2 Year Old in the House!!

I'm not sure if I should say Yipppeee! or Yikes! about having a 2 year old in the house?! Ryane is officially 2 today -- Happy Birthday to my little girl!

Let's see, where do I start to catch you up on the little toddler?? Here's my total brag blog on Ryane... Ryane has recently started singing/practicing the ABC's on her own without us prompting her to. It usually comes out "A B Q S W X Y Z, now I know my A B....yeahhh." (see video below) She is also counting a lot more as well. She and I really worked on counting this summer and she just wasn't as interested in it as I was. But, something has now clicked in her head and if she is on a roll, she can count to 5. However, it commonly comes out "1 2 2 4 5 7...yeahhhhh!" or "3 4 5 7 9 10" Not sure if I've blogged about it before, but Ryane adores the #7, so she always makes sure to include it. Ryane is potty-trained and I've very proud of her for that. Her language skills improve every week. She is speaking more clearly each day and is putting 3-4 word sentences together. We hear "I'll do it" a lot. She is also loving all her ba-gillion books. She is always (and I mean always) asking us to "read it, read it". Just last night she was starting to ask me to count things as well.

Now, I will say Ryane is a 2 year old -- meaning, she can really toss in a good ol' let-me-cry-and-throw-myself-on-the-floor-to-make-mommy-feel-bad tantrum. Ohhh, good times!!

My Little Model!

I took Ryane's 2-year old pictures today. She has really been into getting her picture taken since Grady came along. A side-effect that I am VERY happy with. This is our first official photo shoot and she did so good. But, when she was done, she was done!

Now, I say she was good, but she wanted to do her own thing. There was no showing her how to do anything or forcing any props on her. So, there I was asking her what she wanted to pose with and this is what I got. Feel free to let me know your favorite. Maybe after I get through the many, many pictures we took, I will share the whole shoot with you.

Grady - 3 Months Old

Seems like a lot longer than 3 months since Grady has been in our family. He is such a blessing! He has changed so much over the last month. He no longer has colic in the late evenings and is the sweetest, smiliest baby. He enjoys "talking" to us in the evenings. Actually, he is probably just playing with all the slobber in his throat, but I'll take it as talking. :) Grady is also a big bubble blower. It's not uncommon to look at him and he'll have about 1000 bubbles setting on his mouth. He's just pretty darn cute!

Anything for Ryane!!

Being at home with Ryane for the summer gave me a good sense of what she liked to watch on TV, which wasn't much. She did ask for Elmo often. She never really called it Sesame Street, but rather "Elmo" or "Monster" (cookie monster). Matthew and I figured a Sesame Street birthday party would be fun and Ryane would enjoy it.
As I was frosting the cake, Ryane was beside me on her step-ladder watching and asking "What's That?", "What's That?", "What's That?" pointing to all the icing, cake, and everything else around. I answered her other questions but didn't tell her what the cake was. She was guessing it was a hamburger and I just kept frosting away. I had the mouth, eyes, and nose done and started with the red and I hear "ELMO!". All my work was worth it to hear the excitement in her voice.

Last week, we were pretty busy preparing for the party. I was so focused on Ryane's cake and scheduling it with the whole baking it one night, then decorating and such, that I didn't give much thought to anything else. I then realized Ryane needed a themed shirt to wear, so a-shoppin' we went. Couldn't find anything in the store. After looking online I was faced with the fact that it was too late to get a shirt on time without paying like $15 in shipping (ummm, no thanks!) So, I saw the design online and thought "Well, I can do that!" So, I bought the shirt and fabric paint and Viola!, Ryane got her "Monster" shirt. She's always done a good impression of Cookie Monster--as she is doing it in the last picture.

Grady's Baptism

What a special day for Grady and our family. We had Grady's baptism with many family members and some friends present. We chose full immersion for Grady's baptism as Fr. Darren encouraged it and we liked the sybolism of it all - he entered into this world unclothed and he entered into the church unclothed. He was a very good baby for this baptism. Of course he had the uncertain look on his face as Fr. Darren dipped him 3 times, but not a peep from him. I was definitely impressed by Grady - especially since I just woke him up 2 minutes prior. I still have those flashbacks of Ryane crying during 95% of hers. We chose Grady's godparents to be his Uncle Bismark and his Uncle Luther. I'm sure his uncles will always be there for him and will give him good guidance and direction in life.

