10 funny things about Rye

Self-portrait

1. Riley likes to sleep with his hands down his pants, holding himself. When we pull his hands out, he stuffs them back in, while he's asleep. It's pretty funny, if gross.
2. In addition to his hand down his pants, he has to pull his shirt up above his tummy. Some sort of sensory thing makes a shirt on his tummy bothersome.
   
3. He's been working on combing his hair in the morning. He hasn't quite grasped it yet, but he's trying and the results are always cute.
4. He is in love with all things Mario. His dad (me) is a complete geek and he is totally taking after me. A friend of ours gave us an old Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and all Rye can do is ask me if I can set up the "Nintendo Machine". Mom bought him a Mario shirt yesterday and you'd think he just won the lottery.
5. His speech is getting better. Weekly visits to Seattle Children's Hospital and one-on-one therapy helps. I've been on his case, too, trying to remind him that "ess" sounds come out his mouth, not his nose.
6. He loves to swim and is a complete nut in the pool. When it's time to do the end of lesson jumps, he stands on the edge of the pool and wiggles his butt very gracefully.
7. We've been working with him on his handwriting. It is coming along nicely and it's a really cool thing to watch his improvement. Of course, anyone else reading his writing would be completely baffled, but to me and Marci, it's awesome.
8. He's developing a love for soup. Unfortunately, he's not supposed to have soup unless it's thick, like a nice hearty stew or chowder. Tonight it was beef stew and he porked out.
9. Sometimes he says the funniest stuff. Yesterday our family, Knight and Shannon and my mom were all at Target. The boys got separated from the girls. I called Marci to find where she was and Riley said to Knight, "Um, let me check my map," and started drawing on his hand. Awesome.
10. He has an imaginary friend, Hum, who pops up at the most interesting times.