alllllviiinnnnnn!!!!!!

No photos to go with this post, but Ryan and I met Nana (my mom) for lunch and...Ryan's first movie in a movie theater! We saw Alvin and the Chipmunks, which wasn't as terrible as I expected it to be. He wasn't heavy enough to keep the theater seat down, so we had to be creative with coat placement, etc. He stared at the screen in amazement and didn't even move for about the first 20 minutes, then he crawled over to me, snuggled up on my chest, and slept for the rest of the movie. :-) Can't wait to see this one in March! Too bad it won't be out for his birthday....

Happy New Year, everyone! Some friends of ours are having a kid-friendly party tonight, but we're not sure if we're going yet or not. What a great idea, though! It's so hard to find a baby-sitter on nights like this!

school pictures

Isn't my little man looking so grown up? I can't stand it! Don't you just want to give him a kiss and a squeeze?? I wish they would have varied the poses a bit, but overall I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.


















I'm pretty sure this will be my last post before Christmas (and possibly for the year), so Merry Christmas to all!

Christmas traditions

What are some of your family's Christmas traditions? Last year, Ryan was only 10 months old at Christmas and, although he liked looking at the lights on the trees and playing with wrapping paper, he wasn't really into the holiday. This year he's definitely more excited...he loves "re-decorating" the tree every night, and now that we've had our first snowfall, I'm expecting to find him and Tony having a snowball fight when I get home tonight. So I'm trying to come up with traditions for us...from cookie baking to going downtown to look at the lights on the Circle, to each of us getting to open one present on Christmas Eve, and that present will be a new pair of pajamas to sleep in that night. What are some other ideas?

I have to admit, I've been avoiding Michael's because I think it would be very hard not to purchase all of the Martha Stewart Christmas crafts. I stopped by on my lunch break yesterday to pick up some supplies for a bridal shower I'm hosting, and scored this cute project on clearance for $9! Can't wait to get it put together...we're a few days behind on it!

florida pics - finally!

Jenni convinced me it was time to get my butt in gear and post some pics from our recent vacation to Florida - so here they are!
Okay, blogger sucks and won't let me add text where I want to for captions. :-(

At the park near my Dad's apartment.

















First time at the ocean!






















On a dolphin-sighting boat tour.
Mama and baby dolphin right by the boat!

Thanksgiving Day at the park near my brother's house.

This is Ryan's cousin Skylar pushing him on the swing - too cute! Can you believe she is 6 months older than Ry?