We love puffs!

Ryleigh LOVES puffs! The child would eat the whole can if I let her. I take these with us when we go to dinner and let Ryleigh snack on them while we eat...keeps her occupied and her eyes off of our food! haha
She knows what the can looks like and has learned to partake of them herself!

Birthday Dinner

So I've been meaning to post these pictures, but we've been having dsl issues. Hopefully I can get them all uploaded!
We had a family get together for my birthday dinner a couple of weekends ago. We ate at Cantina Laredo...sooo good!
And yes, Ryleigh is in two different outfits...funny and interesting story that I won't get in to. I'm just glad I grabbed an extra outfit! :)











Ryleigh has learned "touchdown"...we're preparing her for Alabama football season coming up! :)

Standing!

Ryleigh has started to stand really well by herself without holding onto anything. She even starts to dance and flail her arms and continues to stand. I've only gotten one good video of her standing. I don't know why, but the second video just cracks me up as she does a belly flop.
Then tonight as I had her sitting up and putting her pj's on, she just fell backwards. (I caught her of course!) But she thought it was the funniest thing. She kept doing it over and over. Jarred grabbed the camera, but she had already had most of her fun. Maybe tomorrow...




Ryleigh was so enamored with my brother when he last came to visit.






She likes to push her walker both ways.


What ARE you lookin' at?

Ryleigh's 10 mos; Danielle's 28 yrs!

Ryleigh was 10 mos on Sunday the 12th. Where has time gone?! Pretty soon we'll be planning her 1st birthday! We are on the countdown for formula...8 weeks to go! woo hoo...no more $25/week! :) Ryleigh has started using her walkers as you can see from the pics and video. She's kind of shaky with it, but is getting better. She actually let Jarred grab her by the hand and she walked beside him (which I haven't gotten a good video of yet). She's been clapping her hands together, turned her "num num" into "ma ma", loves to "throw" things, and kisses (slobbers) us back. Each and every day is more and more of a blessing. We are truly blessed by our family.

And I turned 28 today! I had a great birthday and I actually ended up in some pictures! (I am normally the one taking them, but Jarred was kind enough to grab the camera.) Ryleigh helped me open my presents (yes, wrapped in Christmas paper...all we had!)

Recently

With the very warm weather, we have been living it up at the pool. Ryleigh loves to swim and showed off her new swim suit MiMi got her. She was trying to figure out what her daddy was wearing...
Ryleigh hasn't taken her first step yet, but has stood on her own a few times for a few seconds. She has begun to say "Dada", "Num Num" (which I take for MaMa) :-) She has her two bottom front teeth. Her top two teeth next to the two front teeth are coming in. I hope her front two come through pretty quick or else our child will look like she has fangs... I guess we better figure out something for her crib because it now has teeth marks all along the front.

Climbing the Stairs

Ryleigh loves to climb the stairs. She gets so excited when she crawls toward them. She goes up them so fast now, one after the other. She usually doesn't stop unless to make sure someone is looking at her. She hasn't yet mastered going down them! :)

Hear Me ROAR!

Call it strange or funny, Ryleigh started growling this past week. It just comes from out of the blue and sometimes she'll keep on for several minutes. She'll growl at us if we get on to her about something...must be her "back talking". haha

Random Pics

Just some random pictures (old and new) I got off of Rance's camera...

Swimming....FINALLY!

We finally got a good weekend of swimming in last weekend. The water was just perfect and Ryleigh loved it! Tomorrow and Sunday are looking even better as the pool water has been in the 90's this week. Ryleigh gets to meet Jarred's Uncle Rusty tomorrow for the first time. We are looking forward to seeing him.

You can see Ryleigh's first tooth in this picture!

