Some Recent Photos to Catch You Up...

Some random photos around the house. These were taken in late September, and I know that because if you look closely, CCR's teeth are beautiful. I'll explain more later...




This photo was just taken a few weeks ago. CCR has shown a ton of interest in walking around recently, but he is hasn't been confident enough to do it without the walker. This is a photo of him walking around the living room with the walker. Update: Last week (Wednesday to be exact) he took his first steps. He walked right across the playroom at Jen's, and has tried again a few more times, but is still pretty skiddish when it comes to doing it all by himself.



Here is a collection of photos of CCR when we were on our family vacation in Canyon Lake with my entire family. This was my dad's first opportunity to meet CCR in person and they weren't together more than an hour and a half, and my dad had him doing "touchdown". I know the quality of this photo isn't very good, but it was so cute because CCR couldn't get enough of doing "touchdown".


Some fun pictures of CCR sitting at the breakfast table in our condo. I love how quickly he went from so cute to so grumpy...pretty funny!

I'll take this opportunity to share about the tooth story...

We had a very traumatic evening in the first week of October when I was trying to get ready for a 3 day trip to Washington DC for a work related conference. CCR was in the bath, and he had been showing a ton of interest in being on his knees in general (gearing up for walking) so we were having to help him understand that it's not very safe for him to be on his knees in the bath tub. Well, I was a little late in telling him because, even though he was bracing himself on the edge of the tub, his knee slipped and he hit his front tooth square on the edge of the tub. He chipped the tooth, and I lost my mind. He was upset for a minute or two, but I was a wreck for the rest of the night. I was fully expecting blood and the whole works everywhere, but he just happened to hit his tooth right on the tub and nothing else was injured...thankfully! So now he's got some "character" because he has this cute, chipped tooth. Can you see it in this picture below? It's his front right tooth...

Here is a string of pictures that we were able to capture of CCR with my older sister, Molly. Some of CCR's faces are just hilarious! I love this over-the-top smile and the puckered lips below...too funny!

And I just love this photo! CCR with his Auntie Molly...

Here's a fun picture of my parents. My mom's 60th birthday fell during the week we were all together so we took everyone (her) to San Antonio and restaurant hopped so she could try different versions of her new favorite drink - Michalata. It is a drink made of spicy (or spiced) tomato juice, clam juice with your choice of a (preferably Mexican) beer. We went to a few different places and had a really great time hanging out at the Riverwalk, seeing the Alamo and then going to a fabulous restaurant about 15 minutes outside of downtown called La Fogata. If you're ever in SA and want a wonderful Mexican food meal, you have to eat at this place!

We had some family portraits done recently so be on the lookout for those pictures...

We hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and New Year's celebration. Tatum has not arrived as of today (Monday) so we're just trying to be as patient as possible. Since she did not arrive yesterday, I have officially carried her longer than I was able to for CCR. That is great news since CCR was so early, but I have to admit that I'm ready to throw in the towel. Thank you God for ignoring me and allowing Tatum to continue to grow in the womb.

Drum Roll Please...

IT'S A GIRL!!!! We found out on Tuesday that we are having a girl. We are very excited but nervous all at the same time. It came as a shock to us both (mostly to me) since I was convinced we were repeating history. Everything has been pretty identical, but that apparently is no indicator of gender. We are now hard at work on a name which is proving to be more difficult than we were hoping for (many girl names will make this poor child sound like a super hero with the last name of Ranney). We are working on a short list which should help us to narrow it all down, but we've got time so we're not in a huge rush...

We're also in the process of cleaning out (emptying out) our back room that has served as an office, guest room, junk room, conditioned garage, scrapbooking storage room, etc. in order to pull together a new room for CCR. He will be moving into the back room when the baby comes so we can keep the nursery intact. We got about half of it moved out of that room which involved moving around mostly my stuff (Mary Kay inventory and scrapbooking stuff). We're going to work on getting the rest of it moved out in the next few weeks.

I will try and get some of the sonogram video posted for everyone to see Baby Ranney. She is due on January 21st which, for those of you who know the CCR birth story, means she could arrive anytime between Christmas and her due date. Only time will tell, but she did make herself known to her daddy on 09/09/09. She was kicking me constantly so I grabbed Doug's hand and she kicked him about four times...and they were good kicks!

Thank you God for blessing us with a beautiful son and now a beautiful daughter! We are thrilled with Your plan for us and excited that You are trusting us with such wonderful gifts. And thank you, from me, for your answered prayers for patience...You are so good!!!

First Haircut

In August, we starting preparing for what we would do to celebrate CCR's 1st birthday. We thought it would be fun to get his first haircut. We knew Grammy B(ecky) would be in town the weekend after his birthday so we decided it would be fun to wait until she got into town. We took him to a fun kids place that really caters to the fidgety. CCR did a really great job - although towards the end, he had to be bribed with animal cookies to keep from crawling out of the chair...check out these adorable photos of his adventure...

