BUSY BUSY BUSY!!

I have been writing this post for about a month and am just now getting around to finalizing it and posting it...sorry for the delay!! Read on and you will understand why!

April has been one crazy month for us!! Ryan got to meet her 2 cousins, Seth and Brady, when we took a trip to visit Dave's brother, Shaun, his wife Heather, and these two amazing and adorable boys. It was Ryan's first "road trip", and it was definitely a learning experience!

Meeting Seth & Brady for the first time!!

They live near Raleigh, NC, and it is about a 7 hour drive for us. Ryan was fine and dandy for about half of the trip up. But after about 4 hours in her car seat, she started to get restless, fussy, cranky, and hungry. We stopped and spread out a blanket on the grass in the shade of a shopping center and let Ryan crawl, play, climb on daddy, and have some lunch while Dave and I took turns stretching our legs and eating our lunches. It was a fun little family picnic! We hung out for about an hour before packing it all up and strapping the poor babe back into the car seat and heading off down the road...I don't think we made it 20 miles before the meltdown was bad enough to force us to stop again. There was next to NOTHING at the next exit, so we stopped in the parking lot of a dumpy old gas station. Dave walked around with Ryan until she basically fell asleep on his chest...I'd say maybe 45 minutes.

She slept most of the rest of the way, and woke up just as we were pulling onto Shaun and Heather's street. Ryan loved meeting her aunt and uncle! Seth came bounding down the hall to give her a hug, but Brady was much more reserved. He peeked out from his room a couple of times before slowly making the bashful walk into the living room. He gradually warmed up to all of us, and in no time the 3 kiddos were laughing and playing in the floor together.

Aunt Heather

Uncle Shaun

It was so fun to see Ryan with Seth and Brady. She loves "big kids", and she was completely enamored by the boys. Seth and Brady were so good with Ryan.

Cousins!!

Playing with Brady

Our last night in North Carolina

The North Carolina trip was a learning experience for us. It was good because we were traveling somewhere where children lived, so if there was anything that we forgot, Heather was right there to cover us. It was a nice, short trip to ease us into the big, huge road trip we took at the end of April - Georgia to Illinois, Illinois to Iowa, Iowa to Illinois, Illinois to Georgia....

10 days of being "on the road" with a baby!................

And we all survived, quite well I may add! We left Georgia on a Friday morning. Ryan woke up at 5 a.m., so we decided to just roll with it. Dave got her up and fed her breakfast while I got ready and continued packing. (did you know that you have to take everything that you have ever owned with you when traveling with a baby? It sure felt that way, anyhow.) It took us probably a day and a half to pack. We kept making last minute lists of things that we needed to remember to pack. We had to take EVERYTHING because while in Illinois, we would be at my grandparents house, but in Iowa, we would be in a hotel for 4 days. I had to bring everything I would need to wash bottles - dish soap, bottle brushes, drying rack, even a sponge! We had 2 medium sized storage bins filled to the top of things needed to care for a baby.

By 7 a.m., Ryan was just about ready for her morning nap, and we were ready to go! The timing worked out great! We had bought Ryan a new car seat the week before - we learned on the NC trip that she fussed in her seat because she was sick and tired of being strapped in a lay down position for hours on end, so we got her a fancy new seat that can recline or sit up! It is quite an impressive invention! Plus, it converts to a booster for when she is bigger, so it will be her car seat from now until she doesn't need a seat anymore (which I think is 17 years old in Georgia now...just kidding, but just barely).

We stopped at Chik-fil-a for a drive-thru breakfast (our tradition for traveling) and Ryan needed a diaper change before heading off again. She fell asleep pretty quickly after that, as did I! I woke up just as we were coming off of Monteagle (my LEAST favorite part of the trip!!) and Ryan woke up just before Nashville. We needed gas and lunch, so we stopped at Cracker Barrel. We walked around the store for a bit, ate some lunch, walked around some more, then spread a blanket on the ground under a shade tree and let Ryan crawl around, practice standing, and have some juice. Our stop was about 2 hours, which is the amount of time Ryan needs to wear herself out. So we got back in the car and se was asleep in no time! She slept all the way to Southern Illinois!

