Cousins

My nephew Hunter, who is 3 1/2, is over playing this morning, and he and Addie play really good together. I made some little cinammon rolls this morning, and there were two left. Addie ran in the kitchen and saw them on the counter, and I watched her out of the corner of my eye as she dragged her stool over and got them both down, then ran into the playroom and said, "Here Hunter, you eat cinnamon roll." Hunter said, "Oh, thank you, Addie," and he came into the kitchen and said, "Aunt Missy, do you always have cinnamon rolls?" I smiled and said no, they were just for today. Addie said, "Aunt Missy, this is delicious!". I like the idea of being the aunt who always has something yummy at her house.

We moved Addie from her crib into a queen bed two nights ago. She was very excited and has been fine in it - no random nightime wanderings or late-night playing (yet). She especially likes that I can lay down next to her and hug her at night instead of just leaning over a crib. We are going to move the changing table into Ryan's room to make it a little more like a baby room. And we're moving the playroom into the office, and vice versa. At least it will give me a chance to take inventory of everything we have and clean stuff out, which I need to do about every 6 months or so.

Memorial Day travels

Hmm, let's see....I guess I will start with the most recent and then add things as I think of them.

We spent 4 days in Dallas last week, visiting my Dad and his wife, and then over to my mom's to see her, my brother and sis-in-law, and two nieces. Addison loved Grandpa's pool, even though it was cold! In the 45 minutes she swam, she was already jumping off the side of the pool holding her swim ring and nothing else. It took us all summer last year to work up to that, and here she is on day one ready to go! Our neighborhood does a month long session of swim lessons, starting in two weeks, and I have signed her up. I will chill with Ryan in the baby pool while the coaches teach her to swim, and I think it will be great. My family always spent a lot of time in the water and I want my kids to be happy and comfortable around the pool.

My dad and his wife Patricia watched the kids while Matt and I met my brother and his wife Erica to go to Six Flags for the day. It was the longest we'd left Ryan before, and the first time my dad has watched a baby since I was little! Six Flags was fun. We thought we would miss the crowds since school was still in and it wasn't quite the weekend, but there were lots of band kids and other school groups. The big roller coasters had lines, but there were still a few we could just walk on with no wait. Man, we must be getting old, because those big coasters were not nearly as fun as they used to be. The Texas Titan almost made us black out because of the G's while whirling around and around. And I thought my teeth were going to rattle out of my skull on the Giant.....way too bumpy and jerky and painful. But it was nice to spend time with my brother, who lives in New Mexico.

The kids did great with my dad. Ryan chilled out the whole time, which I believe is because he was getting sick. He had 102 degree fever Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It finally broke Sunday afternoon. He had runny nose, but no other real symptoms besides decreased appetite, so I wasn't too nervous, but he slept and slept and just was not himself at all for a few days. And no teeth yet.

We then went to my mom's house. My niece Camryn, who is 5, flew all by herself on the plane from New Jersey to spend a couple of weeks with my mom. And my brother has a baby girl who is three weeks younger than Ryan. She is TINY. She weighs about 12.5 pounds at 7 months! I think Ryan is almost 19 pounds. But baby Sarah is vocal and flirty and grabby and very active. I think she was working on crawling for the first time - probably by today she's going. She and Ryan were standing up at the little play table together, and Sarah let out a loud screech, and Ryan, who had been enjoying watching her, crumpled his face and cried because he was scared! What a weenie! It was really funny though. We went to the zoo and Addison had her very first pony ride ever! She loved it.

Matt, Camryn, Addison, and Uncle Patrick

Aunt Erica and Baby Sarah





Pigtails and hats

Addison and Camryn were joined at the hip the entire time. I barely saw Addie at all. And when I did see her, she was copying Camryn in every way, shape, and form. She wanted to wear the same thing, do the same thing, play the same way, eat the same food from the same type of plate, drink the same beverage from the same type of cup, and of course, say everything Camryn said. Addie just blindly repeated everything that came out of Cammie's mouth, whether she understood it or not. We had a big fit once when Cammie was eating an apple. Addison is too little to take bites from a whole apple, so my mom was going to cut it into slices, but that was simply unacceptable to Addison. She cried and cried about wanting a "whole apple", so Mom finally cut the apple in half and carved out the core part, then held it up so it looked like a whole apple, and Addie took it and ate it that way. She was having a few two-year-old moments, and actually has been a little naughty for the past couple of weeks.

We are seeing a lot of testing, and some talking back going on. She is so much more aware and cognizant of everything and is becoming less "directable" by us every day. But she is still very funny and so cute. At my dad's, she whined about not wanting milk and started to scream and cry. So I gave her some milk anyway and told her she didn't have to drink it. She immediately picked up the cup and guzzled the milk. I said, "You told Mommy that you didn't want milk. Remember? You cried about not wanting milk. I remember, it was just one minute ago." And the little stinker looked right at me and said, " Yes, I remember, I went like this - WAAAHHHHH!!!!" And then she smiled. I was so surprised, and I looked up at Matt to make sure I had just heard her say that. He was as shocked as I was! Naughty!

Ryan is crawling all over and can now crawl up the stairs, so it's a good thing we have those gates permanently installed. I also need to gate off the den because of the little step down, and/or teach him how to crawl down it so he doesn't splat on his face. Yesterday we stood him up on his walk/push toy, and he took his first walking steps while pushing it. He is also a big eater and big in general. He will clap his hands if you do it first, and still thinks Addie hung the moon. She is becoming more used to him, but still grouches at him a lot for getting close to her things.

Short video of Ryan's walking

Our neighbor behind us had some guys fix our shared back fence that blew over during the hurricane. We just never got around to finding someone, and neither did they, but now it's finally fixed and looks great. Matt told the guy several times that we were going to split the cost of the new fence, to which our neighbor replied, "Don't worry about it, I'll pay for it. I'm pretty sure I make more money than you do." How does one respond to that? I immediately started looking around our backyard to see what would give him the idea that we were poor! Of course, he is probably right about making more money, and it was very nice of him to pay for the fence, but still. We were going to write him a check anyway, but he said if Matt would water seal the whole thing, we could call it even. That will be next weekend's project.

Here is a picture of Addison being silly. She found her Easter bunny and wanted it all wrapped up. Then she wanted herself all wrapped up.

We are headed to a pool party today with some people from church, and it looks to be beautiful! I am waiting for more pictures to be uploaded from family members, so I may post some more of the kiddos from last week.

Ryan's Croaking

Ryan has still be sleeping sporadically lately. Now that he can sit himself up, he will sit up and cry because he doesn't really know how to lay back down. We would go in and lay him down on his tummy in the middle of the night, but for the past couple of nights we have just been letting him cry and figure out how to go back to sleep. I remember Addie doing the same thing- getting stuck sitting up. Well, today he woke up crying for about 30 minutes at 5:30, but then went back to sleep, and just now, at 8:00, is starting to make noise. And what a noise it is. You know that croaking, squeaking noise you can make while you're inhaling? That is Ryan's noise of choice (Addie started babbling right at this age), so I can hear him on the monitor sounding like that ghost thing out of "The Grudge". What happened to the baby coos?

Side note: I just did a YouTube search for a clip of The Grudge sound, so that you could all hear it. Apparently, there are several babies that also make this noise. Babies are silly!

He is crawling all over creation, into the kitchen and pantry, and pulling up on whatever he can grab ahold of. He wants to follow us so badly, and when we quickly walk out of a room, he starts crying hard and crawling as fast as his tiny arms and legs can go after us. It is very sad and cute.