Sitting and Standing!

Ethan seems to be growing faster than we ever imagined. From day 1 he was holding his head up and at only two and half months he can sit up...

and is even pulling himself up to standing. He is so proud when he does and gets so excited to look around at the world from higher up. He gets that huge grin on his face and at times will even get angry if you leave him sitting for too long! It seems like it won't be long until he is running around. Look out Mom and Dad!

Alessandra Eleni Chiaravalloti is Born!!!

This was a VERY exciting weekend!  Ethan's newest cousin Alessandra Eleni Chiaravalloti was born on 2/18/2010.  Mother and daughter are doing well and got to go home on Saturday.  Luckily, they made a quick stop to Yiayia's where we finally got meet the newest member of the family.  She is absolutely adorable.

Ethan was very excited to finally be "the big cousin". He spent the afternoon telling Alessandra all the things she had to look forward to in the next two months such as how to best handle difficult parents who just won't do what you are crying for them to do, and how to mess with Mom and Dad at the changing table (be careful Mike and Ariana, she learned from the best!).  He was a bit disappointed that she slept through much of his advice, but didn't take it personally.  Infants these days!

For more photos of Alassandra go here.

 

Ethan's First Piano Lesson

For weeks now Ethan has been asking about the strange, big, black, boxy looking thing at the bottom of the stairs so we finally gave Ethan his very first piano lesson.  He was pretty interested in hearing the Moonlight Sonata and Fur Elise but then he started to get a bit bored.  However, when Dad switch gears and started playing (and singing) Ol' McDonald, his eyes lit up!  Move over Beethoven!!!



For more pictures of Ethan's first piano lesson, go here.

Telegadis Boys' Surpirse Visit

We had a surprise visit from the Telegadis Cousins the other day and had a blast. We had missed Lukes birthday a few weeks back because of a HUGE storm so it gave us the chance to celebrate, sing "Happy Birthday" and open presents. Ethan was so excited that after an hour or so of playing he passed out from exhaustion. Ethan had a great time, though and is looking forward to playing more with his big cousins Luke and Cole

For more photos, go here.

Ethan's First Play-Date

Ethan was very excited to have his very first play date yesterday with Mommy's Co-Fellow's Daughter, Farida.  He was initially concerned to be going out on a date with a girl who was a month and half younger than him.  I tried to explain that six weeks was not a big difference, but when he pointed out that at his age (ie two months), two weeks is actually 1/4 his age, I didn't have much to argue with.  When he put it that way, it would be like a 30 year old dating a 120 year old.  Well he eventually agreed to go and ended up having a great time.  Ethan, Farida, and the two parents went out to a nice Indian restaurant where both Ethan and Farida had a friendly competition as to who could  sleep the deepest throughout the entire dinner.  We then accompanied the two kids up to her place where Farida was kind enough let Ethan swing in her Little Lamb Swing making him feel just at home (he has the exact same one).  After nap-time the date was over and Ethan agreed that he had a great time.

For more photos of Ethan's first play-date, go here

Ethan Finds his Voice

Perhaps one of the most frequent comments I hear about Ethan is what an amazing smile he has and how expressive his face is. Well he is now working on taking that to the next level and is starting to practice using his voice. Mostly he like to talk to his two best friends, the Baby Einstein Under the Sea Octopus and the Baby Einstein Around the Worlds Bouncer Lion (and for those of you wondering, no I have no financial connection to Baby Einstein, Ethan just seems to really like them). I am not sure why he talks more to a toy Octopus and Lion. Perhaps when he hangs out with them he feels obligated to fill the silence since they seem to be unable to talk all together (or even make sounds for that matter). Just another example of how mature he is: when the threat of a potential uncomfortable silence looms, Ethan steps up to the plate, finds his voice, and fills the silence with his cooing so that Mr. Lion and Mr. Octopus don't feel awkward about their complete lack of vocal cords. Pretty impressive for a 2 month old, I think.

For more videos of Ethan, go here.

For more videos of Ethan, go here.

Ethan's 40 days

This Sunday Ethan was presented to Greek Orthodox Church for his 40 days.  In actuality, he was really 46 days at the time.  Although part of him was a bit annoyed that we were 6 days late, he understands that tardiness is probably in his genes so there is only so much he can fight it.  Both his parents are notoriously late for things, you see.  They were even late for their own wedding for goodness sakes!  So Ethan did a great job for his first time in church.  He slept through most of the ceremony and then was wide awake for his presentation.  His mother was a little jealous that he got to get a peak behind the alter, which she is very interested in seeing.  However, apparently there are some top secret something-or-others back there and Ethan was asked not to reveal those secrets.  So far he is keeping his silence like a champ.  He definitely knows how to guard important secrets; admirable, I might say.

     Ethan had a great time hanging out with his Yia-yia, pro-yiayia, his Nouna and Nouno, Cousin Gianna and of course is Uncle Peter.  He also got to meet his Uncle Jake for the first time and learned his first handful of old Jewish jokes (a must have for any child with a sense of humor like Ethan).  Mazeltov Koukliki mou!

For more pictures from Ethan's 40 days follow this link.