I love his mohawk!!! And the concerned lips...so funny!

How handsome is he!!!! We immediately went home, washed the trimmings and "product" out of his hair and messed up his 'do so Doug didn't feel that he had a 1 year old accountant...tee hee

We had a great time and are so thankful that Grammy B was there to be a part of it!

Grammy B Weekend

Grammy B was able to come to town the weekend after CCR's first birthday to help Doug and I celebrate. We had a wonderful visit. Here are some of the sweetest photos of CCR with his Grammy B - dancin' and playing with her necklace.

In order to do a little bit of celebrating for CCR's birthday, we got him a little cake and a balloon to help the house look a little bit more festive. I think every parent expects their child to dig right in to their (cup)cake and make a huge mess, but I should've known better. CCR gets visibly upset when he gets remnants of pumpkin spice bread between his fingers at snack time. So it should have come as no surprise to me when he didn't want to get his fingers dirty in this multi-colored edible creation sitting in front of him. After a little while, he did get very excited and then have to sneeze which caused him to land left hand first into the edge of the cake. Then he rubbed his eyes/face which resulted in some of the cute photos below...I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree...afterall, Doug and I exchanged wedding cake on forks...

Here's a cute shot of CCR playing with the bag that contained his birthday gifts from Grammy B. He just loved playing with the little baseball on the handle...

All Things Lawless...

One of my dearest, best friends from high school, Andrea and her high school sweetheart husband, Brian Lawless, came to visit us with their daughter Audrey. Little Miss A was born just 2 1/2 weeks before CCR. Andrea and I have enjoyed sharing updates and stories from pregnancy until now. Finally it was time for our babies to meet - and for us to see each other again. It had been two years. We planned a fun-filled but not-too-crazy few days for us to showcase a little bit of Austin and share some Texas flare with our good ole' California friends. First we took them to The Salt Lick out in Driftwood. It was a lot of fun, the food was fantastic (Andrea and Brian agreed), and we were able to capture a few precious photos of the kiddos. Audrey is just adorable...check out that adorable smile!!!

Saturday, we took everyone down to Zilker Park to enjoy some of the great aspects of our little Central Park. This is a few shots of the babies at one of the Gardens. We had so much fun strolling them around.

Here's a shot at the Butler's Window of Doug and CCR. What handsome men I have surrounded myself with...

Here's Andrea and Audrey...

And here's the entire happy family...

After the Gardens, we took everyone over to the Barton Springs Pool. Just as an FYI, it is a very cool place to show off what Austin has to offer, but beware the water is creek water...that means it is COLD! CCR had fun in the water - as long as we kept the water level below his waistband - and Audrey, who is still getting comfortable with the idea of swimming took a dip and then thoroughly enjoyed playing around in the grass.

Lastly, we took everyone to Chuy's to give them a fantastic taste of TexMex. Andrea and Brian thought it was good but shared that nothing compares to the Mexican food you can get in Southern California.

We had a wonderful time hosting the Lawless family! I am impressed at how mature and mobile Audrey is. You are just adorable, and we can't wait to come see you in San Diego!!!

Happy 1st Birthday Colton!!!

Well, CCR turned one year old this past Tuesday. We took him to dinner (at our favorite restaurant) Chuy's to celebrate. Our server was great and thoroughly enjoyed helping us celebrate CCR's birthday. He brought us a little freeby ice cream dessert for CCR to indulge in. Here are some photos of him enjoying the dessert!

About halfway through dinner, the hostess, Rebecca, caught the attention of little man CCR. He would watch her walk around the dining room seating people and doing other jobs. After a little while, she noticed he was "watching" her so she started to reciprocate. She would wave at him and he would just light up! He would kick his legs and wave his arms and smile so big! He was just smitten with her...here are a few pictures of his following her around the dining room, smiling so big when she would wave and alternatively, getting really shy once he realized what a spectacle he was making...

And lastly, as we were leaving the restaurant, I asked Rebecca if she would be willing to take a picture with CCR because they were so cute, and we thought it was so cute that they had bonded. She agreed. Lately, CCR has been really hesitant to go to strangers unless he's been around them for a while and he gets comfortable with them. He's even been known to cry and make the most pathetic pouty face when he is in the arms of a stranger in the presence of Doug or me. Well, when I started to hand him off to her for the picture, he went right for her! His arms outstretched and ready to hang out up close and personally with his new girlfriend...and from the look(s) on his face, he was making sure his daddy was proud and showing us how excited he was to be in her arms...enjoy!

Thank you Rebecca for humoring us and taking the time to make Mr. CCR smile as big as he ever has on his birthday. It was definitely memorable for us all!