Melts My Heart

There is just SOOO much love in his eyes for this little girl.

Already?

I remember, very clearly, one day my Aunt Kathy, cousin Amanda, and my sister picked me up from First Christian Daycare when I was 4 years old. This may be my first memory as a child, but it definitely sticks out in my mind. We were all going to hang out for the afternoon and they picked me up before nap time. While I was walking away from the school my Aunt Kathy said, "I think someone wants to tell you bye..." I turned around and there were two boys waving bye to me and blowing me kisses through the glass. So, of course, I walked up to the glass and gave them a kiss through the glass. Kim and Kathy like to give me a hard time about that day, but I think it is hilarious memory.
Well, the apple did not fall too far from the tree; however, Ryan's first "boyfriend" came a little earlier in life. There is this ADORABLE boy in Ryan's class named Tripp. Honestly, he and Ryan look like twins, they are about a week apart in age and they are in love:) Ha, well, everyday when I pick Ryan up I always say hey to Tripp and he runs away like a shy little boy, then comes back 5 seconds later to give me a toy he found. Well, Ryan's teacher, Meg (who she named her toothbrush after), told me on Wednesday that Ryan and Tripp are officially boyfriend/girlfriend. She said every time they tell the kids to line up at the door they each grab one another's hand and stand at the door. None of the other kids hold hands, just Ryan and Tripp. Every afternoon after nap time, they play an episode of Dora or some cartoon, while they are changing diapers and Meg said they sat in each other's laps Thursday and Friday. Finally, the past three days have ended with the biggest, most tear jerking hug from the two of them. They are absolutely PRECIOUS together.
Now, I am all for this, this child is so cute- and I am fully aware that Ryan and Tripp are both toddlers, not about to elope from their families and start their own lives together. However, daddy had to see this encounter first hand in order to jump on board.
I told Bill about it on Thursday night, which he promptly decided to have a sit down with Ryan, here is kind of how the conversation went

Bill: Ryan, are you and Tripp friends at school?

Ryan: Tripp!! Tripp!!

Bill: Okay baby, I know that you like Tripp, but you are just buddies with him...okay?

Ryan: (nods her head)

Bill: Okay, so maybe during Dora we will sit beside Tripp, not on his lap.

Ryan: Dora, Dora, Dora, Dora

Bill: Okay, I am glad we talked about this baby. So are you going to sit on Tripp's lap anymore?

Ryan: Yes!!

Man, I am sure glad they had that talk, it seemed to be extremely productive. Lord help this man when dating actually starts...hide your kids hide your wife!

Tea Party

While I was kind of getting things together after we got home last night, this is what I walked in to....Yes, that's right, a tea party set up by Ryan herself. She invited Bill to join her and he taught her all sorts of things.

Like how to pour the tea...

How to cheers a hot cup of tea...

How to properly drink a hot cup with daddy... Ryan put her animals like this all by herself. Lamby (the white blanket thingy) was already laying over the back of the chair. But, she added the other 4 stuffed animals to the chair.
I just sat there and watched these two and cried. I mean blame it on the hormones, but it was definitely a sweet scene to witness. Bill told me it was his favorite memory as a father so far. I love these two!

So what do you think...

I think we pulled it off quite nicely.

Syrup Soppin'

If you want funnel cakes for breakfast, pony rides for $5, and an endless supply of Syrup then the Syrup Soppin festival in Lochapoka, Al is the place for you. This event happens every year at the end of October. Normally, Lochapoka is a town of 135 people, but on the day of this festival there are over 20,000 people in attendance. We got there bright and early, round 7:30 and was greeted at the entrance with the biscuit stand and just a mere 5 feet away was the funnel cake stand. So, Bill and Ryan had biscuits and syrup for breakfast, while mommy and Darby enjoyed an amazing funnel cake.

I loved this festival. It was basically a flea market with some super dooper extras thrown in there. Extra like the poultry palace that had shows every 20 minutes explaining the breeding process of chickens. We even had the opportunity to meet a turkin (half chicken half turkey). We wandered around the festival for about 2 hours, ate some awesome food, and Ryan got to ride her first horse. We had such a great time. I will just let the pictures speak for themselves. On the tracks

Checking out the booths. Ryan looked very interested in the bow tents, so we had to purchase quite a few.
Now, she wasn't so sure about the horse at first, but it did not take her long to warm up...

This was my parting gift. As we were leaving I saw the sign, "Roasted Corn $3!" I could not resist. It was delicious, so Ryan and I shared the cob.

Can I help you?

