?)

The funny face

November 2008

Look Surprised!
April 2009
The Mean Face. (Post sno cone consumption)
June 2009

The fish face

July 2009

The happy (AKA the 'cheese') face!
July 2009

And here he is in motion doing all of the faces LIVE.
If you watch the video, pay close attention to the very end when he says "love you". Ben started teaching him this when he got home by putting his hand over his heart and pointing to us. Now, he can kind of say the words. Melts my heart every time.
Ignore my voice and laughter...it's really bringing down the whole video.

4th of July

We go to Ben's grandpa's farm every year for the 4th of July. This tradition has been going on for a while. I don't think I would be exaggerating if I said it's been happening at least 60 years. Everyone in his family camps out - it's a big family reunion.

The farm is one of Ben's favorite places. He went there for weeks at a time during the summer throughout his childhood. It's really fun to see Eli loving the same things his dad loves. Eli has a great love for the outdoors - which made for a great weekend!

There's a lot of preparation that goes into getting the campsite ready for the reunion. This year, we went down a little early so that Ben could help his grandpa. While Ben was on the tractor, we walked down to one of his favorite places. The bridge:

Gathering rocks to throw into the water.

A quick hug from mom.
Note the rock in his hand. He was ready to play!

He's a fish in the water.

He's a big fan of playing in the river with his dad

Eli and Ben with Ben's grandma.
Eli and Grandma A. played together a lot. She kept telling Eli that he was 'the cutest boy she's ever seen'. We couldn't agree more :)

Ben and Eli with Ben's grandpa.
Great grandpa (or "Papa" as Eli called him) is truly the nicest man I've ever known.

Eli's first driving lesson.
His favorite thing to do is pretend to drive.

Eli on the way home - still reeling with excitement from the weekend.
This is how he traveled the entire six hours home. There was not an ounce of frustration, or a tear shed. He was so content to talk to us or look out the window. He's a dream!

Happy Fathers Day...

from a boy who loves his dad

30

It's true. I turned 30 this week!

Eli tasting the icing. Like father, like son.

Some of my friends threw a surprise party for me Monday night. So fun! Tuesday, my actual birthday, was filled with brunch, a SIX hour day at the spa, a new dress (waiting for me to wear to dinner), and a nice dinner at a restaurant on the lake. There was not a load of laundry, a dish cleaned, or a floor swept by me. Heavenly.

I also got this e-card from my favorite singer.

I know I'm a dork. Some people have an obsession with Twilight, mine, however, is Dierks.
He remembers my birthday every year...could be because I pay to be a member of his fan club - but whatever.

The day after my birthday my best friend moved to Ohio. A very sad day.

Great gift Meg. I asked for an iphone, not for you to move to Ohio. :)

Why Ethiopia?

"Why Ethiopia?" was a question that normally followed our "We're adopting!" announcement. Watch this video. Now. Really. Go watch it.

What are you asking now? "How could you not adopt from Ethiopia?"

And, yes, that is our sweet little boy at about minute 2:04.

The Haircut

We gave Eli his first haircut today. Well, the first haircut since he's been home with us...I thought I would grow it out into a cute little 'fro; but, the more we started getting into hot weather, the more I started leaning towards giving him a cooler hair cut.

This is how he felt when we started.

Don't worry - I don't think he's sad about losing his hair. It's more about the buzzing clippers near his head.

Check out all the hair that Ben took off of Eli's head!

But, look how cute he is with his short summer cut!

Feeling a little more confident now...

Loving his new hair! Cute cheese face.

It makes me a little sad, because I feel like he looks older. I think it's the new hair and the fact that he's doubled the number of teeth in his cute little mouth since he's been home. From four teeth to eight! Even though he looks older, he still likes to be my 'little baby'. I'm enjoying it while I can!

Bye-bye baba, or bobby...whatever you prefer to call it

I was dreading this process. One, because it was the only thing he was attached to when he came home from Ethiopia; and, two, because I knew he would be upset when we started to wean him off the bottle.

After being home for about two months, he went from about 7 bottles a day to two. Seven? you ask? Yes, it's true. He took a bottle before both daytime naps, one before bedtime, and several during the night. I remember thinking that he might be on the bottle until he was 5. Anyhow, about a month or so ago, I took him off the naptime bottle. It was pretty easy, because he started falling asleep in the highchair while eating lunch. (Which he still does by the way. He's normally up from his 'afternoon' nap by 1:00.)

So, we've been down to one bottle, only at night, for a little while. Our night time routine is to give Eli a bath, get him in his pajamas, go to the kitchen to make his bottle, then lay on the bed together so we can read a book or two and pray. The other night when we walked into the kitchen, I decided to put his milk in a sippy cup, instead of a bottle. He stood there and watched me. I handed it to him and said 'go get on your bed', like we say everynight. He took the cup and ran to his bed.

What? Was that all it took? It's true. He's been taking the sippy cup every night since then without a fight.

Our baby boy is growing up.