Kim, Bill and Riley O’Neill

Riley is now 17 months old and talking, talking, talking! One of his favorite things to say (and our favorite to hear) is, “Oh No!”

If Riley falls down, he’ll yell, “Oooh Nooo!”

If he drops something, you’ll hear…”Oooh Nooo!”

If he sees something or someone on TV fall down or drop something, he’ll say, “Oooh, Nooo!”

It really is very, very cute and we sure do enjoy hearing him say it.

If I could have a magic wand, I’d wave it over Riley and make time stand still for a while. He is absolutely adorable right now. He’s learning how to talk…a lot! He repeats everything we say and is now starting to try and form sentences. He can say, “Fur Feet” and “Love You.” Fur Feet comes from his new favorite bedtime book, “The Foot Book” by Dr. Seuss. Bill tells Riley that he has “fuzzy fur feet” when he’s in his footy pajamas…and Riley will reach down, grab his feet and yell, “Fur Feet!” If you ask him his name, Riley will say “EYE-NEE.” It’s close! If you ask him what his dog’s name is, he’ll say, “INNY” which is usually followed by a hearty, “Woof Woof!” We have pictures of the family around the house and he knows exactly who is who. He knows “GA-PA” (and usually calls Grandma the same!), “CACA” (his cousin Collin), “SHAY-SHAY” (Aunt Jenny), “BINE” (Uncle Brian), “AMMY” (cousin Sammy), “KE-KIN” (Uncle Kevin), “OMMY” (cousin Tommy) and is working on Aunt Patsy and Uncle Tom too. He usually just calls Tom, “UNCLE” and can say it very clearly.

We’re not sure if we have a genius on our hands (of course we’d like to THINK so!)…but Riley knows the alphabet! You can show him any letter (even Q) and he’ll tell you what it is. He can also count to five and loves to count on our fingers (not HIS fingers…OURS!). He will randomly count things in the house. You’ll just hear him counting…”UN…TWO…FEE…POOR…FIE” and then you realize he’s actually counting something. One day he was counting and we looked up and sure enough, he was counting the picture frames on the wall!

He is becoming a little social butterfly, too. He loves going up to other kids and saying, “Hi.” The other day he ran out into the cul de sac and said, “Girls! Hi!” to a couple of the neighborhood girls who were playing in front of the house. Unfortunately they are at that age where they want nothing to do with him and completely ignored the poor guy. I guess that was his first experience in getting rejected by a girl!

He is a BIG boy. He’s probably bordering on 30 pounds and is just solid. I’m guessing the doctor will take him off of whole milk at our next appointment. This kid can EAT! When he’s hungry, he’ll eat, eat, eat. His favorite meal is definitely pizza, followed closely by chili. He loves cheese, waffles, bananas, apples, grilled cheese, yogurt, chicken nuggets, apple sauce and ANYTHING SWEET. Riley definitely has the “Munn Sweet Tooth” in him!

Riley has a generous heart. We’re not sure how he got it…you can’t teach that stuff! He loves to share and give things to other people. On one occasion, baby Collin was laying on the floor and Riley walked up to him and gave him his beloved “Pat.” Pat is Riley’s lovey (a teddy bear blanket) that he carries around like Linus carries his blanket. We named it “Pat” because the thing is blue, but the bear has a flower in it’s hair…so we’re not sure if it’s a girl or a boy! Remember the old SNL skit about “Pat?” Well…that’s where it comes from. What kid gives up there lovey for another kid? We think Riley is going to have a big heart!

We can’t believe he’ll be 18 months in a few weeks. Where does the time go?

We have posted new pictures…click here.

We just had our 15 month checkup and the Doctor says Riley is PERFECT (I bet she says that to all her patients!). He weighed in at a whopping 27 pounds, 10 ounces. He’s in the 85th percentile for weight, 84th for height and continues to top the charts in the 95th percentile for his GIANT HEAD. The Doc says he’s very proportional! His heart sounds great, too. He had his chicken pox and MMR vaccinations too, and was unfortunately crabby for the next 24 hours. Kim was up with him ALL NIGHT that night as Riley just couldn’t seem to shake the pain from the needles. Not even his paci that he’s addicted to would calm him down!

