Pers-o-nal-i-TEE

It is so crazy to me how much personality can come from such a small tiny person. And how quickly it develops! One thing is certain, this child of mine... he is FULL of personality. He knows he's cute and will do anything to make sure you know it too. Attention hog to fullest extreme! What's even more crazy is how innate it is that a person be either girly or boyish. He already is into anything dirty. There is nothing about him that doesn't like to be dirty. He eats dirty. He plays dirty. He doesn't even care if his diaper is dirty. Gross, right?! Another boyish thing that he does is when he plays, he makes the noises of what he's doing. He makes drill noises when he plays with tools, he makes a vacuum noise when he plays with his vacuum, and he makes car and airplane noises too. I'm not sure why it just completely amazes me that a little boy, at 15 months, would know to do all that! 15 months ago, he couldn't even pick things up on his own! And now he's got a mind and a will (that he makes very obvious, at times) all of his own. This little monkey is mischievous and funny. He's downright stubborn and he's the sweetest little guy I've ever known. He's wild and crazy. He's friendly and sometimes he's temperamental. He's everything that's just right to make up one awesomely-rotten-and-precious-at-the-same-time-little Jake Ryan.

Moments like these are rare. This boy is ALWAYS on the go. Always, always very busy.

Into anything and everything. When you think he can't... he'll find a way.

So dirty, and so fun

Can't turn my back for a second, or he's into things like dirt!

Always entertaining himself

And trying to entertain everyone else too.

This kid is such an awesome kid. I know I'm 100% partial, but I'm just saying. We have so much fun together. He loves to make everyone around him laugh. Rotten to core and sweet as pie, all at the same time-that's Jake Ryan. Cutest kid I know. :)

The Adventures of Ryan & Tana

By now, you've heard me reference Tana as my best friend. We have been bff, besties, practically sisters... whatever you wanna call it... since 1995. We just realized recently that it had been 16 years like RIGHT now. SO crazy. I can't believe we are even old enough to have had a legitimate friend for that long!! Let alone the fact that we have been through thick and thin, through life and death, and through wild and crazy.  I could list a million different things, good and bad, that life has dealt us that we have gone through together. I can speak for both of us when I say that we have had several friends in the past, but our friendship is always the one that sticks. We can communicate without speaking. Don't believe me? Talk to our husbands. It drives them NUTS!!

How we met. I went to HTCS, an elementary school in Fort Smith. Tana came during the last week of 4th grade to see what the school was going to be like because she was going to attend school there the next year. Tana was from the town I lived in, Roland. Because we were from the same town, we carpooled together a lot. We were always at each other's houses from about then on. After 5th grade, she went back to Roland. That next summer, between 6th & &7th, I spent a lot of time at Tana's house, because they had a pool. My mom had to use their pool for exercising purposes due to a back surgery she'd had. I started Roland the following school year, and from there on we were inseparable. Now, we had our differences here and there... but in the end... we were always the last ones standing side by side. We've never lived more than a short car ride away for more than one 6-month period when she moved to Tulsa. I quickly followed with my husband as soon as I graduated and married him. :) The rest is history. We've gone through terrible news together, births, funerals... you name it, we went through it together. And rest assured... if it was a big life-changing event, you better believe we tell each other immediately. One time about 3 1/2 years ago, when I was working nights, Tana had received some very devastating news... she drove out to my house, in the middle of her work day, while I was sleeping (which was pretty far out of the way from where she was).  She couldn't get ahold of me, so she went into my backyard and started knocking on my window. She knew I'd be there. And I was. I came to the back door, let her in. And while I was just in pj's in my kitchen, I listened to her tell me that her mom had cancer. We cried, and I held her. And just so you know, I've also listened to her tell me every time she hears the news that her mom is still in remission. :)

We are not just best friends, we are family. Her family is my family and vice versa. I have heard my parents both say time and time again how special she is to us. And one of my most favorite memories of Tana's family growing up, was that her Gigi always sent me Valentine's gift on V-day because she knew I didn't get much. Also, much of our time spent together was at either of her grandparent's houses. Those grandparents of hers have always, always had a special place in my heart. :)


Ok, enough with the gushy stuff.

Anyway, I could go into a million hilarious stories too that would likely just embarrass both of us. So, I'm including the lighter humored stories to spare us both the misery. :) And also our most recent adventure, which will be at the end.

And this, my dear friends, is the first year our friendship began. Tana and I are the two in the middle. This is 1995! Represent!

Junior high here, Tana's little brother took these pictures. While he was snapping them, a copperhead popped out of the bushes THAT WE WERE SITTING IN!!! He tried to kill it by chopping off its head. He did not succeed. Mind you, he was probably like 12 at the time. We were extremely freaked out.

