At 23 months, Ryland is starting to speak in sentences, but still uses 2-3 word phrases most of the time.  We think his first sentence was "I see bubbles." (He was watching the washing machine start to fill with water and soap).  He can almost always identify the first letter of a spoken word or picture, and loves to play with anything that has ABC's on it.   We love to listen to his sweet little voice singing a familiar song or "reading" a book:

In the following pictures from November, Ryland matches letter tiles to words in a book, helps Mommy stir brownies (and licks the spoon), plays the piano with Daddy, lines up rubber duckies on the tub, swings with cousins at Grandma & Grandpa's house on Thanksgiving, and more.

Peek-a-

boo!

This month, Ryland's vocabulary has grown and many of his cute "toddler" words are becoming more refined, so we thought we should do our best to record what his words sound like to us before we forget.  Some of the more common things include: "eebees" (means ABCs, as in he wants to watch his ABC video, play his ABC game, read his ABC book, or use his magnetic ABC letters); "yapes" (means shapes, same as ABCs...); "ominus" (means hippopotamus); "Duck! Duck!" (which could, indeed, mean duck, or maybe truck, but usually it means stuck...as in, he's "stuck" on the floor and can't get in his chair, or he's "stuck" in his chair and wants on the floor, or the puzzle he wants is "stuck" on the bottom of the stack, or the toy box is "stuck" on the shelf, or the door is "stuck" closed and he wants to go outside, etc. etc...we hear this a LOT).  When Ryland has more than one word to say, he tends to blend all the words together to sound like one word anyway, like "Nomyeebees, ying-i-me" (Now I know my ABC's, next time won't you sing with me).  He sings his ABC's so fast, it's hard to tell whether he's really saying every letter or not.  When we ask Ryland to do things, he's started responding with "O-tay" (unless it's something he doesn't want to do, then he says "no" and has to be "encouraged" to choose a better response).

Beyond his speech and language development, Ryland is also improving his academic skills.  Often, he will see a word (in a book or on a label, where a picture is present to identify the meaning for him) and he'll spell the word then read it (like he's competing in a spelling bee).  He counts things all the time, and his one-to-one correspondence is always getting better (he says one number for each object he counts) so that he's often able to count up to 12 items successfully.

For Farm Fair this year, we dressed as Ryland's favorite nursery rhyme, Hey Diddle Diddle.  Ryland practiced "jumping" over the moon for several days, and he still pulls the foam moon out and asks me to watch him "jump" over it.

Here are some other pictures from October:

A cute video of Ryland swinging with a fun laugh to make you smile:

One of Ryland's friends invited us to a pumpkin party.  We took a pumpkin to decorate, and Ryland had fun sticking on fall stickers and painting his pumpkin.  He played a candy corn relay game and had fun in the ball pit with the babies.  He really enjoyed the yummy snacks!

In this video, Ryland digs in the box of orange beans finding letters to spell the word orange:

He was more interested in throwing leaves than taking pictures:

But we managed to get a couple of cute shots:

Not much has changed in his development this month, although he finally got the first of his canine teeth to pop through the gums, and a second isn't far behind.  His speech improves weekly...more of his words are clearer and easier to understand.  He's getting better at helping read stories (saying the next word when we stop in the middle of a sentence), "reading" his favorite books (retelling the story using several of the words he's heard read aloud to him), and also singing or reciting finger plays on his own (I'll have to try to catch some of those on video...).  He's adding to his collection of videos that he likes to watch, including Blue's Clues and WordWorld, although BOZ still seems to be his favorite.

This month's pictures show Ryland busy playing outside, reading books, feeding ducks, riding tractors, and helping mix cupcakes:

And here's a video of Ryland playing hide & seek with a frog in the bathtub:

The biggest development this month: Ryland has given up his pacifier in bed completely.  It took several days of fussing before falling asleep, and a few additional days of looking under blankets and asking for it, but we all lived through the ordeal just fine.

Ryland's favorite toys this month have been his cars.  He loves to send them down the ramp and say "Whee" as they roll off the end.  He can also stay well occupied with any toy that has a hole to push something through.  He continues to love anything to do with the alphabet: puzzles, books, magnets, videos, words on shirts and walls, etc.  He even "reads" letters on signs as we drive.  His mind is like a little sponge, and although I work with him regularly on basic academic skills, it still amazes me how much he learns and remembers.  He is starting to "read" more of his favorite books, saying a few words from each page of the story and/or labeling the things in the pictures.  He tries to find things to match with the pictures in a book (for example, holding a toy tiger or tiger puzzle piece up to the picture of the tiger in the book).  He does the same with magnetic letters or alphabet puzzle pieces, holding them up to the same letters he sees in his book.  

Although Ryland still eats reasonably well, he's starting to express his preferences more regularly.  He seems to be "in the mood" or "not in the mood" for some foods at any given time, so it's anyone's guess as to whether we will battle to get him to eat a PB sandwich (as an example) or he'll chow down on it like it's his all time favorite.

Most of the pictures we took last month were part of our San Antonio trip or Cousin Camp, so we don't have a lot of miscellaneous pictures from August.  Enjoy the ones we do have, including helping Mommy unload the dishwasher, doing an alphabet puzzle, pretending to be an eye doctor...

 

Lisa planned day 1-Luau.  She taught on the Fruit of the Spirit.  There was sunshine toast for breakfast, fruit kabobs and goldfish (in little hula dancer cups) for snack, Hawaiian pizza for lunch, and pineapple chicken for dinner (with coconut cups).  Everyone wore flower leis, got butterfly nets and lanterns, and there were inflatable flamingos and palm trees as decorations (and prizes).  We played a fruit relay, colored pictures, had a hula hoop contest, etc.  The devotionals for the day involved a game of Jenga and a baggie of fruit candies.

Alison planned day 2-Army.  I taught on the Armor of God.  We had "soldiers in sleeping bags" (pigs-in-a-blanket) for breakfast, US Army issued MRE's (Meal Ready to Eat) for lunch (courtesy of my brother, Captain Justin Gell of the US Army), and "soldier soup" for dinner.  Snack was person-shaped sugar cookies iced white and decorated with armor/colored with edible markers (thanks Jaime Rinehart, Cherry-Tart Designs).  Campers were issued a badge on which they earned stars (points) for completing various tasks, increasing their rank from private up to different officers.  We played a lot of games:  Air Force Academy, MIA, paratroopers, rocket launchers, mine field, bomb squad.  Our craft for the day included coloring shrinky-dinks and creating jewelry with the charms.  Some campers tried communicating with semaphore flags.  The devotionals included a doll house doll dressed in armor and water grenades with scripture references to look up.

Charity planned day 3-Farm.  She taught on the power of the tongue and our words.  We made our own butter to go with homemade biscuits for breakfast, grilled hot dogs for lunch, had haystacks and made dirt cups for snacks, and enjoyed a full farm chicken dinner with corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, deviled eggs, etc., and a late night marshmallow roast.  Everyone wore their bandannas.  All the kids got a turn to ride Grandma's horse (Ryland's first horse ride!) and shuck corn.  They had a duck walk race, played duck-duck-goose and red-light/green-light, made roosters from their footprints, and made "carrot" napkin holders for the dinner table.  Devotionals emphasized the importance of using sweet words and re-enforced the previous days' thoughts on implementing the Fruit of the Spirit and the Armor of God.

A video of Ryland & Kirsten shucking corn:

It was a great week full of fun with family, but we came home awfully dirty and exhausted.  In a couple of months maybe we'll be ready to start thinking about next year's Cousin Camp...