Birthparents

Over the last four years the Lord has obviously been working in the lives and hearts of Ryan's birthparents. We are so blessed to have an open and wonderful relationship with his birthmother, Becky, even though we live a thousand miles apart. Last spring she called and told me that she and Ryan's birthfather, Dorian, were going to get married! He is serving in the military and they ended up postponing the wedding several times due to Dorian's duties being prolonged in Korea, but last month they were able to finally get married. I'm very happy for them and for their daughter Parker, Ryan's birthsister (she's one year and one day older than Ryan).

Becky emailed these wedding pictures and graciously allowed me to post them here! I showed Ryan the pictures (he recognized Becky right away) and told him that they just got married. He said, "Oh." LOL. He knows he's adopted and is very familiar with his birth story, but I don't think he really grasps much of what that means yet.

Sprinkles

Even though Ryan has had this stuffed hippo since the day he was born, it's only been the last couple months that they have become almost inseparable. His name is Sprinkles, and we bought him when we were first told that we had been chosen to be Ryan's parents. Sprinkles got lost once in WinCo when Ryan was about six months old, but Daddy went back and "rescued" him (I was more upset at that point than Ryan was). Thankfully he was in the lost and found and didn't go home with some little child.

Ryan was allowed to take comfort items with him into surgery, and he took his blankie and Sprinkles. He calls Sprinkles his "baby," and he takes very good care of him. When I told Ryan that we were getting his picture taken today, he asked if he could bring Sprinkles and have his picture taken too. So we brought him along and put him in one of the pictures. The poor hippo is well-loved and very shabby looking, but Ryan loves him to death!

Birthday Pictures

We got Ryan's four-year-old pictures taken today, and they turned out really cute so I thought I'd share them here. We usually go to Kiddie Kandids because I usually have a coupon or a special deal, and my favorite thing is that they let you purchase the pictures on disc and you own the copyright. We send lots of pictures to family and birthparents, and I love being able to print whatever I want whenever I want!

Doctor Appointments

Ryan had two doctor appointments today. The first was his four-year checkup. He fought and fussed even though we kept reassuring him that he wasn't even going to get a shot. I think the reason he was so uptight was that the last time he had his weight and blood pressure checked he had eye surgery and woke up in pain! Anyway, he's in the 15 percentile in height and 50 percentile in weight. It's no wonder everyone keeps asking if he and Abby are twins...he's not growing very tall very fast and she's almost caught up with him!

His second appointment was the one-month follow-up with his eye surgeon. He has healed great and his vision is really good. He most likely won't need to have another surgery, but as expected, we didn't get a full correction of his strabismus. He still crosses a fair amount up close, but at distance there is much improvement. The surgeon said that may be the best we can do for him. He crosses much more with his glasses off than with them on, so he will be wearing those for quite some time, if not forever. Time will tell. Overall though, I am pleased with the results and now that it's over, I'm glad we did it for him.

Not a Thief

On Sunday we visited another church on our search for a church home. Eddie took Ryan to his Sunday School room and introduced him to the teacher. The young woman was trying to make friends with him and said, "Do you want to walk down the hall with me and steal some Band-aids?" Ryan gave her a horrified and scared look and shook his head NO! She thought he just didn't trust her, but Daddy told her it was the word she used...steal. She apoligized and explained her poor choice of words, and he felt much better after that. I don't know what we ever did to instill the Thou Shalt Not Steal Lesson so effectively, but I'm glad he has learned it. We are so proud of him!

Quiet Time

Well, I've finally given up trying to get Ryan to take an actual nap. Ever since he's stopped sucking his thumb, he's not been sleeping at naptime. I guess he doesn't need as much sleep as previously and without his thumb lulling him to sleep he just can't. However, I'm not ready to give up my one hour of quiet time each day, so I've struck a compromise with him. He doesn't have to lay on his bed for an hour trying to get to sleep anymore...IF he will play quietly or read books for an hour so I can have my quiet hour and maybe even take the occasional nap. (He may not need them, but I swear I still do!) He's been doing this for about a week now, and he's been doing great. He takes a few cars and books on his bed and sits there reading or playing quietly until I tell him the hour is up. He's much happier at naptime now and so am I since I don't have to answer the "Can I get up now?" question a million times!

Follow the Leader

Ryan is quite the leader. Wherever we go it seems like he just naturally takes charge. When we go to the park, even kids much older than him will follow whatever game he's playing. Unfortunately, he is often bossy too. I usually try to moderate what he's telling Abby to do, but today Abby seemed to be so enjoying following him around I just left well enough alone. They got to actually play in our backyard for the first time today. I hasn't rained for several days in a row, and the yard was dry enough to let them go out and enjoy the sunshine. They played for four hours! Ryan was busy making up games to play, and Abby was just joyfully doing whatever he wanted. It was wonderful to see them playing so well together. I'm trying to teach Ryan to let Abby choose the game sometimes too, and hopefully it's sinking in. But for today, I was happy to just let them enjoy their "roles."

All Buttoned Up

We've been working on learning to do buttons for quite a while now, and I've known Ryan could do it if he really tried at all. Yesterday was the day he decided he would try, and guess what? He can button buttons! I knew he could, but now he knows he can, and he's pretty pleased with himself.

