Family Pictures
This year we had our family pictures taken twice, once in Phoenix and once in Salt Lake. We LOVE both sets of pictures. 

Rylie 9 Months

This month has been a busy one as Rylie has been on the GO! She is cruising, crawling, standing, pulling herself up, walking with fingers and other push toys, and babbling. Her favorite toys to walk and push are the Cozy Coupe and the shopping cart. Rylie enjoys playing in the water table, "organizing" the pantry, and "emptying" dishwasher. Rylie babbles several different consonant sounds and often plays with her voice with loud yelling. She turns towards us when we call her name. Its so sweet to watch her recognize familiar faces. When she sees pictures of Derek or herself or our family on the wall she points, has a huge grin and babbles something sweet. Rylie eats table food now, which has been so awesome...I LOVE to just make one meal that we can all share. Its so wonderful to put food on her tray and let her eat all by herself so I can do other things. I remember how freeing the first meal was when Derek, Rylie, and I all ate the same thing. Rylie will eat anything as long as she can put it in her mouth herself. Rylie sits in a big girl car seat now, still rear facing, (Derek got a new car seat that transitions into a booster and Rylie got his old one). She LOVES to be sitting in more of an upright position and can "play" with Derek during car rides. When she cries in the car Derek always says, "Rylie, its ok. Everything is going to be alright." Its totally what I say to her when she cries. Derek continues to be an amazing big brother. Today at lunch he thanked Jesus for our food saying, "Dear Jesus, Thank you for my lunch. And thank you for Mommy coming to see me. And thank you for Rylie. And thank you for my bike and apple juice! Amen." He is really great with her, even sharing his trains and trucks with her (the ones he is not playing with of course). Rylie definitely prefers to be held by Mommy, but is getting much better about letting other people hold her. She has been in church nursery now for about 3 months and the last 2 Sundays when we came to get her she was happy. We love our sweet baby girl and cannot believe how fast time is flying by. We are so blessed to be her parents.
At 9 months Rylie weighs: 16.8lbs and is 26.75" tall. She is our little peanut!!

 Sharing Derek's Cheerios...oopsies

 "How big is Rylie? So big!"

 Enjoying graham crackers!

Rylie loves playing with our nativity scene

 Crawling indoors and outdoors

often crawling in a plank position - this girl is so strong!

Derek (2 years, 5 months)
Its hard to believe we are 1 month away from having a 2 and a half year old!! We are just loving this stage with Derek. This month Derek has been really into making tents. His favorite place to make a tent is in Mommy and Daddy's bed. What kid doesn't love playing in their parents big bed?!! He likes to read in the tent, play with his digger in the tent and just hang out in the tent. So fun!

Derek spends many afternoons biking around our neighborhood or biking at the Costco Park (it has awesome hills). Sometimes when we bike around the neighborhood I jog with Rylie in the stroller. Derek thinks its so fun to have me jogging while he bikes. We are having a hard time keeping shoes on Derek for biking. He uses his feet for brakes and since he loves to bike down big hills he keeps getting holes in his shoes. In a matter of 1 month he has gotten a hole in 2 pairs of shoes! We may be teaching him how to ride a real bike soon!! Here are a couple of videos of Derek on his bike.

One Scturday morning, while Matt was in Sydney, Derek met his best bud Zack there. The two boys were so cute biking together. At the end of the biking, they found an awesome mud puddle to ride through. It was so fun to watch the boys be boys!!

 

Love his helmet hair from the bike ride we had just been on!

Derek has been watching Misty Island Rescue and Hero of the Rails a lot this month (taking a break from George). As a result, he has been really focused on his trains, playing with them for hours. It is so fun to watch and hear the creativity come out during his play. This month he has been building tracks all over our playroom floor (instead of on the table). At night before he goes to bed the trains pull into Tidmouth Sheds to sleep. Derek makes sure each engine is put in its proper shed. In the morning he turns on the lights in the playroom and says good morning to the engines. Gordon seems to be his favorite engine. Rylie enjoys crawling after Derek and taking his trains. Derek is so good about telling her no and giving her another train to play with. He usually models my behavior.

Simple Things to Remember
Derek is such a sweet boy with a kind heart. I am so blessed that God chose me to be his Mommy. Here are few things that we want to remember from the past couple of weeks.

• One morning Matt got Derek from his room and asked him how he slept. Derek answered, "God gave me good sleep. God kept me safe." 

• Derek says this all the time, "I want a hug!" Of course you can have a hug buddy!!

• At church, Derek has been learning about the story of David. The phrase he learned from one week was "God wants us to help others!" (which he shouts out loud) He enjoys helping his friends. Often when plays with his trains and friends and they get stuck he says, "Don't worry. I will help you!" Love to see this!

