Ryan @ three months.

Ryan turned 3 months old Sunday the 19th. So yes, I'm a bit late with this. But I'm going to get it down anyway because at some point I'll scrapbook it. I actually just printed some pictures from when he was born so I could scrapbook. His album is empty. Well, it'd be empty if he had one. Haven't done that yet, either. But I will. Soon. When my scrapping mojo returns.

I just took these pictures on Monday. I had to make him a 3-month shirt since the girls' monthly shirts are pink. Not quite as cute as the Old Navy tees the girls had (Thank you for the 20th time to Renee, love those shirts!) but I think it turned out well for my first attempt.

He's a happy baby. Don't you just smile when you see this? I do. I love him.


He's very content. Doesn't fuss much. Doesn't cry. Isn't crabby. Just happy and content. Unless you don't feed him right away when he's hungry. Then he does his Crazy Cry. Thankfully that's not too often, though.


He's getting bigger. No more chicken legs. He's filling out. Getting chubby baby cheeks. He's looking more cute-baby and less grumpy-old-man-baby.


Filled-out-happy-baby:


Grumpy-old-man-baby @ 8 days old. Skinny arms and legs. Still very cute. At least to his mama.


And let's compare the three, shall we. L-R we've got Emma, Mackenzie, Ryan. Definitely seems as though each baby gets more hair. Poor Emma's practically bald. Ryan's is the darkest, but has the red tint to it Mac's did. Maybe he'll turn out blonde like her. Emma's hair now is more like Ryan's, darker with the red tint that you can really see in the sun.

Ryan is still sleeping in his bouncy seat at night. I tried putting him on his back right when he turned 3 months and instead of sleeping from 11 - 7, he woke up in the middle of the night. So it was back to the bouncy seat the next night. He's eating great. He's up to five ounces each time he eats, although sometimes he'll want more, every once in a while, less.

He loves his play mat. He watches the lights with fascination and is starting to bat at and grab the toys. Same with his bouncy seat. He loves the mobile in his bed. He's still in 0-3 month clothes, although some sleepers are getting a bit short on him. He kicks off his socks. He uses his binky but doesn't always want it. Usually just to sleep. He can still wear size 1 diapers but he's wearing size 2 because that's what I have right now (from when I stocked up before he was born.) They're not too big, just bigger, so we'll go with them.

Ryan has a bad case of cradle cap but it's starting to finally, and slowly, go away. He has eczema. He has cracked skin the worse at his ankle creases. Plus patches of eczema on his thighs, arms, back and belly. So, pretty much everywhere. I'm using Cerave cream on him every time I change him. It seems to be helping in that it's less dry, but it's not going away at all, if that makes sense. This is new to us, as neither of the girls had eczema. The acne is gone though.

I realized the other night he has had no day/night confusion at all. That's really nice. Really really nice. The girls did and what a change it is to have a baby who sleeps at night! No real schedule during the day, just sleeps whenever/wherever. But at night he's a rock star. I never thought I'd be getting such nice stretches of sleep at night this early on. I haven't slept like this since before I was pregnant with Emma. And I'm not joking!

The girls are still calling him "boy." I usually call him buddy, bud, sweet baby, big guy, peanut. Athough the last two do seem to contradict each other.

We've got the girls trained. If you joke around and say you're going to give him something to eat or drink, they'll tell you no and that he only drinks his special milk from his bottle and he can't eat food. You can tell I have drilled this in to their head to avoid any incidences of them playing Baby Alive with their brother.

He snores. Is still a loud eater. Toots a lot. (We seem to have gassy babies.) He always sounds stuffed up, which I'm going to ask the doctor about next month. So far, he hasn't gotten sick. He's had no reactions to his vaccines. He smiles all the time. Laughs. Is cute. I love him.

Ten on Tuesday

1. I've got a lot of blog catching up to do. I'd like to say I'm going to post every day until I catch up. But probably not.

2. The girls put the Nativity scene together for me this year. Once it was complete, Emma promptly hid the baby Jesus. Because apparently that's what you do. (And as I'm typing this, I feel as if I've already shared that.)

(12/2/10)

3. The fitness center held their annual Winter Wonderland earlier this month. (Again, feeling like I'm repeating myself. Which I do often, by the way.) Attempted a picture of the girls and Ryan with our neighbors and friends, Caroline and Jack. Mackenzie was being grumpy and didn't want in it.

(12/5/10)

3.5 But then she did. See her face? Grumpy. And blocking Jack.


4. Then Jack made Ryan smile and it was cute.

5. Please let me show you the football hold. Our kids have always liked this.

6. We did some Christmas shopping with my mom. Six hours the girls walked the mall - and with no meltdowns! I was so impressed we had Auntie Ann's pretzels before leaving.

6.5They rode the train. It drives them all around the mall. They loved it.

(12/9/10)

7. Six hours of shopping meant six hours of bags. Which meant Ryan got held towards the end...

8. And the bags went in the stroller.

9. The nicest man sat in front of us at our church's Christmas concert. He was so kind to the girls, chatting with them, not getting annoyed at their frequent moving and talking. Emma even shared her Twizzler with him. When it was over, he offered to take a picture for us. We're missing Grandpa Sweeney and Ryan was in the nursery.

