Ryan just turned 8 months old this past weekend.  He is now able to easily move to and from the sitting position routinely.  He is starting to crawl – he spends a lot of time on his hands and knees, and you’ll see the legs working, but not moving in sync with the hands just yet.  He can generally get to where he wants to go, though, by moving a little at a time, lunging, or rolling.

He’s starting to sample our food once in a while.  One of the funny things he likes is dill pickles.  If we’re having a sandwich, we’ll let him suck on a dill spear.  He’ll chew at it a little bit and he’ll make a big sour face, but keeps coming back for more.

I don’t know if we’ve mentioned it here, but we’ve been working on teaching Ryan some sign language.  The first one we worked on (probably since around month two) is the symbol for “milk.”  He’s been doing it for a few months now, although sometimes you almost don’t notice it because he does it with both hands, and doesn’t look at you like “hey, I’m trying to tell you something!”  He just kind of goes about whatever it is he’s doing and you’ll see his hands start to open and close.

So anyway, I just completed the 8th month gallery, and also posted a gallery of pictures from the Martin Family Christmas at our house.  We got together the Saturday following Christmas and celebrated the holidays as well as Zack’s birthday.

Here’s some quick links to the galleries:

Ryan’s 8th Month

Christmas 2008

Ryan is getting pretty close to crawling, he’s getting up on his hands and knees and starting to lunge forward, sometimes dragging his knees a little, sometimes flopping forward to his belly.  Last night I saw him move one knee forward, but didn’t yet go anywhere.  Jen thinks he’ll be crawling in a week, I’m figuring two weeks.

Last night I finished out the 7th month photo gallery, and added pictures from Christmas in Indiana as well.

Quick links:

Ryan’s 7th Month

Christmas in Indiana 2008

I added a few new galleries today, one from the weekend of November 8, 2008 in Indiana.  Eric and Emily made the trip to Indiana with the triplets, so everyone was together for the weekend at Dave & Mindy’s.  This was the first time Ryan got to meet many of the Pettet family, and there are some great pictures of him with Grandpa and Grandma Pettet.

Also finished the Ryan’s 6th month gallery and started the 7th month.

Quick Links:

Indiana Pettet Family Gathering

Ryan’s 6th Month

Ryan’s 7th Month

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I published two new galleries today, Ryans fourth month and the pictures from Labor Day weekend 2008 (Mom, Karen, Terry, Dave, Jen, and Ryan at the cabin in Lake City.)  Ryan was in his fourth month in this picture set as well.

Quick Links:

Ryan’s Fourth Month

Labor Day 2008

I’ve been falling behind a little lately on publishing pictures.  Tonight, I completed the Ryan’s Third Month gallery.  Now I’ve got to get the 4th month pictures together.

Also published the pontoon outing from August 17th.  Mom, Karen, Terry, Kim, Mike, Zack, Billy, Val, Joey, Dave, Jen, and Ryan on an all-day cruise of Spring Lake.

Quick Links:

Ryan’s Third Month

Pontoon Outing

I published a bunch of new pictures tonight. Last weekend, Jen and I made two trips down to Bath. On Saturday we spent the afternoon hanging out with Val, Joey, and Rob at Joey’s apartment pool party with the Uptown Band playing. Saturday night I went to the Ionia Free Fair tractor pulls with Nate and Billy, and we all had a great time watching the big display of horsepower.

Sunday we made another trip down to have a family picnic with Dad. He was going in for knee replacement surgery on Monday morning, and wanted to get together with everyone before then. I captured a nice series of pictures of Dad telling a story using the continuous shooting mode on our camera.

I also started the Ryan’s Third Month album with a number of pictures we have so far. There is a picture in that album that Val took of Jen and Ryan that is just fantastic, just mom and baby’s faces together. There are two exposures of that one in the album.

Quick links:

Family Gathering

Ryan’s Third Month