Naptime

or rather Playtime! ...

Ryan played in his bed for about an hour this afternoon when he was supposed to be taking a nap - jumping as if his bed were a trampoline, painting with his spit, waving hello, talking off the hook, playing with his pillow, and smiling - so I got out the camera and captured some of it on video.

Finally, he wore himself out and fell fast asleep though ... thank goodness as he would have been miserable at our cookout at Pop's house later. Now he will be refreshed and ready to go :)

Smitten!

There are three little things {among many, many others} that I LOVE about being a mom: (1) a clean baby, or if I must, little boy, at the end of a fun-filled day, (2) that smells of Johnson & Johnson Baby Lotion, and (3) is wearing adorable pajamas. I am absolutely smitten for this little guy!!!

Magnetic Fun

We recently discovered that our kitchen door is magnetic, which {might I add} is very cool since our fridge is stainless steel and is not. Upon this discovery, I rushed out to get Ryan some magnetic letters to play with {primarily when I am trying to cook dinner so we don't have a repeat of our Mother's Day disaster}, but as I arrived at the School Box, I decided to call Aunt Laura to find out the best place to buy such a thing and she had a set from her kindergarten class that she wasn't using and said we could have. So we were off to her school to get the letters and attend her classes end of year party that happened to be taking place that very afternoon.

The party was complete chaos, but Ryan loved being there as always. Ryan was even lucky enough to get to have a turn at the cookie icing station and thoroughly enjoyed his large iced sugar cookie {sorry no pictures as I didn't have the camera since I wasn't planning to be going by the school when I left home} ... the boy definitely has his mama's sweet tooth! After about an hour of chasing Ryan around the room filled with what seemed like a million people {parents, grandparents, and kindergartners} who were doing various activies ranging from hula dancing, decorating sand buckets, icing cookies, coloring, taking pictures, etc., I decided it was time to go home. Ryan was not thrilled and did his fake-like cry that he started doing around Easter when someone leaves and he doesn't want them to or when he has to leave somewhere and doesn't want to, and we were out the door. Then, about 5 minutes after we left, it dawned on me that I had forgotten to get the stupid letters, the whole purpose for my trip in the first place. Oh well, I wasn't going back at this point. We would have to get the letters another time.

On a little side note, somewhere in my quest for letters, I also took Ryan to story time at Barnes & Nobles; however, he wasn't interested in being read too. He instead preferred to stand on the "stage" next to the nice lady that was reading so that everyone could smile at him ... this is not something he gets from his mama, for sure!

You will be happy to know, though, that we did finally get the magnetic letters, and have had fun with them ever since. David has even enjoyed them and I woke up one morning to the following note from him ...



It made my day! Isn't he sweet?! I sure think so! Ryan and I both love him to pieces and are so thankful for all that he does for us everyday!!!

We sure hope that everyone has a wonderful, relaxing memorial day weekend! David is off tomorrow and Monday, and we are really looking forward to it! We are also hoping for a special visit from Uncle Al :)

Catch Air

Today I took Ryan to an indoor play place (recommended by my neighbor) as it is a rainy, stormy day, and I thought that would be a good way for him to use up some of his energy and get us out of the house for a little while. {Whew, that was a long sentence!} It turned out to be an AWESOME idea as he played for 2 hours and had a BLAST! We will definitely be going back often. Hopefully next time, Daddy can go with us too!

Right before we left for lunch and a nap, they had laser show dance time (which must happen several times throughout the day as everyone there was thrilled). So, here is a video of our little dance machine ... so funny! I have been trying to capture Ryan dancing on video for a few weeks now so that I could share it with everyone but he would always stop when I got the camera out. I got it today though, without any problems, as he wasn't paying me any attention :)

And, here are some pictures of Ryan playing. The place was great and had tons of stuff for toddlers!

Sound Effects

Check out Ryan's sound effects as he is playing with his lawnmower. He makes this sound when he is playing with any toy that goes (i.e., cars, trucks, lawnmower, etc). And, as he makes the noise, drool runs out of his mouth. It is so funny!!! Listen carefully :)

All Worth It

What can I say, Ryan has kept my last few days quite eventful (not to mention that I have been in an outright awful mood). It all began on Saturday ...

Saturday morning I got up bright and early to participate in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure. The walk was fun, it was for a great cause, and it made me feel good to have gotten some exercising in while my two favorite boys snoozed away at home!



However, it turned out that I would have been much better off sleeping in rather than getting up 3 hours earlier than normal so that I was nice and rested for the adventure that was to ensue Saturday night.

My sister and I were preparing dinner for my mom for Mother's Day, which was to be ready in a matter or minutes, and David had slipped out for a quick trip to the grocery store to get something to quench his thirst with dinner (as all we had was water, skim milk, whole milk, orange juice, and apple juice, all of which he wasn't interested in). As I was trying to figure out whether the salmon was done, I heard an awful crash and the blood-curdling scream of my sweet baby boy. Everyone ran to the scene to discover that Ryan was laying on the ground amongst broken glass and our foyer table. We picked him up and tried to calm him down although I have to admit that I have never heard him cry like this in his life (although he was already exhausted due to having no nap, hungry because dinner was about ready, and I am sure, scared to death). It took a few minutes but he finally calmed down, and we searched his body but saw no cuts, bruises, scratches, etc. It was about this time that David arrived back home to disarray.

