No, man

Remember that movie Yes Man with Jim Carrey? The one where the guy that says no to everyone goes to that creepy convention and enters into a covanent where he has to say yes to everything and his life because infinitely better?

Yeah, I'm gonna need to find that creepy convention and get Rylan entered into that covanent. A LOT of no's are going down at our house right now.

Me: "good morning"

Ry: "NOOOOOO"

Me: "We're going to go to the library"

Ry: "nooooooooo"

Me: "Say 'Yes'"

Ry: "yes"

Me: "I knew you could do it. Now, do you want to go on a walk?"

Ry: "noooooooooooo"

And if you think I'm just being mean and I'm only asking him things he doesn't like you are wrong. He says no when I look at him sometimes. He says no when I ask if he wants a snack, then takes the snack that he just said no to.

I love that boy more than life itself, but this 'no' business just caused me to nominate both Grandmothers, my Aunt Tina, and my college friend, Amanda for sainthood for doing this toddler thing 5-8 times. This too shall pass.

Okay, after telling something he does that's not cute, I shall tell you something that is super cute. When Rylan is acting partcularly toddler-ish, I've taught him the sign for I'm Sorry, since he can't say it yet. Here's what it looks like:

He's kinda creepy looking, but you get the drift

You are supposed to do this in a circle on your own chest. If you are Rylan, you do this on the other person's chest. He also says "nice" when he does it cause he knows he did something no nice. So, if Rylan offends you, be prepared for him to rub your chest while saying "nice!"

A non-toddlerish mother-son brownie making

Testing for quality control purposes

Its all fun and games till the brownie gets in your eye

And an extra of sweet Max. He's super sassy sweet these days. He loves to grab your face and give you a big gummy grin.

Thank you, Spring

It hasn't been my favorite winter. I've never been so happy to see sun and feel warm breezes smell my obnoxious Bradford Pear in full bloom. Spring has sprung. At least this week. Constant smiles all around. We have spent every day outside this week.

On Wednesday, we met our playgroup friends at Allsopp Park. We love Allsopp, with its fun jungle gym, lots 'o' sand and large swingset. And, we love our playgroup friends.

Baby Karsyn-she's walking now. And its really cute

Max hitched a ride with his friend, Eli

Monster amount of cuteness (Eli isn't sure he's okay with what's going on behind him)

This is Eli's mama Cheryl, on the left. She rocks.

Cute kids, loser horses, and thank you Charlie Sheen for the good quotes

I'm so behind with any kind of updates. I need Go Go Gadget arms, and maybe 8 of them these days. Rylan loves baby Max so much right now, and his love is strong..............

Precious, right?

And, maybe a little rough (notice wooden block right next to Max's head and a Rylan hand directly above it, thank goodness he has a horrible shot!)

Blog time got replaced by goalie/umpire/referee to save poor Max from a flouncing 2 year old. So instead of doing a blogpost for all of our outings that I've photographed, then boring you with my chattiness, I'll just lump them all together and give you cute pics of cute babies.

Little bored with brotherly love time

They are starting to love the new double jogger I got. The key is to start the walk about 20 minutes before Rylan's nap time. And don't lay Max down. He's not a layer. He's a sit and smiler.

One morning last week, I got up to do an good, old fashioned 80's Gilad workout (notice spandex and leotards) and I convinced Rylan that we were dancing. It was so precious, he was trying so hard to follow the people.

Rylan and I have a daily play-dough date. He was trying for a mustache. At least I hope.

Max has started baby food. This was a carrot day. I'd say he's a fan

Rylan is my super helpful helper these days. He REALLY likes helping clean the fridge out

This is how I ensure a safe, uninterrupted shower these days. You simply CANNOT have enough baby prisons. Or toddler prisons.

Yes, Rylan still jumps until he falls asleep

Sooooo, Ry found my book "YOU! On a Diet" and he loves it, flips through it every day all serious like. I'm only half kidding when I say that I expect him to one day bust out "mom, you are carrying weight around your waist, in an apple-type body type and this will increase your chance of heart trouble."

This past weekend, our little family joined Rob's parents in Hot Springs for a mini-vacay. It was such a nice getaway. Thank you so much, Bob and Sandy. Or as Rylan calls you "Papa and Papa." On Saturday Rob's mom took care of Rylan, while Rob, his dad, Max and I partook of some horse racing. As usual, I was able to correctly bet the freakin' last horse of all all the races I watched.

What are Bob, Rob and Max doing? WINNING, DUH!

Ry was a big fan of the hotel. He's on a drug, its called Rylan Qualls

Say when

You know when the waitress pours your drink, she (or he) says "say when?" Well, life had poured me enough and I said "WHEN!" In fact, to be perfectly honest, I said "why me?" "suck it, flu", "who can I sue?", and, "I want my mommy!" I even wrote a whole blog post about how I was a super sad Sara that just couldn't lift my super sad fog, was sick of being stuck in my house, sick of being sick and seeing my babies be sick and I think I even included some information that probably falls under the TMI category about how the flu and the prednisone to heal my bronchitis and Death Fever had caused me to almost have to stop breastfeeding. Life handed me lemons, but everytime I went to make lemonaide, more lemons came.

Well, instead of publishing the 'woe is me post', I packed my two boys and we took off for The Land of Lemonade. Or Grammy and Papa's house. We had already planned on meeting my sister's there for a weekend to celebrate my mom's birthday, so me and the boys extended our trip to make it a nice, relaxing four day event. If doctors ordered weekends away, a doctor would have ordered this one. For all three of us. We all needed to get out of the house, I needed more sleep, Rylan needed to be around some kids, and Max? Well, Max likes to be held and holding is something my fam damily is REALLY good at.

There was Wii Dance Party, there was cake baking, there was story time at the library (in which Rylan shouted NOOOO the entire time and we had to run out, but that's beside the point) there was walks and naps, and lots and lots of playtime. We have returned to Little Rock refreshed and with our bellies full of my mama's home cookin'.

Not a good pic, but a pic of Ry dance partying the day away

Sweet niece Zoe, waiting on her cake

My sister Angie is taking a cake decorating class. This was her pilot mission. I think she did splendid. And the best part? The cake tasted like wedding cake. The good kind. It was delicious.

I'm not going to say how old our matriarch is, but I expect her to live the next 60 years as well as she lives the first. Oops. You are young, hip Grammy!!!

We were going to leave on Sunday, but there were rumors of tornadoes. Since I don't really have a job to go home to, I opted to stay in the warm, dry comforts of my parents house instead of getting on the windy road with my two bambinos only to have to hit a ditch to duck a tornado. Alas, the tornadoes did not come, but we had a super fun extra day with my parents and I even took a nap!

I am crossing fingers, praying the Our Father, and holding my tongue just right that my family can be on the mend now. I'm pretty sure we deserve it.