twinkle, twinkle

Rylan's favorite song for the last couple of weeks is twinkle, twinkle little star. Every night he starts moving his hand in the twinkle motion and saying, "twinkle star" if I don't start singing it first. I try to sing other songs like, Jesus Loves Me, but he won't have it.
Well, tonight when I was changing him he started singing it like normal, "twinkle, twinkle..." and then the said, "...up above ah world" and then "how I wonder..." Anyway, I was very excited because this is the first time he has really sang a song. He has tried to mumble along before, but not using actual words. I called for Cam to come listen and he said, "you're gonna be mad, but he was doing that earlier while you were you gone."
He has to tell me these things! He thought Rylan had been doing that already, so he wasn't as excited as I was. Just another step my baby has taken...he's getting so big!!

Another first

For Rylan's bath routine I wash him and then let him play for a while. The other night while he was playing and I was on my phone I heard him say, "I didn't poop." He said it like he was trying to hide something. When I looked up from my phone he was in the corner of the tub holding his bottom. Then he saw it and started looking all worried and holding his arms up to me to take him and whining a little bit.
This was a first for him and me and Cam got a good laugh from it.

Batter my heart, three-person'd God

Prayers like these give me comfort that I’m not alone in my struggle with human nature and in my desire to walk closely with Christ and to live a life pleasing to Him.

John Donne’s Holy Sonnet 14

Batter my heart, three-person'd God ; for you

As yet but knock ; breathe, shine, and seek to mend ;

That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend

Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.

I, like an usurp'd town, to another due,

Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.

Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,

But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,

But am betroth'd unto your enemy ;

Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,

Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,

Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

God and Myself (Puritan Prayer)

“Lead me to repentance, and save me from despair; Let me come to thee renouncing, condemning, loathing myself, but hoping in the grace that flows even to the chief of sinners.”

And...wise advice from Thumper: 

 

That goes for thoughts too ;)

Rylan...20 months

So, my little man is 20 months old...although everyone thinks he is older. I haven't kept up with each month's progress/events since he was really little. I wish I would have.
Rylan, here are some things you have been doing recently:
-Repeating a lot of things we say and repeating everything we say with emphasis, example, "dang!" We have to get better about what we're saying around you.
-You hate wearing body suits now, b/c you love feeling your belly.
-You have hated diaper changes in the morning for at least a month now...you refuse to get out of your crib b/c you don't want to get it changed.
-You have escaped from your crib a few times in the last few months, but haven't tried this past month for some reason.
-You would drink your milk from a bottle all day every day if we would let you. I had you happily off the bottle at 11 months, but pulled it back out at a year in order to bribe you into drinking whole milk. Well, from 12 months to 19 months we gave you a bottle right before bed and thankfully now your bottle is a thing of the past. Well, until Cullen gets here at least.
-You have went from 2 naps to 1 nap in the past couple of months. You sleep for about 2 hours.
-You love covering yourself with blankets, "blanky" and pillows. And you love climbing onto our made bed and pulling all the covers down and throwing all the pillows off and snuggling down for 5-10 seconds at a time.
-You've been wanting to be held more often. I'm not sure how easy it's gonna be to hold you as my stomach continues to grow.
-A really funny thing you've started to do this past week is get annoyed at my belly when you're sitting in my lap. You get frustrated after a little bit and keep trying to scoot back, but there is no where to go. I try and move you back onto a pillow with your legs still in my lap, but you get mad and plop back down on my lap and push your butt into my belly.
-You usually say, "bless you mommy" when I sneeze which is freaking adorable.
-You LOVE being outside...I'm pretty sure you would live outside if we let you.
-You love riding in the truck with daddy on the console around the neighborhood...there's a part of me that doesn't know what to think about that. But, daddy says I don't trust him enough with you, so I have to pick and choose my battles. And you do love it.
-You boss the dogs around and say, "Boyths!"or "Boys!"and you sometimes say, "Away!" or "Go away!" But, you love them very much too and give them kisses and love to play with them and chase them. They like the attention most of the time, but not always.
-You have become very interested in bugs..."big bug" and want to find them and sometimes even touch them.
-You LOVE bath time and you think it's funny to splash water out of the tub and on mommy which really isn't as funny as you think.
-You sometimes mimic when people laugh even though you don't know why they are laughing.
-You love when daddy tickles you.
-When you're in the mood to give kisses...you GIVE kisses. Yesterday, you pulled my face to yours for a long kiss. That was a first :)
-You have only said, "I love you" once in the last few months. You said it quite a few times when you first learned how to say it, but I guess you want to reserve it for special moments.
-You love fries most of the time and "a sip" from whatever we are drinking. We think it's really funny when we go through a drive-thru and once the food is in the car you say, "fries." What makes it even funnier is that your car seat is still rear-facing and you can't see what's going on.
-You are really comfortable around everyone. You are shy sometimes, but it doesn't take you long to warm up to people. This makes me happy, although we'll have to talk about "strangers" when you're a little bit older.
-We haven't started "potty training" yet. We'll probably try the weekend method once we have a free weekend...maybe sometime in May. You haven't shown much interest in the potty yet.
-Oh, and you love playing in my girly stuff (mousse, gel, brushes, etc) when I'm getting ready.

I could go on and on I'm sure...that's what happens when you haven't written down each month's events I guess.

Rylan, you bring our family so much joy, contentment and laughter. You are so silly, fiesty, sweet and stubborn. We know you are going to be a great big brother!

