Ren {19 Months}

Ren turned 19 months on the 19th (yesterday)! Adam and I were busy shooting a wedding yesterday, and today we needed a rest. So instead of stressing about dressing him up and doing nice photos for this month, I left him extra dirty and took pictures of him doing what he does every day: walking from place to place, checking everything out, and being a weirdo.

Some lunch and some chalk paint from our sidewalk painting adventure are still on his shirt. And face. :)

May seem like a weird picture below, but he does this stance a lot. If he sees something he's interested in or excited about, he crouches down like this and points.

Big bro wanted a picture by himself. Adam got him this X-wing toy Friday night and Sutton told me today that it's the best toy he's ever gotten.

Daddy hugs are the best!

Fighting over who gets to hold a piece of trash. They may look pleasant, but they were grunting angrily at each other.

This is about what I get when I try to take a photo of the two of them together.

Daddy was cleaning out the garage and usually there's a car parked in there, so it was very exciting to be able to run around in the empty garage.

VERY exciting.

Out-of-focus, but his little sneer was funny.

More grunting.

That cute little profile...

We had to do some carseat swapping yesterday because the boys stayed all day and night with my parents since Adam and I were at the wedding. So Sutton's booster was sitting in the driveway and that was SO much fun too.

Inspecting the weed eater. With chalk paint hands.

At 19 months:

*His vocabulary is expanding, I feel like he starting to try to say more words. He says chocolate, ketchup, and pickle now. Three of his favorites. All of his loved ones are still dada (including me).

*He understands so much. He knows the following phrases and usually obeys them:
     -Let's go wash your hands, change your diaper, brush your teeth, get in your chair (in addition to others)
    -Go turn on the TV
    -Can you throw this away?
    -Are you hungry? Sleepy?

*If we say "I love you" he gives us a kiss.

*He loves to sit on people. If he's on the couch with us or if we're laying on the floor, he will sit on us. If it's Daddy, he will sit on his head.

*He doesn't like eggs, lunch meat, he's sick of bananas, cheerios, blueberries. He loves corn, tomatoes, mac n cheese, bread, chocolate, ketchup, McDonald's cheeseburgers (with extra pickles). He actually ate and entire McDonald's cheeseburger this week. He was feeling kinda off and wasn't eating well, so we tried to think of something he would love and hopefully eat, and we hit it on the money with that. He also loves donuts, chocolate milk (though he doesn't get that very often), cheese, plain pickles, and of course his squeezies (baby food in pouches he can eat himself).

*He's wearing 12-18 month clothes, and I just this week switched him to size 4 diapers. The 3s still fit just fine, but we need the absorbency of the 4s, especially for night time.

*He is obsessed with books and reading.

*He's not a very good listener. You tell him NO, and he continues to do it. We're definitely having to use more force with him lately.

*He's so goofy. SO goofy. I don't even know how to describe it. We just sit and watch him and laugh. He makes funny faces, funny poses, copies the strangest noises, burps and laughs, he's such a boy and he's so cute.

*He goes to bed at 8pm and gets up around 6:45am. We have been doing a short morning nap (around an hour) that I wake him up from, and then a longer (2 hours) afternoon nap and that has been working well. He has fallen asleep when we're out and about a lot more lately than ever before, since we're transitioning.

*He loves baths, Diesel, books, Grandma, being outside, his blankie, cuddling, putting on shoes, tickles, wrestling, eating, and holding my empty coffee cups. He doesn't like diaper changes, when Grandma leaves, when we take something away, when we tell him he can't go outside, or when he's not allowed in Sutton's room.

Overall, Ren is such a joy and such an easygoing guy. We love him, and how cute and cuddly he is. Sutton tells me all the time "Ren is so cute when he does that" or "Our baby is so cute." I'm so happy that Sutton takes such delight in how adorable and funny he is too. And I'm glad they can be funny together.

A Day at the Park

Usually, our morning routine is breakfast, the Y, then I work and Sutton plays or watches a show while Ren naps. Then we have lunch and we're off to school.

On Monday, Ren slept in extra late so I decided he could skip his morning nap and we would have a Special Day. So after we got home from the Y, we walked to the park. We LOVE having a park within walking distance of our house. Sutton rode his bike while I pushed Ren and drank coffee. :)

It was a beautiful morning, and the perfect temp! I'm so glad Sutton can swing on his own now and doesn't need me to push him all the time. :)

Ren loves the park and just wanders around the whole time, trying equipment that he's too little for, collecting sticks, and pointing at things.

Another new-found skill that Sutton has is the monkey bars! It's still a challenge for him and he doesn't make it across every time but he's getting better.

Ren is always so busy and stays happy without any attention. I caught him digging holes in the sand. This will be my image for tomorrow's I Carry Your Heart.

