17 Months

Ryland is now 17 months old, which I cannot believe. To me, she is still my little baby I met that wonderful night in the hospital. She is growing by leaps and bounds, and is getting quite the personality. Yesterday, we went to my dad's hosue, whom Ryland has nicknamed "Pop Pop". She was full of energy, playing with rocks, throwing leaves, and rolling tomatoes on the porch. After we had been there for 3 or 4 hours, we all realized how well behaved she had been. No fits, no fussing. Just plain happiness. Yep, that pretty much sums up our girl. Happy. Of course, she has her moments of frustration, but her moments of happiness far out way those times. So lets all live a little more like Ryland. Happy.

New Words

Now is the time to watch your language around Ryland! She is becoming quite the parrot, and repeating our every word. It's been amazing to watch her go from saying one word, to saying all kinds of things. In this video she is repeating all the colors I tell her about. No, she doesn't understand which color is which, but the way she is headed, I'm sure she isn't too far away from knowing a few colors.

crazy week!

It sure has been a crazy week trying to move all of our stuff to our new apartment. As you may have noticed, I haven't posted much lately because I have been emptying boxes for days now. Today is the first day that we have had internet, so I figured I better post a few pictures for you all to enjoy. Ryland seems to really be enjoying her new place. She has a big window that is low to the ground that she absolutely loves sitting by. She loves to watch the birds fly by, and the neighborhood cats roam. Life is good at our new place!

On a side note, tonight before bed, I put on Ryland's pj's and told her to go say "night, night" to dada. She quickly stood up, walked straight to him, and while looking him right in the eye, said "night, night". It was pretty special.

The happiest little girl I know

Ryland spends a lot of her time trying to say new words, but her favorite as of now seems to be "happy". She has been wandering around the last few days saying "happy, happy, happy!" with large amounts of enthusiasm over, and over. We aren't really sure if she knows what she is saying, but she sure is happy about being able to say "happy".

Rp's Stuff

Champ and I have moved only a couple times together, and both times it was just our clothes, our kitchen items, and our bathroom necessities they we were transporting from one house to the next. This time, however, is different. Just yesterday, as I was packing up Ryland's stuff, I realized how much a new little life can accumulate in a short 16 months.

Ryland has her own bathroom stuff. She has her own clothes, her own forks, spoons, and cups. Toys fill up our living room, and we even have boxes of her old clothes in storage. Yes, this little 16 month old girl has stuff to store away already!

So as I was packing yesterday, I realized all of this, and after finishing up packing a box of her stuff, I wrote on it "RP's stuff".

I looked at it, and as much as I dislike packing and moving, I liked this. I actually loved it. This whole moving experience has been stressful up until that moment. I realized that we had Ryland, and all of her stuff. That no matter how crazy, and hectic moving is, the important things are still here. I love Ryland for this. She has made my life more "in the moment", than ever before. Thank you RP, and thanks for your stuff :)





On a side note, wherever we go, if there is a cat bed...

That cat bed becomes Ryalnd's chair...

5 New Things About Ryland

1. Ryland enjoys marching around the house with a huge smile on her face. Most of her marching takes place in the kitchen when Champ is cooking. We think she likes the sound of her feet on the hard floor.

2. Ryland can now repeat everything! Although, some words don't sound right, she has been trying to say 'Thank You', 'Please', and her uncle Guy even taught her the word 'beer'...so watch what you say, Ryland is listening to everything.

3. Ryland is a mess maker! She can tear up the living room in a matter of minutes, and she has yet to learn how to put her stuff back.

4. If you come visit Ryland, she will most likely cover your shirt in stickers, lots of stickers.

5. Ryland knows her first cartoon character. The other day I was trying to get her to say 'diaper', and while pointing to her diaper, I asked "what is this?", and she said "Elmo". Sure enough, I looked down at her diaper, and there was a small graphic of Elmo right there. I was very suprised!

Beautiful One

To my dad, Ryland has been known as "The Beautiful One". He has called her this since she was very very tiny. Recently, my dad gave me a copy of a song he wrote, and sang for Ryland called "Beautiful One". My brother is actually singing with him on it also. This morning, I was listening to the song on the computer, and Ryland looked up, pointed to the computer, and said "pop-pop" (which I'm pretty sure is her version of "grandpa"). She knew it was my dad singing!

I thought I better put together a little slideshow of Ryland to go along with the song, so you could all hear it. Enjoy!