Christmas with the Mellert's

Our drive to my parents went fairly smoothly as it was late and the roads weren't busy and Seth was fast asleep. However, when we pulled in the driveway, Seth awoke, and I mean awoke. It was like he thought it was morning, the start of a new day. When I finally put him down to sleep within 15 minutes he was crying. To make a long story short, I fed him (which I don't like to do since he doesn't need to be fed in the middle of the night, but it helps sometimes!) changed him and paced around the room with him for about 1/2 hour. In the morning we discovered, or rather Ted did when Seth was screaming, that his two top front teeth were cutting through! Needless to say, Seth had a cranky first Christmas. Reminds me of the song lyrics: All I want for Christmas are my two front teeth!

Seth opening gifts with Pappy Mellert

Seth on Christmas morning

Seth opening some more gifts on Christmas

Speaking of Seth opening gifts on Christmas, I will tell you about a little incident he had. He was sitting on the rug like you see in the photo opening gifts and there were a few gifts surrounding him. Somehow he tumbled over landing on a nearby gift and hitting the side of his eye on the corner of the box. He screamed and screamed and nothing would soothe him not even his nuk. I got him some ice to put on it while my mom held him. After a while of having the ice my mom was just holding it in her hand. She was talking to one of us and Seth grabbed hold of the ice and flung it back and hit himself in the head right where he just did only minutes before! Oh my! You can sort of see the mark in the picture above just to the side of his left eye. The picture below is Ted going on his first snowmobile ride ever! He is on the snowmobile I grew up riding and had lots of memories on!

We had a nice time eating and opeing presents at my parents and seeing my aunts, uncles, and cousins. Our trip back to Ephrata however was not so great. We ate dinner with my parents, sister and brother in-law and then went to a furniture store that is going out of business. Ted and I would eventually like to get bedroom furniture and a new couch since we've never bought these since being married. Anyway, while at the furniture store, Ted and I discovered we have very different tastes! Haha! Funny but not so funny. So, we did not purchase anything and probably won't for a while until we can come to an agreement. Also, we have kind of been holding off until we figure out where we move next and know the dimensions of the rooms. Back to the story... We never did change Seth's diaper all the while we were at dinner and the furniture store and then we left to drive back to Ephrata from the furniture store. We had to stop for gas and Seth was awake so I decided to go inside and change his diaper and put on his sleeper. Of course however for some unknown reason the gas station had no diaper changing station. I had to change Seth and had no choice but to do it on the floor of the bathroom. I had a little changing pad with me to lay down under him but that didn't help the diaper rash he had. He was screaming and tears were rolling down his cheeks and I felt so bad for him but I just had to keep going all the while being mad that the stupid gas station didn't have a proper place to change him. Ugh. I was mad. I came out of the bathroom and Ted said he could hear him crying. I was so irritated I just said "lets go" and walked straight to the car. The rest of the ride home was fairly silent as I had to get over my being mad. So, mothers out there beware if you have to change your child and you are at a gas station, they may not have what you need!

Christmas at the Eby's

We had a nice Christmas Eve spent at Ted's parents house eating and opening gifts. Seth finally received some toys for a boy his age. I think he was getting tired of the same old dinky newborn toys we had for him. But we didn't want to get others since we knew he would for Christmas! So, thankfully he was gifted some neat interactive toys. Ones that we even like and might have to fight Seth for! Or not since he seems to enjoy things that aren't really gifts; like an empty tissue box, wrapping paper, tissue paper, paper, paper, and more paper!!

Seth playing with his new toy from Grandma & Grandpa Eby

Seth eating paper and about to open a gift with help from Grandma Eby

I'm not sure what that is. At first I thought a yawn but now I don't know!

Seth wearing his Eagles jersey, a Christmas gift from Aunt Melissa!

That night, we left the Eby's at about 10 pm and went back to our apartment to unload our new gifts and pack into the car all of the million and one things you need to take along when you have a baby! We were then off on our hour and a half drive to my parents.

Seth

So, I am finally going to write my first blog! And it is going to be all about Seth! He is seven months now and weighs in at 18 pounds. Some of his favorite things are: staring at the CD player when it is turned on and music is blaring out and smiling at it, looking out the window at all the cars driving by, playing with Ted, Ted & I singing to him, eating tissue boxes & tags on his toys ( I should probably cut them off) staring at the washer & dryer, and taking a bath to name a few.

And here he is:

Just before he spit-up all over the changing pad cover and my sleeve!

This picture looks like he is puffing out his chest like a tough-guy!

Seth was blessed with his two bottom front teeth the day after Thanksgiving when they FINALLY cut through. I will have to try and take a picture sometime of them and then post it here when I do. It may take a while though, it isn't easy trying to show people his teeth. We try to tell him to show us his teeth but for some reason he doesn't understand! Well, if you look close at the picture above you can kind of see them and if not imagine they are there.

Here are a few other pictures of Seth:

That is all for now we will be sure to try and post as often as we can! In case we don't get on here before, MERRY CHRISTMAS!

a funny clip from mad tv

here is a funny clip from mad tv concerning therapy. to be fair my wife thought it was stupid :) Actually I couldn't figure out how post it in this page but here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYLMTvxOaeE

finding a house

Maybe this is normal, but we've been back in PA for about nine months now and have yet to find that house we've been looking for.
We started looking in Lancaster City, which is a relatively small but fun city. Tiffany and I both have friends there, and have lived there in the past so it seemed like a good place to settle in. The other good thing is you can find really cool townhomes there that have a lot of character, such as hardwood floors and exposed brick walls, for relatively cheap. However, after a bit we decided the city might not be the best place to raise a little tyke, who will inevitably want to go outside and play. Then since you probably don't have a yard in the city you end up with your kid playing in the street, or you have to go down to the park every time. The other thing is that the schools in the city are kind of scary. So we realized that the city might not be the best idea after all.
Then for a while we kicked around the idea of going back to Iowa. There were benefits as far as career and eduaction were concerned, and we loved Ames, friends we had there, and Cornerstone church too! We were second guessing ourselves and thinking maybe we moved back home too soon and wished the Iowa-era of our lives could have been a bit longer. After a while we decided to stay put in PA, for the same reasons we originally left Iowa (family). We also didn't want to end up running back out to Iowa just because we had fond memories and hadn't given our life back in PA a chance to fully blossom. It just takes a while to get re-connected where ever you are.
After we decided we were staying in PA for sure, we started looking at houses in the towns surrounding the area where I grew up. Houses outside the city are more expensive, so it's been a little harder finding a house we both like and can afford. There have been several that came close, but we never ended up going through and making an actual offer on anything. So that brings us up to present day, and the search goes on!
We both are really looking forward to finding somewhere more permanent, and just settling in for a while. And just like anything else, I'm sure someday we will look back on the whole process and realize God was leading us and that we learned some good lessons along the way. At least that's the goal!

Our First Blog

So we decided to join the world of blogging, mostly to keep in touch with out-of-state friends. And as an added bonus we will no longer feel like blog stalkers, reading other peoples blogs and never contributing anything of our own! So anyway, here we are!