(12/10/10)

10. But here he is. Snoozing. With the program. Because I'm still taking pictures of him with things on his lap. It's still amusing me.

Ten on Tuesday

1. When will the snow stop? Depending on who is reporting it we either have 19.5 inches, 20 inches or 2 feet. Or, to put it simply, a lot. And it was still snowing tonight, albeit lightly. Thankfully, Michael fixed the snowblower that broke when I was using it last week. I took this picture Monday morning. Lots of snow. Lots of wind. And it just kept coming.


2. Saturday was Breakfast with Santa. I don't think we'll get a family picture with all of us looking at the camera until Mackenzie outgrows the put-my-fingers-in-my-mouth phase. But I still like it.

3. Snow days are still fun. Michael has had two so far this week.

4. I took Christmas card photos after church Sunday. Not bad for only 10 minutes worth of pictures. It'll work. Ryan's not smiling. It was too much work keeping Mackenzie in place and making sure Emma wasn't dropping him or strangling him to try and get him to smile. Of course, I could've done it when Michael wasn't outside snowblowing and had him try and get Ryan to smile but I wanted to get it over with.

5. And tonight I picked up my cards. Now to address them all.

6. I love The Sing-Off. But Nicole is the Paula of this show. I want to fast-forward when she comes on.

7. One benefit to living on a hill? You can make your sidewalk into a toboggan chute. Michael and the girls were sliding down the sidewalk yesterday. I didn't get any pictures because the wind was blowing the snow everywhere, but I did watch them go down once.

8. Christmas shopping is done except for two presents. One I know just have to pick up. The other I'm stumped.

9. The girls are really in to Charlie Brown right now. Tonight we watched "All I want for Christmas is a dog, Charlie Brown." They giggled a lot and shouted Snoopy! when he came on the screen. I laughed at Rerun in the bicycle seat that was over the rear tire, yet three feet behind his mother, ya know, so you only hear her, rather than see her. I wish I knew how to type out how the Charlie Brown adults sound.

10. I wish I could have all my house clean at the same time, all the time. Yet what usually happens is I get the basement, kitchen and upstairs cleaned and the family room becomes a mess. Clean that, and the girls room is a disaster zone. And so on and so forth.

Scrapbook Sunday/Menu Plan Monday

It's two for one, today. I meant to get these up yesterday but didn't quite get to it. And since I'm cooking again now, (can I just say thank you one more time to my church and my workout girls for bringing us meals for two months!) it's back to menu planning.

First up, the layouts. These were all done for Write.Click.Scrapbook. No supply lists this time, because, well, I'm just feeling lazy. But if you have a question about any product used, let me know.






Second, the menu.

Monday: Parmesan-crusted chicken, fettuccine noodles with garlic and basil, asparagus, carrots
Tuesday: Lasagna, garlic toast
Wednesday: leftovers
Thursday: homemade chicken and dumplings, corn
Friday: meatball subs, baked potato wedges, green beans
Saturday: Michael has a game, so we'll all be on our own.
Sunday: eating out or ordering pizza

Snow Days

We've had a crazy amount of snow over the last three days. Monday was a snow day for both Michael and Emma. Which included the girls playing outside twice while Michael cleared the driveway.

Please note the car coming in to the frame on the left. I've mentioned before how cars get stuck coming up our road every winter. It's entertainment. This one never made it. He had to turn around and head back down the hill.


See, turning around in our neighbor's driveway. Hi Beth.


No snow day Tuesday. By late afternoon the snow had stopped and we went to Emma's program at school. But then it started again. And it didn't stop until late this afternoon. I cleared the driveway Tuesday at 1 and at 1 today there was another 7 inches or so on it. Then the snowblower broke. So that's great.

Emma and Mackenzie got to play with Bree and Ava all day today. Rather than have her mom drive in to watch them in the cruddy weather, they came here. They played in the snow while I snowblowed, we worked on making a fort (but I was pretty much done with that after three rows), played play-doh and babies and more. Good times for the girls.

Here's our deck Monday morning around 10:

And today (Wednesday) about noon.

It's snowing right now. More snow expected Thursday morning, and Friday and then a huge storm Sunday and Monday. Because what we really need is more snow. :)

Ten on Tuesday

1. We have snow. Lots of snow. I took these this morning, and we got plenty more afterwards. Lots of snow means snow days though, which Michael and Emma had on Monday.



2. Emma had her Christmas concert/Happy Birthday Baby Jesus program tonight. It was unbelievably cute. I didn't get any good pictures from where I was sitting, but you can see her in this one.


3. Purple Heart picked up two bags of donated clothes today while I was out snowblowing. I was just cleaning out the laundry room and now have four more bags for them. Wish I would've done this last night.

4. While I haven't started putting together my Dec. Daily yet, I am up-to-date on the journaling and tonight downloaded Ali Edwards' 6x8 overlays. I'm getting there.

5. Ryan is still cute. Starting to grow out of his 0-3 month sleepers.

6. Mackenzie is still a stinker. Oh my is this going to an interesting winter. I'm praying for patience daily. Really. I am.