Some of his other more recent accomplishments are brushing and flossing his teeth by himself. He uses a "flosser," and he can do all but the very back teeth himself. I usually brush his teeth afterwards, just to make sure they're getting cleaned well, but he does a really good job all by himself. Yesterday he also announced he was going to learn to do the zipper all by himself! Pretty soon he won't need me for anything...sniff.

Cookie Maker

For some reason I cannot convince Ryan to taste cookie dough. I keep telling him he will love it, but he's not buying it. So while Abby enjoyed licking the beater, Ryan helped me scoop cookies onto the cookie sheet. He's a good helper...he even helped eat them after they were baked.

New Bike

Months ago after his first dental appointment, we told Ryan that if he could stop sucking his thumb by his birthday we would get him a bike. He promptly told us he wanted a green one with training wheels and a basket! Well, except for one small regression right before we moved (probably stress), Ryan immediately stopped sucking his thumb. We are so proud of him, and it was fun giving him his new bike...green with training wheels but no basket. We can't find any baskets for boys yet, so we'll keep looking. He did great on his first time out around the neighborhood. He's squinting in this picture, but I don't know if it's because of his eye surgery or because today was the first day in months we've actually seen the sun! It was very gracious of the Lord to give us sun for Ryan's birthday celebration.

Happy Birthday, Ryan!

Though it doesn't seem possible, Ryan is turning four tomorrow. He's grown up so much in the last year. We had a small get-together at our new house on Sunday. Nonna (Ed's mom) came and so did Robin and Jakey (one of Ryan's best friends).

I asked Ryan what kind of cake he wanted for his birthday and what he wanted me to fix for dinner. He chose hot dogs and Cheetos for dinner, and he said he wanted to eat at his little table. So I fixed up their little table with a tablecloth and placecards.

As for the cake, he said he wanted a green delivery truck that said, "Ryan's Delivery." That's what I get for asking! Though this isn't one of my best cakes, Ryan loved it, which is all that matters (at least that's what I keep telling myself).

I helped Abby pick out a gift for Ryan for his birthday, and this little truck is what she chose. She helped me wrap it too. I think it is Ryan's favorite gift that he got, coming in a close second is the remote control car that Nonna gave him. He had a great day with lots of fun gifts. Happy Birthday, Ryan! I love you so much.

Helping Abby

Now that the kids have their own rooms, I am having them learn how to make their own beds. Ryan's is still difficult since he's still in the bunk beds (though now on the bottom), but Abby's is now wonderfully easy to make with access on both sides. I sent Ryan and Abby in to start making their beds while I was finishing up breakfast dishes. I heard Ryan saying, "I'll help you, Abby," so I went to see what was going on. I walked in and saw him showing her how to make her bed, and they were doing a great job! It was neat to see them working together on it. Much to my surprise, Ryan had already finished making his bed, and he did a fair job of it too. It's so bittersweet to see them growing up.

Another Case in Point

In my last post I was describing one of the ways it seems that Ryan is maturing, and I had to share one other. We have been trying to work on teaching our children to be grateful, and one of the tangible ways I try to do that is when we are leaving a fun place. It took quite some time, but for the last year or so neither Ryan nor Abby has thrown a fit or gotten upset when we have to leave some place where they have been having fun (actually Abby never has). However, I have been trying to teach them to thank me for taking them to the park or playground or wherever when we are leaving in addition to leaving with a good attitude.

Yesterday it was raining (still), and I needed to get out of the house as much as the kids did. So we ran a couple of errands and then we went to McDonald's for lunch. Neither of my kids like the food there, but they LOVE to play on the play structure! They choked down their McNuggets (Abby had a salad...gotta love that girl!), and ran off to play. They were having a great time, but some rowdy older boys came in and we had to leave sooner than I was planning. As we were getting shoes on, Ryan looked at me and sweetly said, "Thanks for taking us here, Mommy. We had lots of fun!" I wanted to cry! How sweet those victorious moments are when something you've been teaching actually sticks!

Maturing

I don't know if it's his age, his recent surgery, or all of our skillful parenting (cough, cough), but Ryan seems to have matured so much in the last couple of weeks. It's so neat to see some things we've been working on with him suddenly come to fruition! One case in point is dinnertime. Ryan is not a big eater, and he is very picky. However, I refuse to cater to him so we serve him the same thing that everyone else is eating for dinner. Our rules are pretty simple: He must eat one bite of everything, and if he doesn't like it after one bite, he doesn't have to eat any more. Daddy and I think we're being more than fair since we were both required to eat more than one bite of things we didn't like (I can still gag thinking about the pile of banana squash I had to choke down).

Ryan used to eat whatever I gave him until one fateful day in December when he was about ten months old. He just stopped, and he's never resumed since. It's been a battle at dinner time for over three years. I decided we probably picked the wrong battle and should have never made an issue out of it, but having picked the battle, we stuck with it. Well, one or two nights before we moved, Ryan ate his bites without the usual disciplinary actions required! I asked Daddy if he thought we'd turned a corner, and he said, "No." I didn't either, but one can hope.

Well, I am so joyful and pleased to report that we haven't had to discipline him to take his bites since that day! What a difference it makes in our dinner time. I still wish he would eat more, but he's taking his bites and not fussing about it! He has even decided he liked a few of the things he had to taste. I have been a parent long enough to know that he may regress, but for now we are savoring the sweet taste of victory!! I'm so proud of you, Ryan!