We’re in Memphis this weekend for Jennifer’s Mom’s 60th birthday party, and they decided to take Ryan and his triplet cousins Cole, Aden, and Eva Claire Pettet to the photographer for a session.
Some pretty nice pictures came out of the shoot. They included lower-res copies of all the images from the shoot on a CD, so I published them here to the site. Ryan is 14 months here and his cousins are three years old.
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Getting caught up on the pictures, I just posted the 13th month gallery this evening. Check them out!
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I put two new galleries on the site tonight, Ryan’s 12th Month and his 1st Birthday Party pictures.
Thanks to everyone who attended Ryan’s First Birthday! We had a great time and were happy that the whole family came to celebrate with us! And thanks to everyone who sent cards and gifts, Ryan’s enjoying his new toys and books.
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Just a few days before Ryan turned 11th months, Jen was playing with him on the floor seeing how long he could stand by himself without something to lean on. We decided to see if he would walk a few steps unsupported between us, and he did! Up until this point, he has been “cruising” for several weeks (where he’s holding on to something like the couch, and walking alongside it.)
Now he’s starting to look to take a few steps from one thing he’s holding to another, without Mom or Dad involved. It’s fun to watch because he’s very uncertain of these steps, and tends to lunge toward the next item he’s going to lean on.
So here’s the video:
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Then I added the 11th Month gallery, as well as completed the 10th Month gallery. Here are the quick links:
We did Ryan’s first studio pictures last week. He’s 10 1/2 months in these pictures.
They were done by Kelli Wiseman at Clever Creations Photography in Grand Rapids. It was a photo event where she brought in live bunnies, chicks, and ducklings and you show up without appointment on that day to get kids pictures. It’s a pretty neat deal because she’ll give you your pictures on a CD and will release copyright to you, so you’re free to share and publish them. All for $25 – not a bad deal!
Ryan was in a happy mood but it was difficult to get smiles because there was so much going on with cameras and flashing and all.
Ryan just turned 10 months old today, so I got around to starting the 10th month gallery. I’ll put the rest of them up in a few days.
The last month has been one of leaps and bounds in Ryan’s development. He quickly mastered crawling, then advanced to pulling himself into the standing position (supported), then to letting go of whatever he’s holding on to and standing freely (now up to about 10 seconds at a time), then to moving along the front of the couch while holding on to it. He’s now saying “ma ma ma ma ma ma” and “da da da da da da” and while we’re not certain that he’s talking about Mommy and Daddy, I believe he is.
He’s getting very strong. Earlier today, he was holding on to the back of the couch and I went to pick him up. His grip was so strong that it made me pause so as not to pull on his arms. He gets to be more and more fun every day!
A week after Ryan turned 8 months, I was setting up the camera on the floor to take some video while he played. He decided he had to come and get the camera, and I captured his first real crawl of 4-5 steps. Prior to this, he had been lunging and maybe taking a few strides here and there. Within a week after, he was motoring all over the house.
He just turned 9 months this week, and I’ve published his 9th month gallery.
Quick link to Ryan’s 9th Month Gallery
Here’s the first crawl:
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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 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.
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Thanksgiving 2008 – a great time was had by all! We had most of the family at Dave & Jens house and a ton of food. Thanks to Mom, Karen, Julie, Kim, Val, and Emma for all bringing dishes to pass, and to everyone for making the trip. It’s great when we can all get together like that.
Before everyone left, I took all of the pictures off the cameras so we’d have them all. I posted them yesterday and forgot to make note of it here on the site.
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