Every day when I pick Ryan up she is more than excited to see me. She drops whatever she is doing and runs full on until basically tackling me to the floor, this really melts my heart. The joy of seeing me usually lasts until about the parking lot. Some days her joy continues until it is bedtime, but others I think I would have rather left her with Ms. Meg (her teacher) until the next morning. No matter what the mood is, the hugs and kisses wear off when we get to the parking lot, that is when I start getting the requests...

"Juc, juc" - Juice
"Phishy" - Goldfish
"Dog" - Clifford - the cartoon, not the actual dog
"Mal Mal"- Lamby - don't ask me how she phonetically developed this phrase
"Up, up"- pick me up even though your belly is getting larger and larger and more and more muscles are being pulled each passing day- because face it child, you are well nourished.

Anyways, yesterday was one of my favorite days. I like to call it, "Throw an hour long fit for no dang reason." She made it to the car nice and happy, then saw the 3 day old juice cup sitting in my cup holder and started demanding,
"Juc, Juc"
I rationally explained to her, "Baby, this is old and yucky, you do not want this. Mommy needs to wash it."
So of course she replied rationally by shouting, "Juc Juc"
So I decided to take the road that Bill is trying so hard to direct me down, the road of ignoring Ryan when she is throwing a fit. I just turned up the music and ignored the continual shouting coming from the back. I had to run by CVS yesterday to pick up a few things, so when I stopped the car she calmed down a bit. I asked,
"Do you want to get out of the car and go shopping with mommy?"
"NO!"
"Ryan, mommy is going to be sad shopping by herself, come on get out."
"No"
Okay, talking is no longer working, so I forced the child out of the car screaming and kicking the whole way. So I asked her if she wanted to bring lamby along and she said very insistently, "YES!"
So, we load up our CVS cart- which cracks me up that people who shop at CVS need carts, but we were one of them. So the first thing we saw was the candy specials sitting in the front. Which lead Ryan to immediately start in...
"More, More, More"
"Ryan, we do not need candy right now, if you are a good girl we can get some before we leave."
"MORE MORE MORE MORE MORE" followed by extreme crying and yelling
"Ryan Lily, if you do not stop crying on the count of 3 you are going to get a spankin,
1
2."
She stopped crying... for about a minute
I knew I just needed to get my crap and quickly get the heck out of there. SO I grabbed my shampoo & conditioner, toothpaste, red bulls (for Bill), wipes, and a twix bar (I'll give you one guess who that was for:) and hurried to the check out. Well, thank you CVS for strategically placing the bobble head witch candy packets at the check out. I just went through a 10 minute shopping with a SCREAMING child, I see the light at the end of the tunnel, then I see the dang witch bobble heads. Ryan just starts saying,
"More, MORE, MORE, MORE"
I just ignore her and proceed with the check out. The guy at the register is just giving me the, 'Oh poor thing, I am so sorry you have this awful child' look. While I am shooting back the, "What are you looking at?" look
Then I had my two bags and Ryan with her lamby in the cart, I was trying to get everything out and get that child out of the store and in the car, when it happened...
Two young construction workers walked in the door and of course heard Ryan screaming and said in their disgusting flirty tone...

"Oh, mommy, you are so mean!"

I could not believe it, my neck must have turned three shades of purple and I whipped my head around threw down my bags and said,

"LEAVE ME ALONE!"

I mean really, do you need to top your day off by flirting with the pregnant lady dealing with her screaming child by telling her she is a bad mother! I could have spit nails. The nerve of that jerk to make that comment to me. I prefer the stares suggesting that I should just commit myself and hand over my child to DHR. But to say something so snide and pompous from this guys mouth just blew me away.

Finally, we loaded up the car, I called Bill and said, you better be waiting in the garage when I pull up. Of course, my amazing husband was there just waiting to get the little bean out of the back seat. Ryan lit up like a Christmas tree when she saw daddy and the tears were gone for the night.

I just walked in, kicked off my shoes, laid down on the couch and closed my eyes. This peace lasted for about 2 minutes before I felt someone putting my shoes back on my feet saying, "Shoe, Shoe"
When I opend my eyes, Ryan was standing by my feet grinning from ear to ear trying to get my flip flops back on to join her and daddy outside...
Ahh, talk about your ups and downs of motherhood!

Too much

I mean seriously, it's really been a month since I blogged? I am so sorry, what a slacker! Things have been keeping busy as always around the Ferguson household. Bill and I were getting a little stir crazy so we decided to redecorate one of our bathrooms and our two downstairs guest rooms. You would think that we would get on the ball with getting our new baby's room together since she will be here in 15 weeks, but clearly we were thinking otherwise.

