Sunday, November 10, 2013

Almost 2 years old

It's amazing how quickly my baby boy has grown up.  Looking back on this last year, I really feel like time is already slipping away!  Those first few months (let's be honest, that first year) took FOREVER.  Often times, I felt like I was watching paint dry.  But now, I blinked and days/weeks/months have gone by. 
 
So, since April, we took another trip to the west coast to see one of Joe's childhood friends get married in Portland.  We hopped down to Santa Barbara and spent some time with family there (we absolutely love CA).  I earned my "brave momma" badge and flew back with Ryan on my own from San Francisco to Raleigh.  Yes, I dealt with a 21 month old in a confined space for 5+ hours.  I survived, too!
 
Ryan on 9/10/2013

Ryan is a talking machine these days and repeats things that we say all the time.  It makes life more interesting now - little ears are always listening!  Ryan is becoming more and more conversational (you can definitely tell a difference just within the past 2 months).  He's beginning to interact with other little kids his age, and it's so cute to see his personality coming out more and more!

 
This video is from 11/2/2013.
 
Some of Ryan's favorite things these days: anything construction related (excavators, bulldozers, impact hammers, front end loaders, backhoes, dump trucks).  He loves watching videos of himself, too :)  He's beginning to learn how to navigate our phones, voice-search for things on YouTube (I'm not kidding), make voicenotes of himself saying various things, and watching Rebecca Black's "Friday" video.  He loves reading books - and once you read it to him, he'll start it all over and repeat as much as he remembers from the pages or will imitate us reading to him.  He loves going to the park, swinging, sliding down the slide, and running running running around.

He is the best little boy ever!