Half Birthday

 So I had a realization a couple weeks ago... Ryker's birthday is April 30th, which makes his half birthday October 30th. But since he was born the last day of April (just before midnight I might add), and the last day of October is the 31st, his half birthday is practically on Halloween. Pretty much the coolest half birthday ever!

I'll start off with his 6 month pics, and then unload about a million vids/pics on you below :)

Chins/Cheeks

Probably my fave :)

 I cannot even believe that he is already 6 months old! And I'm pretty sure I say that every month... I knew it would fly by, and it definitely has! He's just been growing unbelievably fast! It's so much fun to watch him learn new things every day. There's so much he's learned since the last time I posted, I don't even know where to start! I do have some videos though to show off his tricks that he's been working on these past 2 months.


We bought a Jumperoo for little man a couple of months ago, and he loves it! Ryker hasn't quite figured out how to jump up and down quite yet, but for the last month or so he'll just stand in here and rock. He's got excellent footwork.


So I know babies typically learn to roll from their tummies to their backs right around 4 months. However, Ryker has been a little challenged when it comes to this skill... He's been getting better at it, but he still can't do it consistently. This is him doing it at around 5 months.


He was able to master rolling from his back to his tummy though, and I feel like he learned it in one day! It's kind of a problem, because he'll always do it and then he'll get stuck on his tummy. He's also been doing it a lot at night, which reeeaallly makes me nervous because I'm afraid he won't be able to get back to his back if he needs to. But he does seem to sleep better on his stomach, so that's good. I was able to get a vid of him going both ways here... But the returning to his back part is pretty rare.


So I know I already posted this on Facebook/Instagram... but I posted a shorter version, and the long one is just too cute not to share. This little boy's giggles are my absolute favorite! He doesn't really laugh at our silly noises as much these days, but he is super ticklish. So it's fun to tickle him like crazy and make him giggle and squeal.

I'll stop with the video overload, because I'm going to start on my picture overload  :).

Another milestone Ryker has hit is being able to sit on his own. I still don't trust him to sit him down, and not be right there to catch him if he teeters over... but he can sit for quite a long time without losing his balance. He also learned how to do this within like a week of me practicing it with him. His sitting skills make me feel better about his lack of rolling skills.

 Him being able to sit on his own is also convenient when trying to show off a cute outfit. Like his "Take a Hike" shirt made by his Aunt Charity or his adorable plaid romper that he only got to wear once inside.

At Ryker's 4 month appointment, his doc gave us the go ahead to start giving him solids. I probably would have waited until he was 6 months to start, but since he's had bad reflux since he was tiny, I wanted to get a head start since solids can help with that. It took us over a month and a half for him to finally start taking to it, but he's a champ eater now! It was an interesting transition, though, because he started to refuse eating from a bottle (or eat very little), which I've heard is part of the transition and can be due to teething. But it was rough because he wouldn't eat very much of anything for a long time, solid or liquid! I'm just relieved that he's eating well again, even if it is a goopy mess each time.

Another rreeeeaaalllyy nice thing about him eating his solids now is that he's been sleeping! Hallelujah!! I don't know if I told you before, but Ryker has been a horrible napper his entire existence, only conceding to 30 min naps maximum. After sleep training, he would take one 1hr nap a day, which I was super grateful for... but I still dreamed about the 2 hour naps some moms refer to as "normal."

It hasn't been long enough of consistent solid feedings for me to know if the pattern will continue, but it appears as if he can go longer than his usual 2.5 hrs between feeds, and has taken a total of two 2-hour naps over the last week... which he has NEVER done on his own. Two long naps doesn't quite seem like a pattern yet, but I'm hopeful.

Now, this could also have to do with the fact that Ryker caught a little tummy bug last week, and has been trying to sleep it off. But I'm choosing to believe that it's the solids, and it'll continue :). Starting last Friday, we noticed our poor little guy had a really painful-looking diaper rash, and he was acting like he was in a lot of pain. We then realized that he had diarrhea, pooping every hour or more. I thought it was the apples I added to his food to help him want to eat it more. I thought that the apples had caused it, so over the weekend he had no apples, yet was still a pooping madman. He was pooping around 10x each day. Being the paranoid mom that I am, I called his doc and we took him in (even though his 6 month apt was the following week). The doc said it could be from teething cause his bottom teeth are coming in, but more than likely it's a little tummy bug. So we got him a probiotic, and we'll see if that helps. I also learned from that appointment that reflux peaks around 6 months, which explains his massive pukes he's been blessing us with lately. So between letting him go butt-naked to help his diaper rash, and him puking everywhere... we've been cleaning up a TON of bodily waste as of late.

So the thing that just makes me the happiest and melts my heart every single day, is how much this little boy loves his daddy. He can just be sitting and looking at him, and he'll kick his legs and squeal out of happiness. The best is when Todd comes home from school, and no matter what kind of mood Ryker was in before, he'll be grinning from ear to ear to see his daddy. 

This is my favorite one. He's cranking he head back so far so he won't lose sight of Todd.

I'm trying to think of updates on our lives, but there really isn't too much. Todd had a little less than a week break from school, so we took advantage, and took a day trip to Washington DC. It was really cool, and we didn't have nearly enough time to see everything we wanted to. But we were able to see the Holocaust Museum, Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, The White House, and the National Archives. Not too shabby for a day trip! Ryker was a trooper the whole day too. We're pretty lucky to have such a happy little boy.