Yes, that's right, I did say we are having a girl. All along Bill and I said we would not find out and let this one be a surprise, but hey what can we say, we are very weak. But rest easy my friends, there was no drama this time when finding out the sex of this little butterbean. I will try to find the post from last baby, but it is a day that I would rather not revisit. It took us a couple of weeks to come up with a name for the new one, but we finally decided on Darby Ann Ferguson. Wow, that is the first time I have typed out the whole name and I think I like it. Bill came up with Darby and I had to let it marinate for a day or two, but now I love it. We both came up with Ann because a lot of our family members have that name in theirs. Yes, only 14 short weeks until baby #2 is here and we could not be more excited. This pregnancy has FLOWN by with everything going on and Ryan there is just no time to stop and think, "Hey my ankles are so fat I am officially in the kankles category." Okay, maybe I thought about that once or twice. But we are ready to welcome another baby into the house, and Ryan is as well.

The Koseks and my parents came to visit last weekend for the Arkansas game and my sister brought her new baby, Joseph -it was the test for Ryan. We were pretty excited to see how she would act around a newborn, and she was perfect. She gave him tons of kisses and kept saying, "Babbbbyyyy." She was very curious when he was feeding, but not all up in Kim's grill. She was a perfect little lady (big sigh). We just hope the transition is the same when the little baby is there to stay! I just hope Ryan doesn't get out the chompers and go to town, that is her latest retaliation.

She went through a biting stage when she was about 10 months old, well it is back. She does not bite Bill and me, but almost every day there is a nice staple in the upper corner of her daily report card at daycare and we know that the biting report is stapled to the back. I always get so excited when I see a nice, flat piece of paper with nothing stapled to the back- but that hasn't been the case for the past couple of days. Finally, Bill asked the teachers to record what was prompting the biting and we are anxiously awaiting the results. You know Bill, he is always the practical one. Me, I just say, well what kid is making her mad:) Ha! I really need to get over that. I mean look at her, what harm can she really do, besides attack the heck out of a booger!

Have a great weekend!

It's been too long

I have seriously neglected photographing my child since July. Things have just been more than busy with work and soccer. I do have to say I am SOOOOOO proud of my girls (the U-14 girls team that I coach) because we have been to two tournaments in the past three weekends and we have won both of them. Thunder Road, was in Auburn, Al two weeks ago and they swept the whole tournament with a seat clenching 3-2 score in the finals. The second tournament was this weekend in Atlanta, The Atlanta Cup. It was a long weekend, but well worth it, the girls placed 1st in one of the most competitive tournaments in the South. I do not have a picture of that because the finals were this morning, but let's just say the smiles were a beaming! I am just so proud of these girls, they are a crazy bunch, but really fun to be around. I love to catch little parts of their conversations, because they are so similar to those I used to have when I was their age. I love that they are creating memories they will hopefully hold on to forever.
SO, with all of this awesome soccer, my photographer abilities are incapacitated by the end of the day. So I MADE myself get out the camera last week to capture the life that is Ryan Lily. We went outside to play in the rain, ate spaghetti, and learned a new trick...

I love this picture

Trying to do the splits

Flirting with the camera, her hair is not normally this curly- it was the humidity
Daddy showing her how to do a trick

Trying it together

Mastered it!
This is how dinner time looks every night. We are so proud of our non-begging dogs.
She really does try to use the fork, but this is usually how it turns out

Loving dinner time

This is a look we get quite often when we tell her to sit down in the tub

And this is the look she gives us when she decides not to listen...oh well she'll learn one day!

They're Backkkkk!

