Saturday, December 24, 2011

8 Months

8 months young - 12/18/2011
My little guy is 8 months young and an 18.5 lb ball of energy!  10 days after he turned 7 months he started crawling and has kept us on the run ever since.  He wants to see and touch everything!  There's no stopping this little guy.  If we walk out of the room he quickly follows us, it's amazing how fast he can crawl, AND he loves to stand.  He's constantly grabbing hold of a chair or ottoman or our legs and pulling himself up to a standing position.  This made taking his 8 months pictures very challenging....we couldn't keep him in the chair!


I must stand mommy 12/18/2011
tippy toes
Don't let the elephant get me mommy!  Really I'm just trying to keep him in the chair...
Suspicious  12/18/2011

Ok I guess I'll play along, smile and wave!


It's been a very busy month.  There was the last UT tailgate, Thanksgiving, Ry's baptism, a visit from Unkie Bob & Aunt Janie, holiday parties and pictures with Santa!  Whew, no wonder it's taken me so long to post this blog.

Mommy and Ry at the last tailgate of the season 11/19/2011
Conflicted?
Fun with daddy
That iPad tastes great! 11/20/2011
Unkie Bob & Aunt Janie happened to be in Texas and stopped by one evening to visit.  Aunt Janie got a kick out of Ry, this was their first meeting.  Ry just loved her iPad and Janie enjoyed letting him play with it.  He even let Aunt Janie feed him peas for dinner!
Visiting with Unkie Bob and Aunt Janie 11/20/2011

Ry's been doing well with his foods, he's finishing up stage 2 foods and loves his puffs.  He's finally starting to like yogurt melts and he loves chewing on the occasional pizza crust.  ;)  We've also given him banana wafers and biter biscuits, but those are pretty messy.  Just the other day we gave him his first taste of Salt Lick and he LOVED it!  He went to town on turkey, brisket and some mashed taters.  Ry also loves to drink out of our cups.  Whenever he can get a hand on our water cup he'll sip out of it like a big boy.  Of course most of the time he uses his sippy cup.  He loves carrying it in-between his teeth while he's crawling.  One of these days I'll remember to take a picture of that, it's quite entertaining.
Ready to ride! 12/3/2011

Speaking of teeth, Ryland now has 5!.  His top two teeth poked through about a week ago, and now he's got another one poking through to the right of his top 2 teeth.  I can't believe how many teeth he has so soon!  He really doesn't like us trying to look at them as you can tell from previous pictures/posts.  All this teething has taken a toll on our sleep.  There's been quite a few nights within the past few weeks that he's woken up and needed comfort, Tylenol, a bottle or just plain didn't want to sleep.  Sigh....

I want that red ball! 12/3/2011
Ry and Santa 12/10/2011
All decked out for the holidays 12/10/2011
Even reindeer feet need sleep 12/17/2011
Ryland is very active, vocal and inquisitive.  You can tell that he's trying to figure out how things work.  He loves touching objects and faces.  In fact when Opa holds him, Ry will touch his mouth looking for a mustache, he knows a male is holding him but that he doesn't have daddy's mustache.  Ry makes all sorts of sounds, and we both swear we've heard him say 'mom' or 'mama' and of course 'dada'.  But this could just be normal baby babble.  Ryland definitely knows who his parents are and he makes it well known when he wants us to hold him versus other family or friends.  Right now Ry is all about daddy and will crawl out of my arms to get to him.  Unfortunately for daddy this means he's putting Ry to sleep most nights.  Mommy is a bit jealous.


Rub-a-dub-dub, 1st bath in a real bathtub 12/17/2011

Monday, December 12, 2011

All I want for Christmas are my 2 front teeth!

Guess what broke through the surface a few days ago?  2 front teeth!  Finally snagged a picture.

Before - Dad helping Ry show his teeth.  Ha!

After - happy Ry 12/12/2011

Gobble Gobble Gobble

It's been so busy around here I totally forgot to post about Thanksgiving!  We celebrated with the Maleks on Thanksgiving and the Freunds a couple days later.  

Presenting - my little turkey.


Cousins Ry and Blake 11/24/2011

Al & Isabel w/ Ry and Blake


GOBBLE GOBBLE GOBBLE


Sunday, December 11, 2011

Ry meets Santa Claus!

As this is Ry's first Christmas, Santa pictures are a must.  Thankfully our clubhouse throws a holiday party every Dec, including free pictures with Santa!  I love the fact that it's only 1 minute away from our house, no lines, free Olive Garden lunch, and plenty of parking.  :)  Definitely worth it!

