Chi-Chi's Baptism Day

 Charles Michael Ryan was baptized yesterday at Christ Church East.  It was a special day celebrating our precious Charlie.  Keith and Don were so sweet and he just watched the water intently.

 At our church the father says a special blessing over the child after the baptism.  I love this picture of the "big boys" watching Kyle.

 

Our dear, dear friends Jenn & Kevin and Katie, David & Shelby.  These are people that love us (and our boys) so well.

Baking

This is just one of life's everyday moments... all three children "helping" me bake.

Easter Sunday

We had a great Easter. We began nice and early with a 7am Egg Hunt in the front yard! This first picture cracks me up because the boys pajamas are just HORRIBLE. This is how little I care anymore... at one point they all had matchy-matchy pjs. Charlie is literally in a 6-12 month shirt with 3T pants (hence the rolled up pants!)

After the hunt we got dressed and headed down to Ponte Vedra for church with Mimi and then an egg hunt and late lunch at Plantation. This was the boys 27th egg hunt and they were less than enthralled. I think Mac was the only one who returned with more than 2 eggs. There were lots of animals to pet and horses to ride. Charlie was so in to the animals! He kept calling all of them "dog-dog."

Easter Part 2 -- The Funny Parts

Mac's horse ride. He wanted to ride the big horse after this, but we had to go eat.

We took a LOT of pictures on Sunday.

Charlie was quite determined to get over this egg hunt barrier. He finally did it while we watched and laughed at him.

Tucker called Nan and had his usual 20 minute phone convo... the kid can TALK on the phone. Kyle followed him around and caught him in action.

The Easter bunny came to visit the table. Mac loved it...

Charlie was still unaware here...

Kyle caught the moment he first noticed the bunny.

"Jazz Hands"

Mac's school has an Easter Parade. The Easter Bunny leads the parade and Mac is excitedly telling us the "Hip Hop" is up at the front of the parade. He was very, very excited about the "Hip Hop" until he came to visit their class at the Egg Hunt and then he cried his eyes out!

Lindsey & Mac post-hunt

My friend Lesley said she had a hard time focusing on her own child in the Easter program because of Mac's jazz hands! He was very, very ON this day. He is on the third row - farthest left.

Doctor, Doctor

We stayed inside most of spring break while Mac was potty training, so this was one example of how they spent the time. They love breaking in to Kyle's surgery kits (that he sells) and performing surgeries on each other. It usually ends with one of them hurting the other. Never trust a naked doctor!

Love him.

JMR

Spring Break

Nan came in town for the second half of Spring Break. The first half was Potty Training Boot Camp for Mac... thankful for success on that front! We had a great time on Friday at Ponte Vedra Beach. Not as great as the day when I get to sit on the beach in a chair and read a book without any children drowning or getting lost. I'm really looking forward to that day!

Alright, alright...

It has been over a month. Most of the time I feel like we are just keeping our heads above water these days, so getting to blogging is TOUGH. And today I decided 5:00 might be a good time to try to get back to it. All three boys are completely crazy right now, but I'm pressing on. Most days I do some form of exercise that involves a stroller -- it is rough when these two crazies are both with me. Lots of touching, fighting, yelling (they enjoy screaming "contests" back and forth a few times a day), etc. Everyone knows we are coming from blocks away.

St. Patty's Day

Everyone wanted to be festive for school!

Playing "surgery." Yes, Mac is often naked even when not potty training :)

Comic Relief

... we never have a shortage of comic relief around here. We just have to be willing to laugh.
A few minutes ago (approximately an hour and a half after I put the boys to bed) I went up to take a shower and found the peanut butter with a baby spoon under the dining room table. This is a signature move by Mac and sure enough when I turned left in to the kitchen there stood the CULPRIT!

with peanut butter everywhere.

In other hilarity around our home, Tucker lost his first tooth. We have no photo documentation because it -- in usual Tucker fashion -- was a traumatic event. Let's just say it involved T being so freaked out by the tooth finally coming out (in the Chick-Fil-A play area) that he went with Kyle to the bathroom and threw up and passed out. He then asked Kyle to look at it in the mirror and went limp again!

loves to scare us by being a lion or dinosaur ("roar-roar") or pirate ("aiy-aiy") -
loves to get dirty and be outside
loves to be goofy and make us laugh

Mac loves school. He cries when he doesn't get to go after we drop Tuck off.
He skipped over 3T and now wears all 4T and 5T.
He is saying a lot more - mostly things those of us who know him best can understand, but he is making great strides.
He does Speech Therapy twice a week now at Tucker's elementary school. She says he is a tough cookie - won't do anything he doesn't want to do. Hmmm... no big shock here!
His favorite thing on the planet these days is "boo boo num-num" (blue car) otherwise known as Finn McMissile from Cars 2. He carries it with him and plays with it all day and takes it to bed and sleeps holding on to it. It is presently lost (the second one - already had to replace it once) and he bursts in to tears about once an hour about it's whereabouts. We are approaching 2 hours and I may need to go buy another one!

Sweet Chi-Chi

This little one is almost always called "Chi-Chi" thanks to our adopted second language around here -- "Macish." Tucker made up Macish when trying to explain to one of his friends how Mac doesn't quite speak English yet :) Mac calls Charlie "Chi-Chi" and now so do we. Or "Cheech" for short!

He started walking a few weeks ago.
He is drooling constantly and has been working on 4 teeth at the same time. The last one is almost in and perhaps we will have a break from that for a bit!
He eats for hours on end... The picture below was taken to document one of the Ryan children consuming broccoli. He didn't love it, but he eats most everything else.

Can You Feel The Love???

More and more, after emerging from the "baby-under-1 phase," I am able to sit and appreciate these three crazy boys God has blessed us with. Most of the time the brotherly love emerges like the picture above (so much love it hurts!), but there are increasing moments of tenderness. Fleeting moments, but I'll take them.

Mac and Charlie, who spend a lot more time together, really have a special bond. They are both pretty fiesty and aggressive - it will be interesting watching that play out! They just crack each other up which is hilarious. Tucker spends a lot of time telling us how to discipline them, but he is also really sweet about pointing out how cute Charlie is or how proud he is of Mac for a new accomplishment.