Playing, as told by Ryan

Remember me! I'm the new 2 year old. I don't know why people always talk about the Terrible Twos, when there are so many other t-words to describe me: tremendous, terrific, tender, ticklish, toddler, topnotch, troublemaker, tantrum-thrower, and tenacious. Hey, how did those last three descriptions get in there?!!!





I am quite the helper when it comes to being in the kitchen. I know that the oven is hot and I'm not supposed to play there. The refrigerator is cold and I used to be able to play with it until these locks appeared one day. I worked and worked and worked though and was able to "remove" (okay, so Mommy and Daddy say "break") them. But now I want to play at "cold" but I get s"cold"ed everytime I do. I have one cabinet of pots and pans that it's safe I play in and I love to play in the lazy susan. Really, how many bottles of salad dressing do we need? Same with soup? I say more brownie box mixes, cake mixes, and bottles of pancake syrup!



I love to push my dump truck! It even has handles built in. I don't have to stoop over quite so much and boy do I go fast!!! Unfortunately I'm still trying to figure out this balance thing and there's been a time or two when the truck has "dumped", leaving me flat on my diapered derriere. So as a result, sometimes I push it this way.

I got this cool coupe from my friend across the street, Kevin, when he grew out of it. I usually just push it around (it's got a bum wheel), but I recently discovered that the door opens and closes. So lately I've been working on getting in and out of the car. This thing is great! No carseat need! Plus I get to honk the horn as opposed to mommy who is always laying on it.

By now, you've probably all seen pictures of me pushing my John Deere tractor in the yard or on the sidewalk. Well I've also recently discovered that if you push it through these piles of dried brown things on the ground (I think they're called leaves), it makes a crunchy sound! And you can make that same sound by walking through them too! I don't get to make that sound in our yard since daddy hides all the leaves before I can play with them. Thankfully some of the neighbors don't own rakes and have more than their fair share of them!

Mommy is still trying to post the video of me talking. I know all you want to hear what voice is behind this gorgeous face, but it'll have to wait until the website is fixed. This seemed to be an awfully short update for me to report on. Maybe if I practice harder at the good t-words I'll get another chance. But until then, stay tuned - I'll be appearing in my Halloween costume in the next update!

Ryan Speaks

This is the one you've been waiting for - hear Ryan talk!!! Granted he's just repeating words we're asking him to say, but we'll take it. It was recorded on or about his 2nd birthday. Sorry for the angle, the cameradad forgot that you can't do video vertically.

Birthday Bliss

We had a very exciting Columbus Day Weekend here at the Stoeber house. On Sunday, we had a birthday party for Ryan and we continued to celebrate on Monday - his actual birthday. You would think that I could remember to ask any one of the number of people at our house Sunday to take a family picture of us, but no. So instead we did it the old fashioned way. Funny thing is we didn't purposely get Gizmo in the picture. We didn't even know she was on the couch behind us. Thankfully we did though!

Ryan is still in love with trash cans. Our neighborhood has trash pick-up on Monday mornings and he is in absolute heaven pointing each one out when we take our morning walk. So we decided to make him a trash can cake. Using a board constructed with help from our neighbor, John, we stuck an angel food cake in one dowel rod and a pound cake in the other. Waste Management is our garbage company, that explains the WM you see on the back of the trash barrel cake on the right. The yellow lid can cake on the left is for recycling. In-between you'll see cupcakes (as well as tissue tied) white trash bags. While they were no where near as authentic as what the Ace of Cakes or Cake Boss could do, Ryan did say "tash" (translation - trash) when he saw the cake. That alone made the effort worth it.

It was a good thing we had Ryan's party on Sunday, because Saturday was a rough day. He went to bed early and was told to sleep late because there'd be no napping on party day. Did he understand any of this, probably not. This is a picture of Ryan about 45 minutes into his party. As much as he loves Meepa, he's not quick to cuddle him. He was tired.

Not long thereafter, Ryan was found curling up on Cousin Nathan. Poor Nate, Ryan probably weighed a ton! It was cute to see, yet Ryan didn't fall asleep. He got a second wind (maybe the cake had something to do with that) and was a party animal!

Ryan reads the card as I open his Little People, their airplane, and pajamas from Uncle Doug and Aunt Ju-Ju. Grandma Katie looks on.

Getting the Birthday Song sung to him. It didn't scare him, but it's obvious he wasn't quite content with all these people looking at him and saying his name.

Gramma Pat to the rescue! We were so busy serving the other guests that we didn't even give Ryan any cake or ice cream. Thankfully Gramma Pat stepped in to sugar-hype the birthday boy.

Aunt Marcia and Cousin Ava got Ryan some slippers! We needed these as some mornings the floor is cold to walk on.

Thanks again everyone for sharing Ryan's special day with us. We have a video that shows him saying a few of his words. Unfortunately the website wasn't allowing me to upload it. I'll try again soon!