Here are some recent pics :)

Recent projects

Since I can't sleep right now or lately for that matter, I thought I'd update my blog with some projects I've been doing around the house. 

Cam's mom, Jill found this hutch at a cute little shop in Athens for $50 and got it for us...she knew I was wanting something for the kitchen :) This is the before picture.

It's pretty old, but it's in decent good condition. It just needed a little repair work (fixing a cabinet and new hardware) and some paint. After two coats of paint, plus a tinted glaze it still has an old, funky smell that I'm hoping will fade with time, but I can't complain with the deal she got. And I know this color yellow was a little risky, but I wanted it to stand out some.

 

And Rylan's big boy room is coming along...not quite finished, but I'm close. I saw some no sew curtains (on Pinterest, of course) and decided to make some for Rylan's room since I can't sew. They are a little short, but add some color to the room. And we ordered some model airplanes from amazon that Cam put together and hung...I love the planes!! Rylan's room is bi-plane themed.

 

 

These are some old shutters I found a while back at Habitat for Humanity and knew I wanted to have somewhere in the house. I decided to paint them red and distress them to give them an old barn feeling to go with the bi-plane theme.  I bought a bunch of old frames from thrift stores (for a total of under $8...happy with that b/c frames can get expensive) and I painted most of them and distressed some of them. They have old barn and bi-plane pictures in them. 

Here’s Rylan’s room so far :)

Man's Great End

This is my prayer! It's crazy how when God starts talking to you and you actually take the time to listen...that's when you hear Him over and over again. I pray that my focus will constantly be shifted back to Him and to His glory, rather than to me and my pursuits and my glory. That I will not be continually swayed by the world and it's "empty bubbles." In Him is true happiness, fulfillment and peace.

Man’s Great End (A Puritan Prayer from The Valley of Vision)

Lord of all Being,

There is one thing that deserves my greatest care,
that calls forth my ardent desires,
That is, that I may answer the great end for which
I am made –
to glorify thee who hast given me being,
and to do all the good I can for my fellow men;
Verily, life is not worth having
if it be not improved for this noble purpose.

Yet, Lord, how little is this the thought of mankind!
Most men seem to live for themselves,
without much or any regard for thy glory,
or for the good of others;
They earnestly desire and eagerly pursue
the riches, honours, pleasures of this life,
as if they supposed that wealth, greatness,
merriment, could make their immortal souls happy;
But, alas, what false delusive dreams are these!
And how miserable ere long will those be that sleep in them,
for all our happiness consists in loving thee,
and being holy as thou art holy.

O may I never fall into the tempers and vanities,
the sensuality and folly of the present world!
It is a place of inexpressible sorrow, a vast empty nothingness;
Time is a moment, a vapour,
and all its enjoyments are empty bubbles,
fleeting blasts of wind,
from which nothing satisfactory can be derived;
Give me grace always to keep in covenant with thee,
and to reject as delusion a great name here or hereafter,
together with all sinful pleasures or profits.

Help me to know continually
that there can be no true happiness,
no fulfilling of thy purpose for me,
apart from a life lived in and for
the Son of thy love.

New addition

So, it's been a little while since I've last written. The biggest news lately is that we will be having another precious baby in July...unless he/she decides to come earlier (which I doubt, since Rylan took his time in making his appearance). We found out right before Halloween and were pretty surprised given that we started trying in Sept...a very exciting surprise...mostly b/c that meant that I wouldn't be big pregnant in late August again. That was rough. We are now in the second trimester and I'm pretty sure I felt little one move yesterday morning when I woke up. I was really surprised b/c I didn't feel Rylan move until I was about 19 weeks along and I'm 13 1/2 weeks along now. But, I looked online...like I do...and read that women who have been pregnant before know what to expect, so they recognize it sooner (as soon as 13 weeks). I'm looking forward to feeling him/her again soon!
I'm trying to get everything done that needs to be done before the new baby gets here. I know I'm not going to be able to do much of anything for a while once there are two to take care of. We have two rooms to paint (the study/new guestroom and the guest bathroom), furniture to pick out and buy at a hopefully reasonable price, Rylan's room to decorate, study/guestroom to decorate, and some more organizing and decluttering to do. It may not sound like much, but when I get something on my mind I like to get it done. Cameron always thinks we have more time than we have and I always think we have less time than we have, so I'm sure we will balance each other out and get it done in plenty of time.
Another BIG thing on our list of things to get done before the baby gets here is to potty train Rylan. Given that he is a boy and only 16 months now, we will probably wait till early Spring to try though. I know it's going to be hard, but we're hopeful :)
Some news about Rylan...He can say lots of words: outside, bite, dog, slide, eat, bath, strawberries (or his version of it), cocoa puffs, apple, ball, door, I love you...just to name a few. He knows all the family members names...at least the ones he sees fairly often and some friend's names. He has only said a few of them, but can point out most of them. He's a talker and he's goofy. He makes us laugh all the time when he shows off and claps for himself, when he sways his head back and forth when music plays with his eyes wide open (and looks so serious while he does it), and he does this fake laugh when we're laughing at him and stomps his feet like he's really getting into it. Cam says he's going to be the class clown, but he is shy around strangers so we will see...he may save the goofiness for the family like his mama does. Oh, and he loves dogs and barking and howling like them. And planes...we have quite a few planes fly over the house and he loves it. I'm really looking forward to seeing him with his little brother or sister.