Ryland and Santa Claus 12/10/2011

Evan, Emma, Ry with Santa



Opa &Juju & Ry w/ Santa

Baptized


The Sunday following Thanksgiving we had Ryland baptized at our church.  Several family members flew in that week to celebrate the holiday and to witness Ry's baptism.  Great Great Aunt Deanie was thrilled to finally meet Ryland and we named my brother Steve and his wife Christina as godparents.  Ry did great during the baptism and we celebrated afterwards at our home with family, friends, Rudy's BBQ and cake.  :)



"sprinkling"





Godparents Steve & Christina


Scandalous cousins!

Blake and Ry 11/27/2011

Holding his very own bible, wearing his bracelet engraved with his name

Monday, November 28, 2011

Look who's crawling!

Look who's figured out how to crawl!  :)  We were hanging out at Opa and Juju's, spending the evening with Great Great Aunt Deanie before she flies out tomorrow, when Ry surprised us all.  Ryland got his groove on.
7 months and 10 days old - 11/28/2011  

Distracted by the doggie

Sunday, November 20, 2011

7 Months

7 months young - 11/18/2011
It's crazy how fast the year has gone by.  November is almost over and Ryland is now 7 months young!  Much has happened since our last monthly update.  As you can see by the many mini posts and pictures, Ry has been busy.  He now weighs 18lbs, cut two teeth by the end of October and is working on a third one that looks like the tip of a canine peaking through his upper gums.  

Excited!
Happy and giggly
Pensive
Surprised
Grrrr baby - 11/18/2011
Ryland's personality is really showing through, I just love all his expressions.  He now has this grrrr face where he bares his teeth and squinches up his nose and eyes when he smiles.  It's super cute and I managed to capture it above.  And as you can see he's up on all fours and rocking.  He's managed to move his hand forward one or two steps, but he hasn't quite learned to move his knees as well.  It's only a matter of time and we'll have a crawler on our hands!
Standing in my crib - 11/6/2011
Ryland mastered sitting up by the time he was 6 months old.  Now he's onto pulling up!  We were upstairs going through Ry's clothing when I heard my husband say OMG.  I turned around to find our munchkin standing in his crib!  This was the first time we'd caught him pulling up.  We sat him back down in the crib and watched to our amazement as he maneuvered himself over to the rails, grabbed a hold and hauled himself up.  It was definitely time to lower the mattress.  He now tries to pull up on anything and everything.  Josie plopped down beside Ry and he pulled up on her, and just today he inch wormed his way over to me and pulled himself up on my leg!

Flying Monkey 10/22/2011
Halloween is quite the experience over at our house!  If you saw some of the previous posts then you know we go all out with decor and our annual Spooktacular party (<-- click link for pictures).  I was super excited to dress up Ry in costume and show him off.  We decided to go with the Wizard of Oz theme and bought his costume a week before work announced that our org was to transform into characters from the Wizard of Oz and each team/row was to represent a scene from the movie.  Was that a spooky coincidence or what!?  :)  Ry was a pro, he was great the entire time and really hit it off with my colleagues.

Boo! 10/26/2011

Sweet potatoes! 10/23/2011
Our guy has turned into quite the eater.  It took him a couple weeks before he realized he liked this new food from a jar.  Now he eats everything, including peas!  For breakfast he has rice cereal and a bottle, then his next meal is usually a fruit jar followed by another bottle, then in the afternoon he has a veggie and a bottle, and before bed we give him more rice cereal and a bottle.  This little guy can eat!  We just finished up the stage 1 jars and are now beginning stage 2.
Its a good thing we upped his solid food intake.  A couple weeks ago Ry kept waking up in the middle of the night hungry.  This was very unusual as he'd been sleeping through the night for months.  I hadn't been reading my baby book the past few weeks so I got it back out and caught up to his current week.  That's when I realized we hadn't been feeding him enough!  Since remedying that he's gotten back to his 8pm-6am sleep routine.
Chillin' on the way to Wurstfest - 11/5/2011
Ryland is a very energetic baby.  He loves his jumper and walker and is quite the little socialite.  We've taken him to several UT tailgates and he joined in on our celebration of sausage at Wurstfest.  He's just too cool in those glasses.  He loves watching everything going on around him and doesn't want to miss anything.  He's quite the charmer and has admirers everywhere we go.  Just look at that face!    
Conflicted? 11/19/2011