five

Hard to believe it's been five years - and to watch you grow right before our eyes has been life changing.....you'll forever be our 'baby' even while you are ordering us around, sass and all, hand on hip saying "actually mom, this is how you should do it....."   

 

 

 

 

Your future is bright sista - can't wait to sit back and watch where you go!  We love you Ryan Elizabeth!
Happy 5th Birthday!

Let's play catch-up.....

We've had a crazy week over here.....thus the lapse in posts.  Special shout-out to my mom who is recovering nicely from a double mastectomy yesterday....talk about rock-star in the face of cancer.  She is it!  We love you!
We celebrated Ryan's 5th birthday a week early (pre-surgery so my mom could enjoy herself), more pics of that later (once I consolidate from the plethora of cameras we used to take party pics).  In the meantime, a random smattering of life the past few weeks.
A night-before-surgery dinner out.....Emerson was my date and proved to be quite the chick magnet. You may find my dad and brother up at local restaurants drinking some beers with Emerson at their side:)

Emerson came with me to the hospital* yesterday (the other two had a sitter) and she couldn't have been better or a more enjoyable distraction whilst waiting for my mom to get out of surgery.  And we were there for about 8 hours.  *'hospital' was really a super nice, new outpatient facility near my parents house - we were almost the only ones there with one-on-one care.  If you have to go through something like she did, that's the way to do it.
Most Valuable cancer-fighter award goes to my mom.
Most Valuable baby-in-a-waiting-room award goes to this chick:

My Instagram public have already seen some of these gems, but roll with it for me.....

 Ryan and Reese did a week of Vacation Bible School (with their buddies Owen and Griffin) and loved it.....they are still jamming to their Kingdom Rock cd.  Nothing like walking past their room and hearing "we will stand strong" and other Christian rock blaring from their cd player.   The sweet faced 10 year old boy who was their 'leader', is Grant.  So confusing for Reese.  When she was referring to him she would call him 'dad'.  Bless her.

 I took FULL advantage of being down two kids for three hour spans each morning and made coffee dates, shopping trips, etc...  I told my parents all I wanted was to go have a greasy breakfast with them in which we could sip and drink coffee, uninterrupted, for as long as we wanted.  Emerson was all for it.

 Self portraits....

 Ryan has become quite the techie....She often plays with my phone and when I get it back I find that she's found my photo apps and had a little fun....these are all her.

She was asking me how to spell Emerson's name....now I see why.  

 Speaking of Em, she is sitting big in her high chair now.  Craziness.  She's a big fan of anything I throw her way:  bananas, sweet potatoes, broccoli, pears, avocados....  I'm holding out hope I get the dream eater I've been striving for.

Considering I'm literally sitting next to this:  Reese is insistent on making her own breakfast each morning, which usually consists of peanut butter toast and, of course, licking the knife clean as she is making it.  

Ryan and Emerson are best buds.....so it's no surprise when she eats that Ryan is right there, chatting and helping out the whole time.  

Reese also likes to use my nursing cover as A. a cape to run around in and B. to feed her own babies. And no judgements should you see me at Panera, after having fed Emerson, and Reese runs over and wants to lay under the cover.  It's the Time magazine cover all over again with me appearing to nurse a 3 year old.  I've since nixed that request.  

 Daddy/daughter picnic breakfast....

 All smiles...

 Cousins....

 And you'll see more of this in the birthday party pics but such a cute gift from Ella....Ryan's first grown up American Girl doll, whom she has promptly named Sparkles Snowflake.  And how precious are the matching dresses???  We made sure Ryan was wearing her dress when she opened her gift - too cute.

You're fairly caught up now....I'm sure that's a relief.  Prayers and hugs to my mom!