We've taken photos in this tunnel several times throughout the boys' lives so I wanted to snap another here. Sutton is such a big brother...trying to get Ren to look at me. :)

They were at the top of the playground together and I told Sutton it was okay, so he picked Ren up around the waist, carried him over to the top of this slide, and went down with him.

I thought Ren looked so big in this picture. He has some handfuls of sticks that he was bringing over to poke me in the legs with.

This baby loves coffee or coffee cups, or the combo...I don't know. If I'm drinking out of a cup with a lid, I generally give him the cup when I'm done and he flips out. He's so happy. He tries drinking the last few drops, and he just carries the cup around. He would NOT let go of it for anything this day, and played on the playground a good 15 minutes without setting it down.

Sutton trying in vain again to get him to look at me for a picture.

When we left, I took the cup away to strap him in his stroller and he got so mad. I gave it back after he was buckled and he held it the whole way home.

On the walk home, we happened to bump into our friend GINGER who moved to Atlanta! It was an amazing coincidence. I was walking down the street when someone from a car behind me whistles. She just happened to be driving there right as we were walking and we were so excited to see her. See? Wichita CAN be a small town.

To continue our Special Day, I let Sutton eat his lunch picnic-style on the floor in front of the TV before school. He keeps asking me when we can have a Special Day again.

Sutton's New Skill!

Sutton rides his bike without training wheels! Woohoo!

He's been able to do it for short distances for awhile if we help him start and stop. But this week, Adam taught him how to start and stop on his own, as well as turn around. Just another milestone in the growing up process!

I was at work while they were practicing, so Adam sent me this video:

And then when I got home, he showed me his new skills and I took a few photos because...that's what I do. :)

The New Routine

School has started, hooray! Everyone is happy about it. Mostly. We're sad that Daddy is gone all day again now, but it gives us some structure to our days which is always a good thing with little kids. Since Sutton is in afternoon preschool, we still have our mornings at home together which makes the transition easier, I think.

This year, I am trying to go it alone with no daycare. Each year since Sutton was born, I have dwindled my daycare down and down to now finally nothing. That first year, Sutton went to a babysitter two full days per week. Last year, Ren hung out with Grandma Janet for a couple of hours two mornings a week.

Our days are pretty similar during the week. Ren gets me up around 6:30, and he and I have some alone time and eat breakfast together. Daddy usually gets up around 7, gets ready, and heads to work. I wake Sutton up around 7:45 and we quickly get dressed and get him some breakfast before heading to the Y to work out. Both boys love the Y. Sutton always has, Ren took some convincing, but now he's excited to play when we get there.

After the Y, we come home and Ren goes down for his morning nap. We are at a transition point with naps, so I have started waking him up after an hour so that he will still take a good afternoon nap. During that hour that he naps, Sutton brushes his teeth, makes his bed, reads a couple of books, and then has play/iPad/free time. I use that time to work - answer emails, edit photos, etc.

When Ren is up, it's lunch time! We eat together and then get Sutton ready for school. We leave the house around 11:50am to pick up one of Sutton's classmates and I drive them to school and drop them off.

Then Ren and I head out for errands, a little park time, or sometimes straight back home. I have really been enjoying this one-on-one time with my little guy. Sometimes I try to sneak in some work while he is still awake. Then this happens:

He's just so helpful. :) Don't mind the messy desk. With taking care of two kids full time while running a business, my housework and cleaning are last priority unfortunately!

I have had a lot of babies born in the last few weeks, so I've been having newborn sessions in the studio after Sutton is at school and having either Grandma Janet or a babysitter come hang out with Ren during that time.

Ren goes down for his afternoon nap around 2pm and sleeps anywhere from an hour to 2.5 hours. If I'm not shooting in the studio, I use this time to get a lot of my editing done in my office. Sutton gets picked up by another mom and taken to Adam's school, which is just 2 blocks away from Sutton's school. Sutton hangs out with Daddy for about 20 minutes until Daddy's school is out, then they come home together. Sutton usually falls asleep on the way home.

When Ren wakes up, we have chill time watching a movie or having a snack or playing outside until Daddy and Sutton get home. If it's a free evening, we make dinner and take a walk or a bike ride, or play outside. A lot of times I have shoots though, so the boys have time with Daddy while I work.

Ren goes to bed at 8 and Sutton around 9 and then I get more work in til 11 or midnight usually. Then off to bed and do it all again the next day.

I wanted to document a normal day for us at this point in our life, and I had a few photos to go along with it. So there you go. We will end with a little video of Ren trying to put Diesel's ThunderShirt on him. :)

Ren {18 Months}

Ren is 18 months old!! Totally can't believe my baby is a year and a half. Not quite sure how that happened.

Do you see how handsome this kid is? Holy cow. I can't get over it. Even with that tiny amount of hair and forehead that's on the large side. This kid couldn't be cuter.

