I'm sitting here in front of the computer trying to figure out what exactly I should blog about. It has been so long that it seems there are lots of things I could share. :)
Preston is 23 months old now (can you believe he's almost 2 already?) and he's learning to say new words and using them in his speech everyday (literally). It's just amazing to see how much he's listening and observing! For instance, I was working out with a friend tonight, and needed Ethan to help pry Preston off of my legs so that I could continue with the workout video, so I said something like "Ethan, come here" and Preston repeated it! lol
Ethan built a fort for Preston using a large cardboard box we had in the attic, tape, a drill, and blue LED lights. This was about a month ago. Preston just loves it! Ethan 'added on' to the fort just recently. There is a main entrance (Ethan made the cardboard more pliable by perforating the hinge side). There are two windows that Ethan kept the cardboard present so that you can open the window or close it. On the ceiling, Ethan added blue LED lights from drilling holes into the cardboard and pushing through each light. Recently Ethan cut out part of the ceiling to that he could be able to surprise Preston when he is hiding in the fort. As you can imagine, this fort becomes Preston's hiding place when he's not ready to take his nap or have his diaper changed, or even when he's encouraged to share a toy. :)
I've been keeping busy with practicing on my piano as well. I have a goal to learn 5-7 Christmas songs on the piano so that I can play them on Christmas. So far I've learned (but haven't mastered in any way) Angels We Have Heard On High, and Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.
I've also been keeping busy with babysitting AJ (he's so easy to love), volunteering at A Hope Center, and going through a Bible Study on Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges.
Ethan has been keeping busy with work as usual. He's also leading an accountability group that meets on Saturdays (and doing a great job at it too)! He recently had a lot of fun with some coworkers playing paintball games for a few hours. He came home with somewhere around 15 'hits' from these paintball wars, and it was so great to see him excited to share with me some of the highlights. Apparently, Ethan was the only one present with a semi automatic paintball gun, so it was that much more fun for him to go commando on his boss and friends. ;)
We are planning on having my side of the family over for Thanksgiving this year, so I'm pretty excited to open up our home for this! Wishing all of our family could be together, but we're thankful that we can certainly keep in touch via email, mail, or phone!