• I was frustrated with Rylie one afternoon and Derek was watching me try to get her to sit still to take her bottle. He looked at me with a concerned face and asked, "Mommy would you like a hug?" Then climbed down off the couch and give me a hug. Melt my heart!

• At dinner we give thanks for our food together before we eat our meal. We always ask Derek if he wants to pray. He usually says he wants one of us to pray, but during this month he has started giving thanks. Derek will say, "And thank you for my crocs, and thank you for my bat, and thank you for Mommy coming to see me and Daddy coming to see me. And thank you for Rylie. And thank you for keeping me safe" Its awesome to hear Derek speak from his heart. We want Derek to learn from an early age that we have so much to be thankful.

• We often act out the story of David and Goliath using a sword and soft block. Derek likes to be Goliath and fall to the ground. He remembers what both characters should say and will let me know if I forget to say something or say something wrong. The other day we were at a play date and Derek started telling me that David was a shepherd boy and shouted, "Praise the Lord."

Rylie 8 Months

Rylie has learned a lot of new skills this month. I guess this is what she had been working on during her no-napping phase. I cannot believe how fast she has learned these skills...it was a matter of three days. I guess Rylie learned everything from all of the time she spends watching Derek!! You can tell she wants so badly to just run after him and play with him. Its so cute to see the 2 of them "play" together! She crawls after Derek as he does sprints down our upstairs hallway (one of Derek's favorite activities).

Crawling
Rylie is crawling all over the place and exploring everything. She loves her new freedom and enjoys moving around. You can tell she likes making her own decisions about where she goes. She is quick and loves to crawl after Derek and his toys (especially his bike and trains). Rylie can crawl and then push herself up to a sitting position. We caught her trying to grab Derek's chocolate chip cookie the other day. It was hilarious to see Derek realize that Rylie was the one taking it. Here is a video of the first time we really caught her crawling (Oct. 30th). She is MUCH faster now!

Pulling herself to standing
One day after they started crawling Rylie began to pull herself up to a standing position. Rylie's eyes light up and she squeals with glee when she pulls herself to a standing position. She reaches for my fingers and wants to walk around. One of her favorite places to stand up is next to the train table, especially when Derek is playing trains. We hear Derek say, "Rylie, no. That is my train. I am playing with it!" We lowered Rylie's crib and put toys in the crib too. Before she goes to sleep and when she wakes up Rylie sits up and plays quietly in her crib. Its so fun to watch on our webcam. It is so fun to see her mobile. Here are a few pictures of places we have found Rylie now that she is mobile. She is now able to hold on with one hand and bend over and pick something up or sit herself down. It won't be long before she is cruising around!!

Walking

Rylie loves to hold onto our fingers and walk around the house. She gets a big smile on her face. Rylie will crawl over to you and even on top of you...whatever she has to do to find your fingers. Then she grabs our fingers and pulls herself to standing and off she goes. One of her favorite things is to walk laps in our house around the Derek motor speedway (as we have nicknamed it).

Video of Rylie when she first started walking. Matt had just come back from a week in Sydney and was catching up with all of Rylie's new skills. (He still has the boot on his foot from breaking his little toe.)

Clapping
Rylie loves to clap. She often crawls somewhere, sits up and claps with a big grin on her face. Then repeats. It is precious to watch. She is such a happy baby.

 

Eating table food
Rylie has been eating solids 3x/day for the past 2 months. This month she has begun to eat table food. She is grabbing cheerios and puffs and other small bits of food and getting them in her mouth. It is nice to have her eat what we are eating. She grabs everything (within her reach) and tries to eat it, so we have to watch her. The other day at Costco I was getting Derek a sample of chips and salsa and wasn't paying attention. Rylie had grabbed a chip and had taken a bite of it. I made a big batch of baby food for Rylie when she first started solids, but then started buying it and dinnertime is much easier and happier for all of us.

All these new skills have been wearing Rylie out because she has been napping so much better these days! I am so thankful! Right now she seems to be napping 30-45 min. in morning and 2 hours in afternoon. She continues to sleep through the night, going to bed around 6:30/7:00 pm and waking up about 6:30/7:00 am. We are so proud of Rylie and just love her to pieces. She brings so much joy to our lives. Her determination and curiosity are so fun to watch!

first ride in coupe (Big brother Derek pushing her of course)

Rylie and Derek LOVE each other.

 I treasure the times when they are "playing" or laughing together.

 Rylie moves so much in her sleep, found her dressed this way one morning.

 swinging at Costco Park, while Derek rides his bike

The view I see a lot of now!!