We bought Riley is very first pair of shoes the day after Christmas. He’s walking like a champ! He’s finally figuring out what to do with his arms and doesn’t always hold them up and close to his body. He’s definitely on the verge of running! He has almost given up crawling altogether.

Riley can recognize the numbers 1, 2, 3 and 4 and can point out the letter O. He can also tell you which shape is a the circle…and then he actually says, “circle!” He’s talking like CRAZY and will repeat just about anything you say. We think this kid is going to be very smart…probably smarter than we would like! He’s already figured out that if he does something bad and we say “No,” he’ll stop what he’s doing, turn to you and start clapping and yelling, “Yeeeaaaahhhh!” He thinks he is being “good” because he stopped doing the bad thing. He’s something alright!

It finally happened on Thursday, December 11th. At 14 months old, Riley took his first steps! Both Bill and Kim were there to enjoy the very special moment! We knew that he had been “thinking” about walking for a few weeks. He has been cruising around the furniture for awhile, but only recently starting letting go for a few seconds to try out his balance. So we got a few feet feet away from each other and tossed Riley’s blanket between the two of us. Sure enough, he chased the blanket by taking a few steps towards each of us. It was AMAZING. And the smile on his face was priceless. Riley was so proud of himself! He was laughing and Kim was crying…it was a moment we’ll never forget for sure.

Of course he’s by no means an expert walker at this point…he’s doing the “drunk walk” for now! It’s fun to watch him try his legs out. He laughs and has a great time while taking steps. It cracks us up!

He gets better and better every day. He’s taking more steps as the days go by…and soon he’ll be running around here like a crazy man. We know our world is about to change but we are looking forward to this stage in our life together (and looking forward to the much needed exercise!). Let the fun begin!

And…yes…there IS a video! ENJOY! Click here.

At 13 months, Riley is starting to talk! He can already say a handful of words…maybe not perfectly, but good enough!

His first word was HAT. We have three hats in our hallway (they each belong to Bill’s Dad, Kim’s Dad and Kim’s Grandfather). Riley points at them and says HAT.

When we go into his room in the mornings, Riley usually stands up in his crib and says UP. He knows how to use this word properly, as he does the same thing in his highchair when he’s done eating. When he wants to get up, he says UP!

He can say CAR and points them out all the time, especially in a parking lot. His little finger will go nuts pointing at all the cars…and he’ll say CAR, CAR, CAR.

He learned how to say BALL after he was given a bathtub basketball set for his first birthday. There’s a hoop that suctions to the side of the tub and three basketballs. He’ll swim all over the tub trying to get those balls saying, BALL, BALL.

When he wants a snack, he’ll say ACK.

When he wants to read a book, he’ll say OOK.

Riley will point at our dog, Indy and say, WOOF.

When you say, “Say Purple” he says, PO-PUL.

Our clock in the family room gong-ed two days ago at 5:30. He looked at the clock, pointed and said, CLOCK.

He calls his Grandpa, “PA.”

He says MAMA and DADA and can point us out. He knows exactly who we are!

One of Riley’s favorite things to do everyday is go to the mailbox to get the mail. He’ll say OX and point to the mailbox when he wants to be taken down the driveway to get the mail. He hasn’t mastered opening the box yet, but he sure enjoys it when there’s mail in there! He gets very excited!

If you ask him what sound a snake makes, he’ll say, SSSSSSSSS. If you ask him what a duck says, he’ll say, “KACK.”

A few weeks ago, I was changing Riley on his changing table and Indy was barking like a crazy dog. I looked at Riley and said, “That dog is a pain in the a**.” Sure enough, what did Riley say right back to me??

He said A**.

We now have to watch EVERYTHING we say around our little boy.