Junior prom, no need to comment.

Just a random high school picture.

This was on an FCCLA trip to OKC

On that FCCLA trip, we were late. The teacher's motto was, "if you're not five minutes early, you're ten minutes late". They left without us. We finagled the principal into somehow persuading the VERY stubborn teacher to stop the bus. The entire bus had to wait on the interstate onramp while we were riding in the backseat of A ROLAND CITY COP CAR, with sirens blaring and everything, doing WAY over the speed limit to catch up to the bus. We were in "trouble" and had to sit at the front of the bus (where I am certain we bugged the LIFE out of that teacher). Then we had to go wherever a certain guy went that we found to be really annoying. We drug him around with us and then convinced him to let us ditch him. :) Good times.

first day, senior year

graduation practice

Not sure what grade here, but I do know it's high school. Awesomely short shirts, right?!

Our senior year, we spent A LOT of time in the library. You must know that Roland's library, back then, was not full of quiet people reading... oh, no... it was full of very loud people, laughing and skipping class.

Senior English... was such a joke, but provided LOTS of memories!!

Tana's 21st birthday. I compiled a lot of the pictures you've already seen here and made her some sweet little pictures. :) That she still has, by the way.

Lake time, good times

Dancing the night away in Cancun

Again in Cancun, ready to go out to eat.

We helped with the Extreme Makeover Home Edition in Alma, AR!!

We both got married. Here we are at Tana's wedding... she's with her matron of honor. :)

Most recent girl's trip to NYC... here we are with that nasty naked cowboy. He's a perv.

Oh, my friends... yes, that is me. We proudly pilfered through this huge newspaper only receptacle.

Too receive this lovely treasure!!

Tana in deep concentration over the deals to be had!

Paid $4.50 for all of this.

Paid $3.79 for all this. Thank you, coupons!!

Everyone has a best friend during each stage of life. Only a precious few have the same one.

Thank you, Tana, for being the best friend ever!!

Girls Trip Extravaganza!!

Well, I went to NYC and back a couple weeks ago. We had SO much fun. It was a ridiculous amount of fun. I thought it would be hard leaving Jake. And don't get me wrong, I definitely missed the heck right outta that crazy kid. But, I guess we just kept ourselves so busy that I didn't really have time to stop and think about how much I wanted to hug and kiss on him, and hear his crazy jibberish, and feel his sweet hand brush my cheek before bed. I did miss that, but I didn't I didn't have time to get sad about it. So that was really nice.

Oh, yes... I was excited about that roadside vendor hot-dog. 

I was kind of sad because I was in the middle of trying to find a pair of contacts that would work with my eyes. For whatever reason, since pregnancy, it has been uber hard to wear contacts. Turns out, I'm allergic to some material. Whatever, I've since found a pair that work, and I'm excited. But when we were on the trip, I hadn't found that pair yet, so I had to wear my glasses the whole time. ;-/ I was pretty bummed, because I am a sunglasses wearing fool!! And who wants to roam around NYC without those huge awesome sunglasses?? Not me. But I did. And enjoyed my time, nonetheless. :)

The most beautiful place (Central Park) inside of a very noisy and bright city.

Me, Tana, and Chelsea. We took a carriage ride around Central Park. Our horse's name was Chelsea. :)

This is everybody! L-R Judi, Me, Heather, Gail, Haileigh, Chelsea, Tana.

Sisters, very obvious tourists too.

This is what Ground Zero will look like come September on the 10 year anniversary of 9-11. The two fake water things are where the Twin Towers stood. They call it the footprints of the towers.

Heather, me, Tana. We were going to see Lady Liberty.

She was every bit as beautiful, if not more so, in person. Actually, a picture does her absolutely zero justice.

The song playing while we floated by probably seems cheesy. But when you're actually there... it is very emotional. We live in a free country, people. That's pretty profound. She stands for a lot.

Oh, delicious Magnolia Bakery... How I wish you were closer to me than NYC!!!

Sweet Judi will talk to anyone! Our trip wouldn't have been half as eventful or entertaining without her!!! Also, check out the creepy guy she's sitting by. He freaked me out. She obviously wasn't phased by him. I'm not sure anyone would phase her.

And that, my friends, concludes my brief overview of our girls trip extravaganza!!!

Thank You, Lord, For Bedtime.

Do you ever have one of those days where you feel like your child has acted the worst possible way every place you went? Dear Lord, today was that day, and it was so embarrassing. Jake, for the most part, is a very well behaved child. I have been told countless times that I should consider myself lucky. And I do. But today, I am afraid I got a little inkling of what Jake's terrible twos may look like. I am going to go ahead and blame it on the molars that have been trying to come in for literally MONTHS (just because you can always blame bad behavior on those dang teeth!) and the shot he got yesterday. However, excuse or no excuse... the kid was a nightmare today!!!