7. Emma still talks a lot. And questions everything. We'll be lucky if she still believes in Santa next year. She's already wondering why there are so many Santas and if they're the real Santa or not.

8. We cut down our tree Saturday (pictures to come) and afterwards you can go in their barn and get hot chocolate, make s'mores, roast hot dogs. It's the best hot chocolate ever. And the woman who owns the farm was nice enough to share the recipe with me. It makes a lot. I mean a lot of hot chocolate mix, you only need 1/3 cup per serving.



9. Have you checked out Write.Click.Scrapbook. lately? December brings WCS for the Holidays, a month of holiday-related posts, projects, layouts, mini-albums and more. I have two new mini-albums that will be posted later this month.

10. I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping. Thursday I'm going to the mall with my mom (first trip with all three kiddos) and will finish my sister and mom that day. I'll then just need to get my brother-in-law's present, some stocking stuffers and I'll be done. Very excited by this.

Friday Five

1. Tonight at dinner we were discussing Emma's day at school, specifically show-and-tell and I asked her what Layla brought. (We always ask what specific people brought, trying to work on her memory skills, since she doesn't seem to remember much, or anything, that she does during the day other than play and craft.) Her response was, "Mooooooom, I just told you what Layla brought!" And while she didn't roll her eyes, it was implied in her exaggerated tone of voice. Also implied, "duh." Michael and I just looked at each other and laughed.

2. I'm doing a December Daily album this year even though I never finished last years. Haven't actually made it yet. Although I did pick up the cardstock at Hobby Lobby today.

3. Speaking of Mac, her newest thing when she's angry is hurl an angry insult at you. Her insult of choice? "You silly goose!" growled in a very angry, laughter-inducing, 3-year-old voice.

4. I took this tonight and it might be my new favorite picture.


5. Or it could be this one. Ha! Mackenzie wanted a picture of her with her breadstick with Ryan. And he sneezed. And she's fake-eating. There's just something funny about this.

Ten on Tuesday

1. Tonight I was watching CMT's countdown of the top 40 country songs of the decade. I was doing this while rocking Ryan. Watching country music videos while holding your still-new baby boy means there will be tears. Just saying.


2. Have I mentioned I think he's cute? I do.


3. The above picture was taken on Thanksgiving at my in-laws. We were out in my father-in-law's workshop watching the trains. The kids love it. They all got to pick out a train car from Grandpa's collection to take home. Which means the train around our tree will be three cars longer. And since our track isn't that big, there's a good chance the first car will be meeting up with the last.

4. Impressed the girls are looking without making faces and Ryan's awake.


5. Mackenzie's really into reading. And reading to Ryan.


6. All the Sweeney grandkids.


7. Sigh. I love him.


8. I mentioned the love of reading. I have a love of seeing them read books.


9. Also, I love hearing her read aloud.


10. Funny Ryan sleeping pictures.

The End.

2 Months

Ryan was two-months-old on Friday, the 19th. The only picture I took of him that day was this though, in his car seat. He pretty much slept from about 2 pm until the next day other than waking up to eat. I think the combination of shots and Tylenol pretty much knocked him out.



@ 2 months old:

He's sleeping in his bed but in his bouncy seat. I might attempt him sleeping on his back soon, but so far any attempts at him doing so results in him waking up. My kids are just incline sleepers, it seems.

(11/16/10)

He's on just formula now. I stopped pumping the day after he was 5 weeks old. He doesn't seem to mind. He eats between 3 - 4 ounces at a feeding, usually every 3 - 4 hours except for a 5 hours stretch at night. When he's hungry he just whimpers and puts his hands to his mouth. Unless you don't feed him fast enough, then he gets mad. He gained almost 2 pounds and 1 inch in the last month. He's now 9 lbs 6.8oz and 22 inches long. Still 25% for both. He's still the noisiest eater ever. I have to warn people beforehand how loud he is and that while it might sound as if he's choking, he's not. He's just that noisy.

The acne is about gone, but he has some eczema on his forehead. Hopefully that clears up easily with lotion, hydrocortisone when we need it. He also still has strangely greasy hair.

He smiles. I love it. First smile was at 7 1/2 weeks old on 11/10/10.


(11/18/10)


He's cute. Really cute.


(11/16/10)

And still awfully serious sometimes.


He like his play mat. He's so interested in the lights and music above him. He really likes the mobile over the changing table, too.

(11/15/10)

He sleeping great. He usually falls asleep between 8 - 9, wakes up and eats around 11pm then sleeps until 4 or so, eats again and sleeps until 7 or 8am. I cannot complain one bit.

He's an easy baby. Content as can be. Rarely fusses. Just easy. For now at least.

He's out of newborn clothes and newborn diapers. With these (almost) two pounds he's gained, he's fitting in most 0-3 month clothes nicely. The fleece sleepers are still way too big, though. He's starting to get chubby cheeks we noticed last week.

He uses a binky, but is hit or miss with it. He's definitely not as into it as Mackenzie was. Sometimes he really wants it, but often he has absolutely no interest.

He's still awesome.