Papa and Grandma Judy greeted us on the porch. They could not believe how much Ryan had grown! We had a great time in Illinois! As usual, Judy had a huge spread of food prepared for each meal! And we went to the Bonnie Cafe for biscuits and gravy for breakfast (the best ever!) My great-uncle and great-aunt came over one night to meet Ryan. Sunday was Easter, and the Easter Bunny left Ryan some great gifts! Then we went to my old church for service. After church, we all headed to my aunt and uncle's house for Easter dinner - chicken & dumplings, my favorite! All of the food was so yummy, but Dave and I felt like we each gained 20 pounds in 3 days!!

Ryan with her great-great uncle, Jim, and great-great aunt Alana

We woke Ryan up early to open her Easter gifts before church

She looks thrilled...

Reading her Easter card

Great-grandma Judy reading me my bedtime book

Me and my Papa

Here Papa, I will help you read the paper

Monday morning, we packed it all up again and headed on to Iowa. There was lots of flooding, and the Mississippi river spilled over into fields the entire trip up. It rained the whole way. There was literally nothing, and I mean NOTHING, along our route. I think that we were lucky that the road was even paved....it was past lunch time and we desperately needed gas. I had to pull out the GPS to see if there would be anywhere to stop in the next 40 miles before our gas ran out. We stumbled upon a lonely truck stop with a Denny's attached to it. I don't know if I had ever eaten at a Denny's before....

Ryan had some applesauce for lunch and then we walked around the gas station for a while to try to wear her out a little. After we got back in the car, Ryan was a little fussy. After we got down the road a ways, she was absolutely miserable and unconsolable. I told Dave to find a place to pull over for a while as I lifted her out of her seat to hold her....AND.......there was POOP all up the back of her onesie!!! "FORGET IT!! PULL OVER NOW!! PULL OVER NOW!! EMERGENCY! EMERGENCY!!" I screamed. Dave let out an "OH MY!" as he looked back to see what was the matter.

We pulled off on a side road and stopped on the shoulder to take care of things. I had to dig in the back of the car into the mountain of luggage to find Ryan a clean pair of clothes - I usually keep a set in her diaper bag, but for some reason, there was not a change in there when I really needed it! Dave laid Ryan out in the back seat, and poopy diapers, clothes and wipes went flying out the door behind him as he tried to clean her up while I dug for clothes. After I found a change for her, I took over the diaper duty and Dave started bagging the trail of trash and splattered clothes we left in our wake. Needless to say, Ryan was not a happy camper after this little episode (we call it a "Poop Monster") so we had to let her stand in daddy's lap and pretend to drive for about a half hour.

After that debacle, it was pretty smooth sailing to Iowa. (By the way - we were in Iowa because Dave's company's headquarters is there, and he had to attend a 4 day long training class, which just happened to be held in our hotel!)

We had a good time in Iowa. It was cold and rainy the entire trip (except for the day we were leaving, which was gorgeous, of course). Dave had to get up early each morning to get ready to go to his class. We had breakfast with him one morning, and we got to have lunch with him twice. Other than that, Ryan and I just spent our days riding around checking out the area. It was really nice there. Zero traffic, even at rush hour. The people are phenomenal! Everyone is so nice. There are a lot of really nice parks, trails, attractions, kids museums, neat places to shop, historical districts, and beautiful scenery! It is just as green as you could possibly ever imagine, and there are endless barns and old farm houses popping up out of the flat-as-a-pancake fields.

When Dave got out of class each night, we would all get some dinner and then ride around together for a while. Then it was back to the hotel for Ryan's bath and bedtime. Ryan started "cruising" while we were in Iowa. She pulled herself up on the edge of the couch and held on as she walked about 5 steps. What a big girl!!

We left Iowa Friday around 1 p.m. Dave had a half day of class, and I spent the morning packing between sneaking in a little bit of the Royal Wedding here and there. Ryan slept pretty much the entire way back to Illinois. We stopped and walked around a Wal-Mart for a while to get her out of her seat and let her stretch and then we went to a Mexican restaurant to feed her her dinner before getting back on the road. Ryan slept all the way to Illinois after that.

We spent one more day in Illinois before packing it all up once again and heading back to Georgia. (did I mention how LONG it took to pack everything up each time? At LEAST 2 hours, usually more) Ryan was good the whole way home. We did the 2 hour stop at Cracker Barrel again, but other than that, she slept most of the way. She woke up about 45 minutes from the house, and I had to climb in the back seat with her and entertain her.