I just love this picture of Grady's special occasion. I think it really shows the purity of it all. Credits go to Aunt Sherry for taking it.

Party Time

We celebrated Ryane's 2nd birthday party as well while family was in town. She had a great time. Here is Miss Ryane blowing out her candles. This just one of many pictures. I will share more later, possibly after I get a chance to scrap them. Right now, sleep is calling my name....

What's with our garage?

Seems to always be a partily disassembled/assembled mustang setting in it...



Matthew started putting together Ryane's birthday present. I can't wait to see all the fun she has with it. I'm sure she'll probably drive like her mom, so stay off the sidewalks!!!

A Whole Year

It has officially been a whole year since I started our family blog--Happy Anniversary to me! One year and 107 blog posts later, I still feel like there is so much more to share. It has been fun being able to share all the pictures and little happenings in our lives over the last year. I started close to Ryane's first birthday last year and we are closing in on that again. We are having her party this weekend so that means I am going through the fun task of baking and decorating her a cake--an Elmo cake! Wish me luck. We are also having Grady baptized this coming Sunday. If anyone would like to join us, he will be baptized at the Sacred Heart Church at the 11:00am mass. Here he is in his baptism jumper that his Nana made for him.

Fashion Show

I leave the room and come back to hearing Matthew say "Show your mommy". I walk into the room to see this:


Cute board shorts Ryane!! Earlier I had gotten Ryane's baby clothes out to try to find a new home for them. In this picture Ryane has on a pair of 0-3 month pants and they are fitting her! I was pretty amazed. She also has a pair of shorts on underneath that she was wearing. She has a pretty small bum and considering she is wearing big girl undies, it means she wears smaller shorts and pants than she should. We put a pair of jeans on her on Saturday and they want to come down. This winter should be fun dressing her in our pants and jeans selection--she might be wearing "capris" all winter.

Ryane continued with her fashion show by putting on another pair of pants that were out, 0-3 month as well and they are on backwards. Glad we have her around to entertain us.

Scrappin'

Just sharing a couple of recent scrapbook pages with you.

I wouldn't be an ordinary mom if I didn't take bathtime pictures of my baby! Grady tends to enjoy his baths, but gives us the big look of surprise when his bare bum first hits the water. :) We have always included Ryane in Grady's baths from the very first sponge bath we gave him after bringing him home. She has moved into more of an observer than a participant like she used to be. Don't get me wrong, we still have to beg her for the washcloth back now and then.
page credits: free download kit from twopeasinabucket.com and the font is chiller

We attended ESU's first football game a couple weekends ago. It was a Saturday night game. Ryane was really into the game this year and lots more fun. She enjoyed watching the football, guys running, and doing some of the cheers with the cheerleaders. We tell her to say "Go Hornets!!" and it always comes out "Go Cornets!!" She knows who Corky is, so I'm not sure where the C comes from, but we've tried and tried to help her in her pronunciation, but she insists on saying "Cornets". Grady may have had his eyes open for a little bit of the game, but overall, he slept through most of his first ESU football game.

Too early for Halloween Jammies??

Not at our house!! :) I just love the day after holiday sales, or even the week after the holiday sale when "the goods" are even further discounted. I bought Ryane these Halloween pajamas as well as another pair to wear this year. I also got Grady a cute outfit as well. Yes, we just found out we were pregnant last year at that time and I was thinking ahead and buying him things. Can't wait to see what Halloween stuff they have in the stores this year that I can pick up at least 50% off on Novemeber 1st.

Gavin's photo shoot

I feel blessed to be able to take Gavin's newborn photos. You can view them here! I really don't get the opportunity to do many newborn pictures, so it's been fun to have 2 of them in the last couple of months. Here is a first time newborn photo for me. I could never get my kids to curl up, so Gavin showed me what a good baby can do! :)