We decided to do a quick shoot in our front yard before lunch today and it went about as you would expect a photo shoot with an 18-month-old boy and his 5-year-old brother to go.

Please also note that the above photo is completely out of focus. I'm telling you, photographing my own kids is not my forte...except then Ren flashes me this amazingness:

Goodness. My heart. And then there's the toothy grin.

Brothers are the best. Seriously. Before I had kids, I always thought that two kids - one boy and one girl - was the perfect family. Boy, was I wrong. Brothers are the way to go.

This is his "I'm done with this let me get down and get that thing out of my face" face.

Then there's this other cute boy named Sutton who always has to have at least a moment of his own in the spotlight.

But that wasn't good enough because he needed me to include his whole body in the picture. Fine.

And then the inevitable "Mommy! Look how cute we are!"

The baby 18-month-old ran off with my lens cap but then returned and tried very earnestly to put it back on. At least he knows where it goes!

I wanted a change of scenery, so over to the wet grass we went. But he wouldn't stand still so I made him sit and his life was over.

Ren is very good at mood changes though, as you can tell:

I tried my best to get a smiling closeup, but these were as good as it got. I love each of these expressions, as I see them all of the time.

I probably shouldn't compare so much, but how can I resist. Sutton on the left at 18 months, and Ren on the right. I think they look SO different, but then if I look just at their noses, they look the same. Or just their eyes look the same.

At 18 months, Ren:

*Sleeps 8pm to 6:30am approximately. He's pretty excited about going to bed. He naps twice a day still. Around 9 or 9:30am til 10:30 or 11. Then around 2-4pm. One day this week, he decided to skip his afternoon nap (on a day I had SO much to do, of course), and then by 6:30pm he was an out of control sobbing mess. That was a long evening.

*He wears size 3 diapers still and 12-18 month clothes. He still seems pretty skinny but he might be getting a little belly.

*He has just recently started refusing some foods. Like scrambled eggs. Weird. Up until this point, he has been such a good eater and he still is for the most part, but he's starting to get a tiny opinion about things.

*He has started mimicking sounds a lot more than he used to. If I ever exclaim "Whoa!" or "Wow!"...I can be sure that I will have a little parrot repeating me. He usually just makes the vowel sounds, so Whoa = O and Wow = Ow. We went to the park this week and I kept asking him to say Park. He would just say the K sound.

*His list of actual words is still short: dada (for everyone in our house), Diesel, uh oh, cracker, tractor, truck, (cracker, tractor, and truck all sound the same so you gotta use context clues), meow (ee-ow ee-ow ee-ow). I definitely feel like he is trying to say a lot more, it's just still completely unintelligible. It sounded like he said "dada work" one day this week when Sutton asked me where Daddy was. But it was probably a fluke.

*He is becoming more aware of things. He watches and tries to figure things out. We talk to him through his video monitor like a walkie talkie. Today I talked to him on it on my way to his bedroom to get him when he woke up from his nap. When I went in his room, he kept pointing to the end of the monitor that's in his room and saying something. I think he was trying to tell me that he just heard me there.

*If he wants to be held, he toddles up to you and hugs your legs and buries his face between your knees.

*He has started kissing and it is freaking adorable. If you ask for a kiss, he will usually give you one (open-mouthed, of course). But with me, and only me, he will randomly come up to me and kiss me out of the blue. I melt. He gets right up in your face and maintains eye contact until he's too close that you can't anymore. We get lots of kisses that have a pacifier in them too. :) Recently if we ask him "Can you say 'I love you'?" he will kiss or hug us. We didn't even teach him that! I think he just already knows what love is.

Today, he emptied Adam's wallet and we got onto him for it. 2 minutes later, he was emptying mine! Like, he went and opened the cabinet where my purse is, got my wallet out, and started taking stuff out. I got mad at him and made him leave and was very stern. He came back over and kissed me and I obviously couldn't help but laugh. Little stinker.

*He is still so entertained by the outdoors. He doesn't need toys or entertainment. He will just wander around and find sticks and rocks and puddles and be so happy.

*The boy LOVES books. He is always bringing us books to read to him. His attention span has gotten better but it still doesn't last throughout a whole book (unless it's a short baby one). We've started taking books along in the car because that is one thing that will keep him happy for a longer time.

*He has started obeying simple commands like "Put that back" and "Throw that away" and "Can I have that?"

*He loves to give us our shoes when it's time to go somewhere. Even if we already have shoes on, he will bring us whatever pair he sees on the ground and insist we take them.

*He walks around with his hands sticking straight out behind him. Like he's trying to go fast or something.

*Stats from our doctor's appointment on August 24:
     -Weighs 23.88 pounds {45.35 percentile}
     -32.25 inches tall {42.8 percentile}

We love you, sweet Ren Adler! Happy 18 months!