Now that we are back, it feels almost odd...I became so used to living out of storage bins and making due with what I had that I forgot how to live out of our own house. Ryan has been cutting a tooth, and she is also adjusting to life in the same place each day...she has been a tad difficult. I know that I have not had a lot of patience with her either, so that only makes matters worse. Plus, I'm pretty sure she misses the full attention of adoring grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and Adam Schlag. ;)

Here are some photos from our time in Illinois...

Making cole slaw for the fish fry

Papa frying fish

Papa took us out to the coal miners monument...Old Ben 21 was his mine

His name is on one of the brick (Harvey Lee Conner)

Sitting in Uncle Greg's spot with Aunt Sheila

Hello Adam Schlag

Knife trade

Cousin Lanie

Cousin Leah

Ryan, Robbi, and Papa on Easter Sunday before church

getting up close and personal with Uncle Greg

I love beards, and yours is a really nice one...

Great-great Aunt Delores

Other than all of the traveling, Ryan has been SO busy. Just this month, she has learned to clap her hands when you say "CLAP!!", she is starting to wave hello, she has started crawling and pulling up all by herself, she says "MAMA" but only when she really feels like it, and she can go from laying down to sitting up all by herself. She says "ba" most of the time. We don't really figure that she is trying to say a word, it is just the only sound she really knows how to make and she fascinates herself with it.

For Mother's Day, Dave, Ryan, Grimm, Tonka and I went to the park and had a great walk that afternoon. Ryan, Grimm, and Tonka got me tickets to see Alison Krauss at the Fox Theater in August. Ryan has some little toy stuffed flowers that she "gave" to me, instead of spending the money on real flowers (I am trying to save every dime possible right now!) Dave gave me the first season of Parks and Rec on DVD (my favorite show). We have been watching episodes at night after Ryan goes to bed.

Well, that is all I am going to write for now. Hopefully I will be able to write more soon :)

~robbi

6 months already?? Almost 7!!

Hi there! Sorry my mom doesn't write on here very often...I keep her pretty busy :)

Ryan celebrated 6 months on February 27th, and she had her 6 month doctor visit the following day. The baby next to us in the waiting room was only 2 days older than Ryan, and the two little girls enjoyed looking at each other and reaching for one another. Ryan weighed 17lbs, 12 oz and was 26 inches long. I was surprised....she is a little chunker, and I was expecting 19 or 20 pounds, but what do I know?!

She got 3 more shots. It was not as bad this time as it was the first or 2nd time. She was fairly happy and alert the day of the appointment, and she only cried as she was being stuck and she was pretty much fine after the stick. The doctor is always totally enamored with little Ryan (it is understandable - she is irresistibly cute) and this time was no different. When we told her that Ryan has started having tantrums when a toy is taken away or falls out of her hands, the doctor lit up and exclaimed "That is GREAT!! That is a 9 month milestone!!!" I am happy that she is "advanced"...but come on....of all things to be advanced at, she chooses throwing fits. How nice.

Don't get me wrong, Ryan is still a happy baby. But for several weeks there, she was teething, and was basically a completely different child. She was extremely fussy, and completely pitiful. Her poor gums were hurting her so badly, and she didn't understand what was going on. I try to be completely patient with her and do all I can to make her feel better, but a screaming inconsolable baby can really take a toll on the nerves!

She has 2 teeth now, the bottom middle two. After she cut those two teeth, we started to see her coming back around to her happy, playful self. She started refusing food at one point, which was completely frustrating and heartbreaking for me. I had force feed her through screams and tears several times, but gave that up in a hurry. I figure she won't STARVE, and there is no point in making mealtime a miserable experience. She still took a bottle, so I knew she was at least getting the nutrition she needed.

What? No food??

I suppose that she was not eating due to her teeth hurting her, however - I started making all of her baby food with all organic fruits and veggies. I don't think that is why she was not eating, but perhaps the change in flavors made her uneasy. I have been reading and researching a lot on health and food lately, and without getting on a soapbox here, basically we have decided to eat as organically as possible. I just want to have as much control over the things we are eating as possible and not eat a bunch of junk food with ingredients that we can't even pronounce. We are transitioning slowly - it will be years before we are ultimately where I would like to be, but I can already tell a difference just in the past several weeks. It helps out at the grocery store too! Since the healthy and organic food is more expensive, I am much more careful about what I buy and don't make a bunch of impulse buys. I just get what we need and that's all.