Now to fast-forward about two hours (after everyone had eaten a semi-normal dinner and Ryan had watched Wee Sing in Sillyville, which is an hour long, as he was still very fussy), all of our company left and it was while Ryan was waving bye-bye that I noticed something grayish looking on the inside of his finger. After a closer look, I realized that it wasn't grayish but rather black and blue and very swollen. Apparently, we didn't look closely enough at his fingers when we were examining him as we were so concerned with his body and head at that point. I immediately picked up the phone and called my mom to return to our house so that I could get her opinion. After several minutes of deliberating, we were off to the Emergency Room at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta.

Ryan finally fell asleep in the car so David went inside and got us checked in so that he could sleep as long as possible. However, it turned out to only be a few minutes before they needed him so they could take his weight and give him a lovely bracelet. Thank goodness the ER wasn't super busy! As I was looking at Ryan's new jewelery, I noticed that his birthday was incorrect ... it had 12/18/09 rather than 12/23/08. This goes to show you just how frazzled David was as he had given them my due date a year later rather than Ryan's actual birth date. I quickly got up and informed the nurse, and Ryan got another bracelet. I think the nurse thought David had lost it - poor thing! As we waited to be called back, I observed that there were no girls in the waiting room, all BOYS! This didn't excite me as I have a real problem with hospitals and people being hurt, although I did okay on this occasion.

Ryan did really well the entire time we were there with the exception of getting x-rays. He was hysterical while they did this! And, the outcome of our trip was that his right index finger is fractured. They taped it too his middle finger, put a splint on it, and wrapped it up in a big ace bandage thing with instructions not to get it wet or take it off unless absolutely necessary.





I specifically asked what we were supposed to do if he got it off and all they said was hopefully he doesn't. I left it at that. We got home at midnight and went straight to bed. By the next morning, Ryan had everything off and at this point, I was the one that was hysterical. David calmly put it back on but this became our hourly routine until yesterday afternoon. And, let me tell you that it was not fun!

I took Ryan for a followup appointment with a hand doctor yesterday (much earlier than instructed by the ER as I was sick of our new routine). Boy am I glad that I did because I feel much better now! The doctor pretty much said that at 16 months old, there is nothing they can put on Ryan's hand that he will not get off (even a cast). So, when we get tired of fighting with him about it, just quite trying ... it will heal just fine regardless. Whew! However, the doctor did wrap his finger again in a much less invasive bandage and Ryan has pretty much left it alone now for 24 hours! Yay!

So, today has been MUCH better and I am much happier! Ryan is napping now but we had a wonderful little "date" this morning. We went to the park and played (Ryan loves to swing best, and I wasn't complaining at all today as that is not going to hurt his finger). Then we stopped at Chick-Fil-A and got chicken nuggets and fruit for lunch, and had a nice lunch outside on a picnic table at Bruster's Ice Cream where Ryan got a special treat after he finished his lunch of course ... a kid's dirt sundae (ice cream, Oreo crumbs, and a gummy worm) with peanut butter ice cream. I even got a hug and a kiss from my little date as I put him in his car seat :) Made my day! And, more importantly, it makes me realize that all the stress he has caused me since Saturday (and all that is sure to come), is absolutely worth it!!!

Baby Rino

First, for a quick update on Ryan's obsession, he still LOVES to watch the said movies any chance he gets; however, he officially managed to break the DVD player yesterday afternoon as he pulled the DVD tray (if that is what the thing is called) out until the plastic gave way and completely broke off.

So, unfortunately for us, Ryan cost us $100 or more just like that (probably the first of many times to come), and he can now no longer watch movies in a room where we have a door to shut ... boy was that short lived!

Now for two more firsts ...

This past Saturday, Ryan had his FIRST encounter with a real live horse. Ryan and I traveled to Keysville, Georgia, with my sister, to see my cousin, Catie, ride in her annual Derby Day. At first Ryan wasn't sure about these big animals, the biggest he has ever seen (besides a trip to the Atlanta Zoo last July, which I would say doesn't count as he wasn't really old enough to realize where we were at that point, which makes me think we need to take another trip soon!), but he quickly decided that he enjoyed petting them. But, what he enjoyed even more was playing in the dirt on the farm. He was covered by the time we left and my sister was not at all pleased that he had to ride the two hours back home in her clean car. He had a blast though and was asleep before we made it out of the driveway, ...




which was a really good thing for two reasons, (1) it made the car ride home much easier and (2) Ryan got to go to his FIRST friend's birthday party Saturday night. Ryan and Ellie, the little girl next door (who turned 2), have become the best of friends in the last few months (i.e., now that we are home during the day to play). My little boy is growing up!

Ellie calls Ryan "Baby Rino." And just as a side note, I NEVER considered this as a nickname of Ryan when we decided on the name, but she is not the first one to call him this! It is pretty funny though and so interesting that she thinks of Ryan as a baby when he is only about 8 months younger than her and just as big as she is. Good thing Ryan doesn't realize it or he may just be insulted :) Nonetheless, the two of them have so much fun together and love to give each other hugs ... it is so sweet! What can I say, Ryan must like the older women!




Oh and, Happy Cinco De Mayo! We cannot wait for David to get home from work, soon hopefully, so we can go have some delicious Mexican food for dinner!