7:30 traffic on Glenn as I head to work!!! Waiting in line at the grocery store!!! Sitting two cars back at the gas station pump!!!! Running over beer cans on my way to soccer practice!!! Yes that's right, school is back in session, and the lovely Auburn University students are back in town!
Now, for those of you who do not live in Auburn, some of this stuff may sound like complaining. Oh no my friends, the best time in Auburn is Christmastime and Summertime. For those are the two holidays where all of the lovely college students make their way back to their hometowns only to give the quaintness of Auburn back to the locals. I truly get spoiled in the summertime. I love heading to Momma G's at noon on a Saturday and waiting in no line whatsoever. BUT, Bill and I tried to go there last Saturday and there was a line out the door at 1:00. It's very funny how we were immediately pissed off (well I was, you all know Bill is pretty even keeled). I thought to myself, how dare these "college students" just waltzed back in MY town and eat at MY favorite sandwich place without asking ME. (side note: pregnancy brings out the incredibly selfish side of me)! So instead of eating my yummy turkey delite, we went to the next closest location, Tenders- which there we were only greeted with grandma tour buses and rednecks (Bill loves that place, I do not!).
Don't just think it is the restaurants, the gas stations, the roads, the grocery stores- THEY ARE EVERYWHERE. When I see the 95 pound girl standing in over 15 item line with 2 lean cuisine pizzas and a 2 liter of diet coke, I want to pick her up over my head and hurl her skinny butt out of the door, so she will get the heck out of my way so I can purchase my 84 waffles, yogurt, lunch meat, kid cuisines, wipes, milk, apple juice, grape juice, easy mac, chicken nuggets etc. etc. etc. But, no I wait patiently while Ryan is going through the candy aisle picking up as many things as she can while saying "More, More." Then I sternly say, "No mamm put that back!" And that skinny little twit has the nerve to turn around and give me a look, first in the eyes, like how dare you talk to your child like that. Then at the belly, like how dare you get pregnant again if you are going to talk to your daughter like that!
Oh, well, I guess I am just gonna have to put on my big girl pants and suck it up until Christmastime, but I know you locals feel my pain!

Around Here Mega Post

I feel like I have let my record keeping abilities down by not blogging for over a month now. This is a really exciting time in our lives right now and no documentation for this family. Well, I am trying to get back on board, but I know it is not gonna get much easier. As the summer winds down, I think everyone sees the time slipping away from them. I still have a notebook full of things to do before I go back to work and somehow the days are just not there.

First, we had some pretty horrible news. I took the babies (the dogs) to the vet for their yearly check-ups and found out our new addition Cap'n Jack has heart worms. I just immediately broke down, I mean we just lost Radly, I cannot handle losing another doggy. So, we are on the very expensive road to recovery. Apparently the heart worm treatment is very intense and can take quite a toll on a doggy. Before treatment begins they have to do all of this blood work and x-rays to make sure Jack's organs were strong enough to handle the treatment. After he gets his first shot, he has to be "self contained" for a month. He is not able to get excited to the point of heavy breathing. Jack has handled it pretty well, but it has not been easy. He has to be walked to go outside, he cannot roam the house, he and Kramer cannot play- it is pretty tough to keep a puppy calm. But, he will go back in for another treatment on August 16th and then another month of self confinement and he should be heart worm free. So send your happy thoughts to Jacko.

After the heart worm scare, I had a soccer camp to work, then we were off to Rosemary Beach for a much needed vaca. We went with the Koseks and the Mortimers.
The weather was absolutely beautiful and there was no oil to be seen. All of the kids had such a great time and the adults acted like big kids as well. Rosemary Beach is such a wonderful place to take kids on a vacation. The had kid block parties, movies on the lawn, splash pads, moon bounces, kids theater night, bicycle trails, and awesome restaurants in walking distance to our house.

Ryan wearing my swimsuit cover up and sunglasses
Playing with daddy during breakfast one day

Absolutely loving the splash pads

Even though we were at the beach, we did not spend a ton of time there. It is tough to take three one year olds to the beach and keep them cool. We did decide on one day to spend a half a day there and the boys did the ultimate set up. My parents let us borrow the big soccer tent and Kim brought a kiddie pool. The boys set up the tent and filled the kiddie pool with fresh water by walking back and forth from the shower station at the top of the beach with a cooler. They are such great daddys. Last time we were at the beach, Ryan was not crazy about the water or sand, this time she was pretty comfy with all of it.

Ryan and Hughes taking their first dip in the pool

Jack not being too sure about all of this sand.

Precious baby girl!

Since we were not at the beach a lot, we basically lived at the pool. The pool was also directly across from our house, which was SO convenient. Ryan loved playing on the steps and was a champ at going under water.

Check out that adorable face. She did so well with her swimming. Kicking on the steps. Cheesing it up with mommy The gang, minus the Mortimers, in the pool. The daddios.
I'll leave with you some final pictures from the week. What a relaxing time.

Mr. Goodbody and I! He is so dang good looking

Tennessee Lemonade

Bill's sporting his anniversary present from me. He loved a pair of very similar sunglasses, but I broke them. They were a cheapo pair, but I felt awful. So we were shopping and I saw this pair of Ray bans and just had to get them- he's obsessed!

The Mortimers

The kids on the way to the block party

I love these two!

Kate would not separate with these goggles. She was quite the fish.

Ryan was basically a rock star