Ryan's favorite foods so far are bananas with berries, and squash. I have been trying to get her to 3 spoon meals a day, and then bottles after and in between. I found some organic baby crackers that basically dissolve in your mouth, and she LOVES them. I love them too, because they keep her VERY happy and entertained in her highchair, giving me a window of time to do dishes, cook, clean, etc. It is adorable and amazing to watch her look for the cracker pieces on her tray, reach for them, wrap her little hand around a piece, and put it into her mouth. She is very smart, and figures these things out in no time flat!

Ryan likes to play with her toys, but she seems to like to play with things that are not meant to be toys even more. Her absolute favorite thing is paper. She loves to crinkle it and tear it in her little hands. We have to really watch her if she gets a piece, because everything goes straight into her mouth, and paper will get soggy and eventually fall apart and could be swallowed. She likes to chew on rubber spatulas, and mommy's phone is especially captivating.

Did I mention how EASY sitting up is?? Why does everyone think it's such a big deal?

Ryan has discovered how to bounce in her excersaucer. It is SOOO cute. She gets the biggest grin on her face and jumps up and down, bouncing away. She will do it for about 10 to 15 minutes before she gets tired of it and wants to be picked up. She knows what the word "bounce" means, and if you tell her to bounce, she gets really excited and jumps, jumps, jumps!

Me and Brother Grimm...he's so handsome!

Ryan had her 6 month photo shoot a few weeks ago. I took her to the same girl that did her newborn photos. I know that I could have just done them myself, but this photographer has TONS more studio supplies than I do, and I really just wanted to sit back and let someone else do it anyhow. My friend, Brianna, went with me. I invited her because she is an aspiring photographer, and I thought that the experience would be helpful for her. She ended up being a HUGE help - getting Ryan to smile, holding her for me when I was busy fetching something, helping pick outfits and backdrops....we had a lot of fun. Ryan was "okay" during the photos....not GREAT, but not horrible either. She doesn't LOVE the camera, which is unfortunate for me, since I take a zillion pictures of her.

A few of my 6 month photos

My photography business is starting to get more and more attention. I have had several people book sessions, and lots of emails inquiring about my services. I have been going out and shopping for supplies for my studio - I have backdrops, flooring options, and lots of cute headpieces for babies. It has been a lot of fun gathering these things, and Ryan has been modeling for me so I can test everything out.

Modeling for mommy

On March 6th, we were "Welcomed Home" at our church. We have been going there over 6 months, but it was never officially announced that it was our home church. Over the past month or so, we have had new members declare it as their home church each Sunday. The pastor would call them to the front to welcome them home. It is kind of a new thing I guess, and since they never officially did it for us, they did it then.

Dave is working a lot, as usual, but he is finally in a position that he really enjoys. I am usually starting dinner when he gets home, and he spends time with the babe while I finish that. Then we eat together, and then it is time to start the baby's nightly routine - eating spoon food, a few minutes of playtime, bath, bottle, and (hopefully) bedtime. There is so much going on all of the time that the days seem to fly by.

Still no sleeping through the night. She made it from 11-7 one night last week, but then she was up once every hour the very next night. We are frustrated about it, but we will make it. It's hard because I have tried everything I can think of...we started her back on cereal in her bedtime bottle, and she will take it now. (she refused it when we tried a while back). We make sure that she has a super full tummy by bedtime. We wear her out completely - she is almost falling over asleep at bedtime some nights. We have tried different types of outfits for her to sleep in, thinking maybe she is uncomfortable, hot, cold, etc. I prop a toy up next to her to trick her into thinking that it is one of us laying with her. We have had her in the crib and in our bed. We have a humidifier, a fan, a white noise machine....she just can't quite make it through the night. She sleeps good in the morning, however. She will sleep from 4-10am most mornings. We just need to back that up a little...10-6 would be just about perfect.

Guess what? I'm gonna be crawling ANY day now!!