9 Months Old!

It's been a while since we've updated on everything that has been going on (my camera batteries have been dead for weeks) so I will try my best!
Ryleigh is 9 months old today! Soooo hard to believe! I spoke too soon about no teeth...she cut her first one on the bottom last weekend. (I'll post pics soon when I get some batteries!) Jarred is so upset that we don't have a "gummy smile" anymore. But I think the little tooth is just as cute! The tooth coming in didn't seem to bother her too much. She has just been drooling and gnawing on everything. I see 2 on the top under the gums getting ready to come in, but they aren't the 2 center teeth, they are the ones next to them. So we will see which ones come in first.
Ryleigh had her 9 month doctor visit today. Luckily she didn't have to have any shots. She didn't like it too much when the nurse wanted to lay her down to measure her and then when she tried to put the tape measure around her head and then get her temperature...she was screaming bloody murder. She warmed up though once she got used to the room and saw the mirror. She weighed 19 lbs 7 oz; 28 inches tall; and her head was 46.5 cm I think. (The nurse had to do it twice as Ryleigh was screaming her head off and turning it back and forth...haha) She was in the 75th percentile for her height and weight and in the 95th for her head size. The Dr said we can pretty much give her any table food we want with a few exceptions...woo hoo! And he predicted she would be walking before her 1st birthday!
Oh yea, she is EVERYWHERE! Crawling (FAST!), pulling up on any and everything, and is now cruising. She loves the stairs in our house. She goes up them one after the other. She gets so excited when she sees them and crawls over to them. I'll try to get a good video and post it.
Ryleigh's hair is starting to get longer now. She had a head full of hair when she was born, but lost a lot of it. It has finally started to grow, but it has lightened up and is now a light brown. Jarred had light brown/blonde hair when he was little, so she must be getting that from him! It will be interesting to see if it gets darker as she gets older.
I will post more pics and videos soon! Here are a few my parents took when they were in town last weekend.
Ryleigh loves pulling wipes out of the box as you can see!

Teeth or No Teeth

Ryleigh doesn't have any teeth yet, but we expect any day now! She is over 8 1/2 months and still no sign of a pearly white. This last week she has been chewing on her hands more and drooling like crazy, plus being fussy! Although we love her gummy smile, I'm sure a little tooth will be just as cute!
She loves her cold teething toys. The other day she had one in her mouth and would leave it there while she went about her business. In one of the pictures, the teething toy made it look like she had a full mouth of teeth and fangs! Kind of scary looking...haha!

Memorial Day

We tested the pool waters again on Memorial Day, but the temps weren't much better. But we did manage to get a little more pool time with Ryleigh. Once the water warms up, we think she is going to love it.
Here are some pics and video from Monday.

Kicking Off Swimming Season...Sort of

We kicked off swimming season this afternoon at Jarred's parents pool...well, sort of. The water was soo cold that we weren't in the pool for very long at all! Ryleigh got all suited up in her pink polka dot bathing suit with matching hat, had her sunscreen on, and her turtle floaty ready to go. Unfortunately the weather has not been picture perfect for their pool, but we gave it a go anyway. The water was a chilling 75 degrees...pretty much like swimming in ice water! We attempted for Ryleigh to get in her turtle floaty for a few minutes, but she wasn't up for the cold water either. Maybe tomorrow the water will be a little warmer since it was a pretty afternoon. If not, we'll try again next weekend! More pictures to come after we get a better day of swimming in.

Swingin'

What a task we had last weekend! Toys R Us had a swing set on sale a few weeks ago that we couldn't pass up for Ryleigh's birthday (yea, a little early, we know...). Bossier Toys R Us didn't have it, but Monroe had several in stock. My parents were nice enough to jet off to Monroe for us on the last day of the sale to get it...what won't grandparents do for their granddaughter?! :-) So my parents, Jarred's parents, MeMaw and us went in to get it for her. My parents came over to help as well as Jarred's dad. It took ALL day last Saturday. We started about 9am, took a short break for lunch, and didn't stop until after 7pm! And still didn't finish! We were missing 3 boards, but luckily they didn't prevent us from having to wait on them to continue on. We did all we could until we were all beat. There was a 60% chance of rain and thank goodness it didn't sprinkle until the very end of the day.
Jarred and I finished up the canopy after the boards came in on Thursday and finished up the picnic table part of the set we hadn't finished last Saturday.
After all said and done, Ryleigh loves swinging in her bucket swing and will hopefully get a lot of use out of it...one day.

Smart Baby

Ryleigh surprises us every day! She has caught on that if she is holding her bumbo tray and she lets go, that it will make a loud noise. Right before she lets go, she prepares herself for the loud noise. It's just too funny!