Ryan at 14 Months

Since I've been so bad at keeping track of Ryan's developments, I was going to skip this entry, but I figure, why not? What's so great about consistency anyways? :)

Ryan learned to clap soon after his first birthday. He started with one hand stationary with the other hand doing all the work. He didn't make much sound at first, but now he's quite loud! He claps when he hears other people clapping. For instance, on his learning puppy, if you press the puppy's hand sensor, it makes a clapping noise. When Ryan hears it, he likes to clap along. Whenever he thinks that he's done a good job, he claps for himself, even though he may not have gotten that puzzle piece completely in. What can I say? I clap along for him too. :) He claps when you say "yay" or "good job" too. He loves clapping and his whole face brightens up when he does.

Ryan's really been into self-feeding lately. If I try to feed him with a spoon, he'll take a few bites and then attacks the spoon until he gets ahold of it. He likes to grab the spoon with his left hand and then he switches it over to his right hand where he'll use it. He's not very good at scooping food up, but he's managed to stab it and push food around his plate. Ryan is a biter, so I try to utilize that by having him bite into as much of his food as possible. We started with bananas soon after his first birthday and we've moved on from there. Yesterday we shared a tuna sandwich from Quizno's at the mall. I break off a smaller piece and then let him bite off what he wants to eat. It works out pretty well and it keeps his hands a little bit cleaner. He's really good at biting! I don't know if that's a good thing or not!

Ryan has gone overboard sucking his thumb lately. I think it's because of the ear infection that he had a few weeks ago. He likes to suck his left thumb while he pulls his right ear. He can even walk and do it! It's a bit ridiculous. He's always sucked his thumb, but it's really turned into an obsession so much so that we've decided to do something about it. We ordered some stuff called Mavala Stop. It's suppose to come in the mail soon. I'll let ya'll know if it works out or not. I'm tired of having the only kiddo who sucks their thumb!

Ryan has developed a particular affinity for our white haired canine. Poor Button, he "pets" her, which is fine, but he had a tendency to get rough. Ryan eventually starts yanking out handfuls of Button fur and she just sits there and takes. It drives me nuts. I always yell at Button and tell her to run away from Ryan, like Carrie is smart enough to do. Sadly, I don't think that Button gets as much attention as she's used to, so she'll take whatever attention she can get, even if it's Ryan pulling out her fur. We're trying to teach him to do it gently, but he's so attracted to her that he follows her around the house and sometimes we just can't keep up! Poor Button!

Ryan's current pet peeves are diaper changes (aren't they always?) and getting dressed. When he sees me pull out clothes for him to change into, he goes running off in the opposite direction. When I say run, I really mean run! He runs away and giggles. He's so silly, he knows when he does things he's not suppose to. When I catch him going up the stairs, he goes up faster and giggles. When I caught him pulling down a towel off of the towel rack, he giggled and did it anyway. We haven't really disciplined him minus biting, and we've been lucky so far. He has started throwing some fits, but there's usually a way around them, or we just let him go at it. Usually when he throws a fit, he'll sit on the ground, lean forward and bang his head on the ground. He hasn't done it since his ear infection a few weeks ago, so we've been lucky. He was really acting up and fussing last week, but we think it was just teething because the minute we gave him some orajel, he was instantly better. The biting is definitely related to teething. When he bites me excessively, I know now to bring out the orajel!

Ryan has become a walking pro. I've heard of kiddos taking steps here and there and then eventually walking, but Ryan didn't let go of our hands/walker until he was ready to walk. He did a few steps the week before his birthday, but it only took a week until he let go and was walking all over the house. I've heard that soon after learning how to walk, they learn to run and that's the end of having a good child. I didn't see it at first, but now I can totally tell that he's running and he sure is fast, especially if I'm chasing after him with clothes!

At the kiddie gym, Ryan hasn't really wanted to hang for the past month. I can't explain, but it's just not his thing right now. On the other hand, he loves the ball pit. Once he gets in there, he's hooked and doesn't want to come back out, which would be fine except that he loves to throw the balls out of the pit. He also loves the tunnels at the gyms. When he sees one, he likes to dive right in.

Ryan hasn't been into vegetables lately. It's probably because we give him so much fruit. Even if I try to hide some veggies in a spoonful of food that I know that he likes, he can magically tell and spit it out. That's another thing that he got from being sick, spitting out food. Apparently, when kids get ear infections, it hurts to eat so they don't eat as much. When Ryan got his ear infection, he learned how to stick out his tongue to spit out food. Even though the ear infection is gone, he's already learned the habit. So much for having the baby who'll eat everything. I'm trying to cut back on his fruit intake, but what can I say? Ryan's a fruit-aholic!

Okay, I think that's enough of an update for now. I need to take more pictures!!