Ryan is READY to crawl. She wants to SO badly. She pushes up on her hands and knees and tries SO very hard to move, but just can't quite figure it out. She does the "inchworm" and wiggles on her belly to get around. She will also roll across the room to get to what she wants! (usually Grimm's tail!)

Right now, Ryan's thing is "ROAR!" Daddy like to lay with her and make lion and dinosaur sounds, and she will do it back to you - completely intentional. So, technically, she is kind of "talking" already....her first non-official word is ROAR. Sometimes it is a little scary in the middle of the night...she sounds a little possessed, quite frankly.

I started giving Ryan apple juice in a sippy cup. The first few days I would hold it for her and show her how to use it, then I started just putting it on her tray in front of her. She grabs it and gets it to her mouth, no problem, but she can't quite yet understand that she has to tilt it UP to get the juice out. She is getting there though!

"Walking" to my bath!

She is out of her baby tub and onto the regular bathtub! Baths are SO much quicker and easier now! Dave and I don't have to traipse all over the house collecting bath supplies anymore. It is all in one place and can stay there. She can splash all she wants, and it doesn't make a huge mess across the kitchen floor. We have a couple of bath toys for her, but after a week or so, I took them away - she throws one hellacious fit when it is time to get out and you have to take her toy away, so to solve that problem, I just don't give her a toy in the first place :) She entertains herself by splashing. She stills loves her bath! It's the "afterbath" that she hates...especially the nose cleaning!

A few more shots that I just LOVE from Ryan's 6 month photo shoot

THE END!

It's been a while!

Well, it has been a very long time since I have paid any attention to this poor blog. Understandably, I have had my hands full! Taking care of our little Ryan is a full time job! So much has been going on, that when I do get a free minute or two, blogging is the farthest thing from my mind.

Ryan had her first Halloween. She was a skunk, and it was absolutely adorable. It was so much cuter in person than any of the pictures can possibly show. I could just imagine her getting up and scampering around like a little Pepe LePew, complete with fun sound effects, but unfortunately she can't walk yet and it never happened...it played out many many times in my head though. We carved pumpkins like we do every year, gave out candy to trick-or-treaters and had some home made vegetable beef stew at mom's house. No big annual Halloween party at the Sullivan house this year. Too much going on to throw something like that together. We did, however, get half of our pumpkins stolen from the front yard, leaving me FUMING. We took Ryan up to a pumpkin patch to get some pictures in her skunk outfit as well.

Daddy carved Ryan her very own punkin...

At the pumpkin patch

My Halloween outfit

Ryan also had her first Thanksgiving. We did it at mom's house this year. We stripped her down, sat her in her highchair and plopped some mashed potatoes on her tray for her to play with, but she never really took to them. We would put some on our fingers and put it in her mouth, but most of the potatoes ended up on her chest. She really liked the gravy however. She was a good sport about all of it and let me get some super cute pictures.

Playing with my food

Bashful

Thanksgiving nap after all of that food!

Thanksgiving ended up being a really horrible day for Dave and I. We found out that a good friend of ours died in a horrible car accident the day before Thanksgiving. We went to his brother's house that evening to hang out with friends, and to offer support to the family. It still doesn't seem real. I won't get too into it, because I want this post to stay positive...

Black Friday was also a hard day. We didn't get on the road until later than I would have liked, and ended up getting to the outlet mall around 1:00. I have never had a bad experience on Black Friday, but my nerves were shot and people just seemed 1000 times more rude to me because of the baby stroller. I ended up crying on Dave's shoulder in the middle of the mall.

Our tradition is to stop at the Christmas tree farm on the way home from the outlet mall on Black Friday to cut our own tree, but it was cold and rainy, the baby was tired and I was fried, so we just came on home. I never really got in the mood to get a tree, so I sent Dave out on his own to get one....that's right...I didn't go. He picked one out all by himself. He did a really great job too. All of the tree lots around here only carry Douglas Firs, which aren't my favorite, but as far as Douglas Firs go, Dave got a good one :) It took a couple of days to get it lit and decorated, but the task was finally completed, and Ryan just loved to look at it.

Ryan got a package in the mail one day with a sweet little sheep ornament in it from Aunt Heather, Uncle Shaun, and her cousins Seth and Brady. She "put it on the tree herself".