His faces kill me

Ryker was sleeping, but he still made the picture!

As you may have seen on facebook, Ryker was a super cute little shark for Halloween! He even had two opportunities to wear it! We got to attend our ward Halloween party/trunk or treat, and then Todd's PA class had a party/parade. It was fun to show off his super cute costume. He even won an award from Todd's PA class for cutest costume! 

Ryker wouldn't wear his hat for pictures, so we did this instead. ALMOST as cute...

So if you couldn't tell... Ryker was a shark, Todd was the shark attack victim, and I was the life guard. Turned out pretty well I think, even if my lifeguard shirt is so obviously homemade :).

Another exciting update is that Todd and I found an Ultimate team here! Todd was in the library and just so happened to hear someone say the word frisbee. He approached them, and found out that there is a school club team. They're pretty much all brand brand new to the sport and all freshman... we've even been playing much longer than the guy who started it up. But it's an opportunity for us to play, so we're super happy about that. It's also fun to be able to teach them all the basics. They're all so coachable and eager to learn, which we love :).

Oh, and one more story before I go...
We basically win the worst parents award for the following three pics... 

First reason we're horrible... is that it was pretty cold for this pic... But we decided to make it a quickie. Second reason we failed, is that Ryker isn't the greatest of stand-ers quite yet... and he fell. Whoopsie!! You can kinda tell in the last one that he isn't holding on anymore. He was just fine after a few minutes, but I felt horrible! Luckily the pics turned out at least :)


So that's basically it for now! Happy Halloween everybody!

Happy Four Months

Wow! I can't believe our little guy is already four months old! It's been quite the eventful last four months. The last few months have been the most exhausting and difficult, yet precious and rewarding months of my life, and I wouldn't trade them for anything. We love our little man more than words can express!

 

 

 In his short four months of life, this boy has already been on 8 airplanes, 5 states, and one other country (Canada)! Needless to say, he is well traveled.  

At the airport on our way to SLC

He was asleep for most of it, but now Ryker has already seen one of the seven wonders of the world!

 

Ryker is talking like crazy these days. Anytime he's playing with Mom, Dad, or on his play mat, he just babbles (and squeals) away! Every little noise he makes always makes us smile. He also is salivating much more frequently, and lately every noise he makes is followed by some bubbles being blown. It's pretty freaking cute. 

His bubbles can definitely get better than this. But this is the only pic I have of them

Some of Ryker's favorite things include bath time (where he'll kick his legs like crazy!), his play mat, kicking the yoga ball, standing on his strong legs, watching tv, chewing on his fingers, looking at himself in the mirror, and getting tickled by Daddy.

Did you catch that one in the middle? Yes, Ryker is ADDICTED to the tv, and I'm a little worried. Since I'm home with him pretty much all day every day, I will watch some tv to not go crazy. That's become quite the issue lately, as Ryker cannot take his eyes off of it. We try to do everything we can to keep him from being able to see it, while he'll do everything he can to get a good look. Lately, I've just been shutting it off all day.

Since Ryker clearly needs more fun things in his life, to distract him from the tv, we recently got him this little jumper. He's still way too small for it, but I think he's going to be spending a lot of time in here in the future :).

Someone I worked with at LVHS gave us this super awesome high chair! I'm getting excited cause Ryker is almost old enough to start eating solid foods, so I wanted to see how well he fit in the high chair. As you can see, he's still a little tiny in it... I think we'll probably have to use the bumbo till he's older. 

 Speaking of Ryker starting solid food soon, I've been on a baby food making kick! Since I know how expensive it can be, I thought I'd try my hand at making some! Turns out it's actually super simple. I've just been prepping the fruits/veggies while he naps, and then letting them cook for a while. I also recently discovered a farmer's market not too far away that sells reeeaaallly cheap produce, so I was aaalll over that!

Some more of Ryker's new skillz include grabbing toys, and crunches. Any time he's reclined or sitting up straight, he tries to lean forward like he's doing a crunch. I think he mostly does it because he's looking for something to chew on.



So, as many of you probably read on Facebook the other week, Todd, Ryker, and I had a bear encounter. I don't feel like writing the novel of a story of what happened, but here's a shorter version. I wanted to take a "cool" night picture of our tent illuminated from the inside. I went to the car to get the camera and left the trunk open. As I was taking pictures, I heard loud thumping noises. I ran back to the tent, where Todd assured me it was probably just noisy neighbors. Todd left the tent to go close the trunk, and a giant bear turned around from the front seat of our car and growled at him. Then I started taking a video and narrating, but the video won't load... so basically, some other campers came over (cause they had a gun just in case), and them and Todd were able to scare him back out the trunk, and he ran away. Talk about a close call! At least... to me it was.

We were very fortunate that the car was not damaged in the slightest! The most damage that bear did was chew up some bottles, get my diaper bag muddy, and pee on the front seat. Could have been SOO much worse! So after that frightening experience, Todd packed up camp while I stayed with Ryker in the car, and we got the heck outta there! It made for a good story, but it was probably one of the more scarier moments of my life!

Can you see how wet the seat is? Yeah... pretty sure that was pee

One of the bottles he chewed up

There are many more things that I could say and update you all on, but to be frank... I would rather sleep right now :). So I'm going to go do that, and leave you with some more 4 month pictures of our handsome, goober of a boy!