11 months!

Get a load of those new teef! Non-blurry eleven month pictures brought to you by... containment!

It is so hard to believe that just a year ago, we were washing out the newborn clothes and diapers, securing a co-sleeper, and getting ready to start school early in eager anticipation of this sweet baby boy's arrival. This month has flown by like none other. We have been blessed beyond imagination with this fellow, mellow from the get-go, with his contagious smiles and heartwarming personality. He had kind of a rough month with teething and traveling for two weeks (who wouldn't expect that?), but a week+ of sleep has him back to his usual good-natured self. He is very contented most of the time to just sit and busy himself with some toys around him, and I hope that continues with the start of school fast approaching (especially considering he's going to be ditching that morning nap soon after his first birthday, if he's anything like his siblings).

He's been perfecting his crawling and pulling up to standing daily, even standing for a second or two on his own. All I can say is, I cannot believe he'll be WALKING soon! He's a pretty good eater and enjoys feeding himself (cheese, peaches, broccoli, chicken, grapes, berries...). He nurses for me before and sometimes after bedtime/naps, and he's even started taking a 4-6 oz. bottle after he nurses at bedtime (which helps a lot with his nighttime sleep). He babbles a lot but nothing really intelligible yet (except for "Dada" and "nigh' nigh'") and still makes that charming gargling noise of his on occasion. He loves peekaboo, his siblings, putting anything and everything in his mouth, and looking through picture books- his favorite are animal ones. He laughs when we bring him close to Athena or the goats and likes to reach out touch them.

Sweet T, you have brought so much life and joy to our family. We have been so blessed by you, and we can't believe you're going to be ONE next month! Stay little!

3,295 miles in 13 days {SD- Custer State Park, Wind Cave...}

Can you spot the antelope? After Crazy Horse, we traveled south to Custer State Park (the state's largest state park at 71,000 acres) and nature preserve. We saw jack rabbits, deer, antelope, and American bison! The park ranger at the gate told us where the bufflo had been roaming that day, and we were blessed to not only spot the huge herd, but watch as they came down close to and right across the road. Signs around the park warned that it was best to observe them from a distance, but they didn't seem to mind coming close to all of the cars that had stopped along the side of the road to see them. They seemed not to notice. Once they'd crossed the road to another large stretch of prairie, Mike took the kids, one at a time, over to get get a closer look. They'd stare at Mike (and child) and start in with their loud grunting noises, and Mike would come get the next kid. This seems to me like something my dad would have done with us when we were little, and I'm glad the kids will have these fun memories of traipsing through the field to see the buffalo up close (I'm sure glad I married this guy.).

It was already almost 4 by the time we left the buffalo, and we had hoped to be back on the road heading east by this time, but and since Mike and I aim to please (and how often do we get to the Black Hills, really?), we decided to add a tour of Wind Cave to the day's already full itinerary. MAJOR excitement. It took about 40 minutes to get there from where we were, on scenic, yet serpentine roads. We booked our family for the 5:30 tour. I failed to see that it lasted more than an hour, but we were on a roll. Thus far, the kids had been doing marvelously on our whirlwind day. Littles caught naps on the in-between drives, and we were supplying squeezie-applesauce, granola bars and baggies of Kix and raisins to them from the snack bag.

The kids and I had never been in cave before, so this was an especially engaging excursion. The cave itself was very neat. It's notable for its displays of boxwork (a calcite formation). About 95% of the world's discovered boxwork formations are found in Wind Cave alone. It was also the first cave to be designated a national park anywhere in the world (by Theodore Roosevelt). I was fascinated by the history of of the cave, first discovered in 1881 by two hikers who heard a whistling sound, caused by wind being blown out of the cave (it can also be sucked in, depending on the atmospheric pressure). It contains 140 miles of discovered passages under one square mile of land, and it is believed that that is only 5% of what's actually down there. Mind-blowing! Read more here, if you're interested.

Our tour guide, Jess, was great. I wish I'd gotten a picture with her. I kind of wanted to take her home with us. There were about 40 people on our tour total, and we Ryans got to be the caboose, which was all as well. Toward the end of the tour, Opal and Toby were letting on, with feeling, that they'd had their fills of that cave. It was bedtime for T, and he hadn't been nursing well, since... well, since we'd left home nearly two weeks ago. But I'd brought the diaper bag and was feeding them both Toby's puffs just as fast as I could to keep their neediness at bay. We'd gone down and down and down so many stairs, I was thanking God that there was an elevator at the end of the tour to take us back up to the surface. People were (kindly) saying, "Let the family go first," since only 10 people or so could ride up at a time. The tour lasted 1 hr, and 15 min., it was bedtime (in CT), our kids hadn't had any dinner yet, and they had done great (with some help from some puffs). We stopped to see a prairie dog "town" we'd passed coming and then headed back into the town of Custer to grab a late dinner at an old fashioned DQ. Then, we called it a day and drove a couple of hours east to Kadoka before crashing at a hotel there.

The next day was spent almost entirely in the van, but we were finally on the home stretch of our journey. Mike and I took long driving stretches so we wouldn't have to stop as much, and we got to meet Grandma and Grandpa for dinner at Hu Hot Mongolian Grill as we were passing through their area- an added bonus!

So there you have it! I feel incredibly blessed that we were able to make such a trip. I think some people thought we were kind of nuts to go as far as we did out of our way on those last couple of days, and maybe that's true, but we're so glad that we went. We have some amazing memories to show for it. I need one more post to wrap up what life has been like since we returned home- kind of crazy and fraught with trials, but also full of God's graces. God is good.

We are blessed!

3,295 miles in 13 days {SD- Mt. Rushmore & Crazy Horse}

The Ryan children strike again. You guys! After breakfast in the hotel lobby, we put on swim suits and spent 30-40 minutes in the pool. The kids had an especially fun time on the water slide and in the hot tub- a great way to start our crazy, full day!

We then packed up everything, checked out of our hotel, and headed west into the Black Hills. Again, we had a stunner of a day (typical weather there, I know). Our first stop was Mt. Rushmore. The kids first found the Pennsylvania and Wisconsin flags and pillars in the Avenue of Flags before admiring the impressive memorial sculpture. We visited the neat museum under the top walkway, which included original designs and models, accounts from the workers (there were 400, including sculptor Gutzon Borglum in the 14 years between 1927 and 1941), tools they used, history of the featured presidents, etc. It was about lunchtime already, but we pressed on, knowing how much more we wanted to see that day (and not wanting to spend an arm and a leg at the federal park restaurant, though I could have splurged for some of that Thomas Jefferson ice cream). Onward, to Crazy Horse Memorial!

At Crazy Horse Memorial, we watched a fascinating video on the vision, process of making, and continued hopes of the project. The Memorial has been a work in progress since it was begun in 1948. And work slowed significantly when sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski died in 1982, but his wife stepped up to fill the void. They had ten kids (five girls and five boys), who grew up assisting their dad, so they have continued to advance and oversee the huge project. The museum was neat- it highlighted the Native American peoples of the area. After leaving there, Mike and I decided we'd like to take on a monumental sculpture project for our own growing family. Jack kept pointing out large rocks that had some potential. What will we carve into the face of a Black Hills mountainside? After nearly two weeks traveling with Opal, we opted on our "Tiny, Crazy Bird."

I thought I'd be able to wrap up our last non-driving day with just one post, but we just covered too many things. I think that's enough for today. The next post involves animals native to the northwest!