Ryan was baby Jesus in the Christmas Program at our church. She LOVES going to church. She really likes the music and singing, plus she gets to wear fancy dresses and she LOTS of attention. Dave and I were Joseph and Mary in the Program. I sang a solo and Dave just had to gaze at me and the baby lovingly :) Ryan was SO good the whole time! During the first 4 songs, Jesus hadn't been born yet, so Dave had her in the back of the church. Them the 5th song was my solo I sang as a pregnant Mary and a lady in the church held Ryan in the back while Dave came out to get me to take me to "give birth". At the end of my song, I walked out of the sanctuary, took my baby bump off, grabbed the baby Jesus, and we had to walk up the aisle as a family while the choir sang. Ryan had fallen asleep while she was in the back, and she slept through half of the play. When she woke up, her eyes SHOT open and she had an extremely mad look on her face...she had slept though her 2 favorite parts - the angels dancing in their flowy white gowns, and her friend Mr. Moe singing a solo. She was visibly upset, but she contained herself and never cried. She was awake for the rest of the Program, and she was perfect the whole time (fitting, since she was portraying Jesus, haha). After the Program, I think that every single person in attendance came up to see her and tell her how good she was! Lots of people said that she was such a good baby, and the best baby Jesus that they had ever seen! Several guests asked how old "he" was, and they were surprised to learn that this Jesus was a girl!

Ryan got to go see Santa at our church. She sat on his lap and let me get a few pictures...

Ryan had a good first Christmas. Daddy got us an ornament that is a little silver shoe with Ryan's name, birthday, birth weight and length on it and it says "Baby's First Christmas". We will keep it always!

We got up on Christmas morning and had Ryan open a very special present first thing...it was a pink Bebe Pod seat, which helps her sit up by herself! She sat in her seat for quite a while and opened some gifts and watched us open a few. Ryan enjoyed the shiny bows on packages the most. I tried to put lots of curly ribbons on her presents so she could grab at them with her hands. She would actually rip the wrapping paper herself, but we had to help her get the gift out. Besides her seat, she got the book Goodnight Moon and a few toys. She got lots of clothes and toys from the Illinois and North Carolina families.

New seat!

New penguin friend!

New whale friend!

My Weebles!

We went to my parent's house in the afternoon and Ryan got more gifts there. Her favorite so far is a little mermaid girl that was in her stocking. We gave her a sample of baby food at dinner - peaches, of course, for a little Georgia Girl! She did okay eating it, but again, her favorite was the gravy. I didn't give her very much as to not upset her little tummy!

Merry Christmas from the Sullivans!

It started snowing in the afternoon on Christmas, and left several inches on the ground the next day. We suited up the baby in her little snow suit and went outside for 10 minutes or so, just to snap a few pictures of Ryan's first snow day!! She didn't love it, nor did she hate it...she just cooperated for the pictures, never really smiling, never crying.

Me and Mommy

My brothers are so handsome!

My Daddy is handsome too!

Two days after Christmas, Ryan had her 4 month visit at the doctor. She has grown so much!! She was very good for the doctor, but she had to get 2 shots, and of course she did not like it. It was much easier than last time, though. She cried for a few minutes, but was pretty much okay by the time we got in the car, and she was out like a light after we got on the road. She felt fine for the rest of the day, maybe just a little worn out from the crying. The doctor said that she is pretty advanced and is doing a lot of things that are considered 6 month milestones.

Ryan is getting so big. She weighs 15 lbs, 11 oz. She is 24 inches long (that's 2 whole feet!) And her head was 42 cm around.

The doctor gave us the green light to start cereal and baby food. I mixed up some cereal for her, and there really wasn't much to it and she didn't really like it. She didn't get upset about it, she just wouldn't swallow it. The directions on the box have you thin it out with formula so much that it is basically like trying to feed her formula with a spoon...it ended up all down her front side. Dave and I made her some cereal 2 more times, but we kept getting the same results.

Cereal is not very good

So after some poking around on the internet, we decided to go ahead with baby food and just skip the cereal phase...lots of people on the internet said they did the same thing and that cereal really doesn't have a much nutritional value anyhow, it is just filler and apparently a lot of babies don't like it.