Self-Feeding

Ryan has really been into self-feeding lately. Check out the video on his picasa site (http://picasaweb.google.com/babytangy). I've tried to switch over to flickr, but I get errors when I try to upload pictures. I know I should keep on trying, but then it uploads the same pictures again and then it has errors. It's really been annoying. I think we might just stick with picasa. We'll see. I'm going to try again on flickr and I'll let ya'll know how it goes!

Higher

A couple of weekends ago, we headed over to the neighborhood park to enjoy the nice weather and get outside for a bit. Ryan was on the swings as happy as could be and when the kiddo next to him said "higher" asking his Dad to push him higher, Ryan responded by asking Steven to push him "higher" too!

Lil Engineer

Okay, so the picture doesn't really go, but I thought it was cute and wanted to include it on the blog. :)

During zip line week at My Gym, when Ryan was placed in the airplane to be zipped across the room, the first thing he did was look up at the pully system holding him. He stared at it during his first flight before he looked away at his surroundings. According to the My Gym owner, he said that kids of engineering families always look at the pulley on the zip line when they're on the ride. I looked at him in astonishment and told him that Steven was an engineer! He said it was just one of those things that he's noticed during the last three years that he's owned the gym. Weird, huh? So apparently we're raising a little engineer!

Congrats Auntie Al!

On Friday, we went to Alice's white coat ceremony in College Station. The first two pics are of her awkwardly being dressed in her white coat. Yeah, I just don't think there's a graceful way of being coated! It was fun visiting College Station again and seeing Al walk across the stage. The next time that happens, she'll be graduating from vet school...yay!

Silly Little Lion

Here are some random pictures that we've taken of the little lion being silly.

The first pic is of Ryan trying to sit in a box that's too little for him. I guess it's a good way for him to figure out how big he really is (and how heavy he weighs!).

The second pic is of Ryan trying on Carrie's dog collar. Before Steven bathed Carrie, he took off her collar and placed it on the couch. The following morning, Ryan found it and placed it on his neck!

The third pic is Ryan chilling out at Starbuck's. We've frequently patronize the Starbuck's in Four Points and while waiting for our order to be done, Ryan crawled onto the comfy chair and decided to hang out Friends style.

The last pic is of Ryan sitting in a big boy chair at storytime at Cups 'n Cones in the neighborhood. After stealing the chair from a little girl (sorry about that), Ryan sat and enjoyed listening to the guitar being played, even though the girl barely knew how to play any of the songs! Maybe we should look into a music class where they actually know what they're doing!

Easter

Our neighborhood had an easter egg hunt for the kiddos on Saturday, March 22nd. We were so excited that Ryan got to egg hunt for the first time, so of course, he's wearing his camo pants for the hunt! He actually did really well. He put the first egg into his basket, I helped him add some more and then he proceeded to throw most of them out of the basket again. :) He's really into sharing with others.

Ryan got to meet the Easter bunny and sit on the local fire truck! We had a great time and can't wait to egg hunt again next year.

Peapod Travel Bed

We got Ryan this travel bed since he's a total crib sleeper. The last time that he slept in bed with us, I think I only got 2 hours of sleep total that night, he was wriggling around so much! It's a cool little bed that looks like a tent. The front can be zipped closed so he can sleep safely inside. There's a panel on each side that can be opened for air circulation and there's even an inflatable mattress that slides between the floor of the tent and the ground to make it more comfortable. When we got it, we thought that we'd let Ryan check it out. He went absolutely crazy playing with it! Yeah...I don't think he's going to get much sleep in this thing afterall!

Just Like Daddy

These pics are of Ryan Lion taking after dear ole Dad, he's playing his first video games! Ryan started off with Galaga and then moved onto Ms. Pac-Man. I gotta say that he's a natural. I wonder if we can go on the Today Show...

A Day at the Austin Museum of Art

On Tuesdays, the Austin Museum of Art only charges $1 for admission. Since we've never been, Emily and I thought it'd be a fun trip. The museum is really small and the exhibit showcased local talent. I hate to say this, but we were more impressed by the kids' area of the museum than the real exhibit on display! Sad, I know.

The first pic is of Emily reciting Dr. Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech. There was a teleprompter in front of her and she read out the words over a microphone. This was one of the pieces of "art" being exhibited. See what I mean?

The next pics are of the kids' room. The first pic is of a cool tunnel with 3 sides of mirrors. Ryan tried climbing on his reflection. Each kid is allotted three colored dots of various sizes to put up on any of the white spaces in the room. You could move around previous dots already there, add onto them or start your own masterpiece. We saw caterpillars and teddy bears, and a wide array of other really creative things. Since Ryan is new to stickers, that was enough to keep him happy. Maybe the next time we go, he'll get to work on a masterpiece of his own. :) The last pic is of my serious baby when he's intent on something. Here, he proceeded to empty out the contents of this plastic container onto the floor. I wonder if that could be considered a piece of art?