Forgive me for venting. :)

We started off the early morning with lots of fussy sleeping. Sometimes he does this crying while still sleeping thing. It's really awesome when you're a light sleeper. I don't feel comfortable enough yet to not use the monitor, so if he is crying, I am awake. What makes the fussy sleeping even more awesome, is that he actually slept in today. He slept until 8. But I was awake at 6:30 when he started a 5 minute fuss. Awesome. He is normally a 7am alarm clock, and nearly always sleeps in when Derick is home with him. True story. Then at nap time today, he fussed for nearly 40 minutes before finally falling asleep. This is not incredibly uncommon, BUT we had a lot of errands to run and it would happen on the day we had things to do. Our first stop, he acted alright. But I also had a friend with me. When we were leaving, though, he pitched a fit in the parking lot. I am in no way opposed to spanking my child. I don't really like to do it in public yet because he's so little and for now, it's actually not even that effective. Most effective is for us is time-out. I wish there was a way to do time-out in public. If any of you have input on that, please, feel free to let me in on it! Anyway, so I am trying the ole walk away and ignore it thing. Well, for one, it's hard to walk away from a one-year-old... let alone a one-year-old that is as fast as he is. So, I just make it obvious that I'm not giving him the attention he wants. So far, nothing is successful in stopping his ridiculous fits other than time-out. I love time-out. :) Second place we went was to a store. Whined and screamed nearly the whole time we were in there. Third place we went was to visit Derick at work. Whined and screamed when he didn't get his way. Then pitched a fit outside as we were leaving. Last place we went, he pitched a fit in front of everyone and it was awesome. Not to mention, the child that LOVES to go places and is either singing, talking or sleeping in the car, was screaming at the top of his lungs today. I understand that he's not gonna be perfect 100% of the time, but man... he really let me have it today!

You know what makes all of this even more awesome? I was reading a hand-out that the doctor's office gives us with each well-visit... it said that soon the child will start to throw tantrums and fits. HA! Soon?? We've been at this for MONTHS. Funny story... I had a couple friends over recently who both have 3-year-olds. They were telling me that around 18-24 months they start throwing themselves down on the floor and throwing fits. I told them we were totally already there. I don't know if they were thinking that I just thought he was throwing fits, or what, because when he actually did have a fit for them, they were like...ooooh, he does throw fits! Yes, yes, he does. He is barely 15 months old and he will jump up and down, waving his arms, screaming and whining, and then sink to the floor slowly. He always puts his head on the floor as if he is in agony, or something dramatic. This is kind of mean, but I think it's kind of funny when he does it in the tub. Hehe. He forgets for a second that there's water. It's like it catches him so off guard that the fit is instantly over. Maybe I should get a water bottle!!

And you know, despite all of this... this is still my most favorite stage thus far. Maybe because the rewards are greater? Challenges are getting more difficult, but the rewards are even better. :)

Anyway, some days are awesome. Like yesterday, he was great yesterday. Today, completely different child--whom I still completely love and adore... especially now that he's sleeping and we get to start over tomorrow.

This mom is off to bed early tonight.

***UPDATE***
The very next morning, we woke up to find our very first molar. :)

15 months

My sweet tiny little Pickle baby is 15 months old today!! Where on earth has all the time gone?? The changes and growing that he's been doing is so amazing! Every age and stage is always the best, but this stage TOTALLY rocks and kicks all the other stages we've been through's butt!!! ;) He talks so much. Everyday he says something else and we're like, "when did you start saying that?"

Jake, at 15 months you are...

26 pounds

wearing size 5 shoes

in mostly 24 month clothes

RUNNING everywhere

starting to get upset when mommy or daddy leave you

counting and two is your favorite number, you always say it with enthusiasm

LOVE, LOVE playing outside

really like "helping" daddy work outside

Dirt is your favorite thing about nature. You are often caught in the act of trying to eat it!!

You love throwing trash away in the trash can

You love sliding down your slide 

You love going for walks with your Nena and Quincy

You also love talking to Nena and Pop every night on FaceTime.

Your funniest saying is "Oh, man!" and it is hilariously cute!

You nod and shake your head.

You love to point out mommy's ears, eyes, nose and mouth while we're cuddling.

You have become a bit picky with your food these days... much to mommy's dismay.

You will always, always eat cheese though. And milk... milk is your best friend, second only to Blankie and Mr. Bear.

You love to run and hide when it's time to get dressed or change your diaper.

You are so fun!! You amaze me the way you learn and grow every day! You understand the things we say now and take direction pretty well. :) When you make a mess, you are quick to help clean it up. 

Mommy and Daddy love you a million times a million, and that's too many to count!