We stripped Ryan down and sat her in her Pod seat, since she is still small and kind of slumps over in her high chair. We gave her sweet potatoes, and she could not eat them fast enough!! She LOVED them! (I didn't think they were so bad either, haha!) She would actually grab the spoon out of my hand and SHOVE it in her mouth! The first time she ate baby food, it went everywhere...she likes to stick her hands in her mouth while she still has food in there, so it gets all over her hands, and from her hands it goes to her eyes, cheeks, legs, hair, chest, and Pod seat! We are all starting to get the hang of the baby food now, and the ratio of food IN her belly compared to the food ON her belly is much, much better now! She has had sweet potatoes, peaches, and peas....and can you believe that PEAS are her favorite, and PEACHES are her least favorite?!?! I think that the peaches are a bit sour for her. But she sure does love her peas! Hardly ANY peas get spilled or spit out! This makes me so happy that she likes her veggies!!

Sweet potatoes!!

Yes, they are good!

Ryan is so much fun and can do so many things! She is using her hands - she can grab a toy in front of her and shake it or bring it up to her mouth. She can also move a toy from one hand to the other. She still doesn't have a lot of interest in rolling over (I think she could if she wanted to though) but she can lay on her tummy and lift herself all the way up with her arms and hold her head up and look at you. She will sit in her highchair for a half hour or so and play with a toy on her tray. She will look at you when you talk to her and she recognizes Mommy and Daddy's voices. She giggles and "talks" a lot. She will lay in her crib and have an entire conversation with her hands. Oh, and she sucks her thumb...great. I am not very happy about that, but we will break her of it before she gets too big! She drools constantly, so she has to wear bibs. She likes the sound of laughter, and she is still in LOVE with music! She still likes Justin Bieber, but she likes bluegrass now, anything with a BANJO!! She still loves her bath time, and we had to take out the "baby bumper" in the bottom, so now she just sits in the whale tub with no seat. She can stand up from a seated position all on her own, you just have to hold her hands for balance. She loves to stand - she is SO strong, she just doesn't have the balance down yet, so you still have to hold onto her.

She likes beards - she likes to touch daddy's beard, and our friends Mikey Sullo and Mike Conkin both have some facial hair and she just loves to look at them and smile. She can focus on objects. She likes to look at the dogs, Brother Grimm will let her pet him on the head, and Brother Tonka still gives her lots of kisses. She is going through a "Daddy Phase" right now, where if she is upset, nothing will do except Daddy. She goes to sleep on him much faster than she will on me. She typically wakes up pretty happy, and when you walk up to pick her up, she smiles, smiles, smiles when she sees your face.

She is in 3-6 month clothes, but will move on to 6 month clothes very soon! We had to do an emergency trip to the store the day after Christmas because she woke me up in the middle of the night and she was VERY upset about something. I took her to change her diaper and her back was soaking wet! Her diapers were just too small, so we had to run out and get the next size up.

After her nap one day several weeks ago, I found her with her head squished up in the corner of her cradle with her little body all cock-eyed staring at me as if to say "GET ME OUT OF HERE!" So after that, I went straight to the store to get her some sleep sacks and I put her sleep positioner in the cradle. I am petrified of SIDS, so no more blankies in the cradle with her and she has to sleep in her positioner, which keeps her from rolling over or wiggling around too much in her sleep.

For Ryan's first New Years Eve, we stopped and got a few sparklers and some Megamillions tickets (Dave informed me that we did not win by telling me that he would be going back to work next week...boo) The 3 of us went out to eat with our friends Mike and Jayme Conkin, who will have a little one of their own next year for Ryan to play with!! Hooray for playmates! After dinner, we came home and lit a few sparklers for Ryan - she liked to look at them, but didn't quite know what to think. She just stared blankly, never smiled, never cried. She fell asleep around 10:30, but Mommy and Daddy stayed up to see the ball drop, and went straight to bed after midnight!

Hmmm...what is that?

Sparklers!

Well, that pretty much brings us up to date. Here are just some fun pictures...

Mommy, Ryan, and the boys

What a face!

Checking out her crocheted dress from Grandma Judy

We have had Daddy home from work with us since Christmas Eve, and he goes back on the 4th. We have LOVED having him home and are going to miss him horribly when he has to go back :( He has been a big help around the house, and we have gotten a lot of things done that have been on our "To-Do" list for a long time now.

~the Sullivans