Every day of my life is better because Ryder is in it. His sensitivity is is superpower. He’s the kid who notices the little things. He’s the kid who asks, “Can I help you, Mama?” He’s the little boy who picks up on the emotions of others and cares deeply about those around him. He is still very much the kid who loves holding my hand and will run after me to say goodbye one last time and get one more long hug and kiss in before I leave to go somewhere. I swear I could hug this kid forever. His hugs are something special, I’m telling you.
Ryder’s big brown eyes are so expressive and showcase every last drop of what he’s feeling in any given moment. He still loves his hair “spikes” and quickly re-forms his mini mohawk after a bath or a shower. Any picture Ryder draws of himself includes his spikes and I love them so much.
He has the best throaty voice and a belly laugh that ripples through our family, usually after something his big brother said or did that has him in hysterics. Ryan and I have always said Ryder is “under the radar funny” and constantly comes up with one-liners, silly words or statements that have us laughing and quoting him for days to come. (One time he called us “grown-ies” — short for grown ups — and this word is now a staple in our family vocabulary.)
Ryder is adventurous and playful and absolutely loves swimming, martial arts, riding his dirt bike, playing outside, running, cuddling, games (card games and board games), soccer, catching and releasing various creatures, wrestling with his brothers, scooter rides, arts and crafts, music and his family.
Ryder’s love for Pepper, our family dog, knows no bounds and there’s something special about their bond that feels bigger than a kid-dog relationship. Pepper is his comfort and his cuddle buddy as well as his playmate and the source of endless kisses.
Ryder is still our wonderful introvert who absolutely comes alive around people he knows, loves and trusts. I was a little nervous about his transition to kindergarten last fall but didn’t need to be because this kid thrived!
During a parent-teacher conference, his teacher told me she would “take a class of 24 Ryders” and his confidence seemed to grow throughout the year. Ryder loves school, his teachers and his classmates and, especially, the double recess kindergarteners got every day.
Ryder will still opt for family time above all else, but as he’s grown up a bit, his trusted circle has become a little wider. The past two years have been huge for Ryder socially, as he became much more excited about playdates and birthday parties, two things that didn’t really interest him for years. Watching Ryder’s confidence grow and his comfort level with those outside of our family increase has been such a joy.
Ryder is a deeply feeling kid, and I mean this in the best possible way. He’s very attune to the feelings of others and feels his own emotions deeply. He loves so hard and if you’re one of his people, you feel his love deep in your bones. Ryder’s empathy and sensitivity are two of his biggest assets and whoever ends up on the receiving end of Ryder-love has lucked out big time.
While Ryder is not shy about expressing love and positive emotions, he can struggle a bit with talking about emotions that are not pleasant or uncomfortable. This is something I personally struggled with for years (truly until I met Ryan) and talking about ALL emotions — positive and negative — is incredibly important to me to help cultivate in our children. It’s something we continue to work on with Ryder as we want him to be able to express himself fully and not shut down when he’s made a mistake, done something embarrassing or been on the receiving end of something that hurt his feelings. I never want our deeply feeling kid to feel like he cannot express himself, especially among trusted family, and it’s a constant work in progress to help Ryder name his emotions, validate how he’s feeling, keep our boundaries, reassure him we love him even when he makes the wrong choice, etc. Ryder has done wonders to educate me on the different ways to parent and discipline children because a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t always work with different kids with different personalities. We’ve seen huge improvement in his ability to express himself, but it’s a journey and one we’re still very much on with our sweet (almost) seven-year-old.
Middle Brother Ryder
Chase and Rhett are Ryder’s world and the two people he prefers to play with above anyone and everyone else.
His brothers are his favorite people and watching the relationships between our three boys grow, evolve and strengthen will forever be one of the biggest sources of joy in my life.
The age differences between our boys means Ryder looks to his brothers for different things. Ryder and Chase can do a lot together, physically and mentally, and always seem to be running around, playing sports, creating imagination games, wrestling, exploring, dirt biking, fishing, swimming, practicing martial arts, and coming up with various adventures to go on together.
Our two big kids share a room and Ryan and I get so much joy from listening to them belly laugh together after we tuck them in. The “Goodnight Chase” and “Goodnight Ryder” they call out to each other before drifting off to sleep will forever melt my heart. Chase and Ryder are attached at the hip 99 percent of the time we’re home or out and about as a family and the way they naturally want to spend time together is something I hope and pray will last a lifetime.
The trickiest aspect of their relationship to navigate is the competitiveness that will surface from time to time. We can remind Ryder that Chase is three years older than him until we are blue in the face but sometimes he will struggle with having a bigger brother who can beat him at various things due to Chase’s age advantage. (We also try to tell Ryder this won’t always be the case, but an almost seven-year-old’s world is very black-and-white, so this can be hard for him to comprehend. We just try hard to point out Ryder’s strengths and emphasize effort over outcome but man this can be a challenge… though, again, it’s getting easier with each year that passes.) Also, this is an area where Ryder going to kindergarten has been the biggest blessing, as it has placed Ryder around more kids his own age for longer periods of time, allowing him to develop more confidence in his own abilities. Truly, kindergarten has been HUGE for Ryder as he will light up telling us about something special he did at school and his personal successes.
As for Ryder and Rhett’s relationship, it was the spiciest in our family for a while when they were younger as they were both little and would get upset over little kid stuff like knocked-down towers and sharing favorite toys. Thankfully those days are largely behind us and a playful, loving relationship came out of the fire!
Listening to Ryder and Rhett come up with the most imaginative games as they play is so fun for me, especially since they can both now contribute and participate a little more equally. Frustrations will still surface as communicating and playing with a spicy four-year-old who isn’t always the most reasonable can test Ryder’s patience but he’s thoughtful and fun and so creative. Ryder and Rhett share a love for doing quieter activities together, too, and can often be found sitting side-by-side as they work on puzzles, melty beads, diamond paintings and various arts and crafts projects.
Ryder’s favorite thing is to simply be home with his brothers, making forts, kayaking, playing outside, dirt biking, building magnetic tile creations, working on a crafts project together, spying on me and Ryan with walkie talkies, playing with Hot Wheels, building Legos, snuggling on the couch for movie night or swimming in the lake. Three boys is all kinds of chaos and all kinds of joy and Ryder is right in the middle of it, always.
Random Things to Remember
- Favorite Foods: Jonny Pops, watermelon, white cheddar macaroni and cheese, chicken nuggets/fingers, bell peppers, pizza, strawberries, carrots, grapes, cucumbers, waffles, pancakes, cherry vanilla ice cream, sausage, pepperoni
- Favorite Color: Red
- Favorite Books: Dragon Kingdom of Wrenly series, Arcade World series, Press Start! series, Owl Diaries series, Dog Man series
- Favorite Songs: “When I Grow Up” (FloRida),
- Favorite TV Shows: Grizzly and the Lemmings, Octonauts, Paw Patrol, Creature Cases, Hot Wheels: Let’s Race
- Favorite Animal: Deer, reindeer
- Wake Up Time/Bed Time: Ryder is the earliest of our early bird kids and typically wakes up between 6-6:30 a.m. and goes to bed around 7:30 p.m.
Likes
- Playing with his brothers
- Riding his bike and his dirt bike
- Martial arts
- Catching and releasing creatures
- Puzzles
- Legos
- Riding his Nighthawk and Plasma Car
- Swimming
- Soccer
- Craft projects
- Building projects of any kind
- Books
- Cuddle time
- Kayaking in the lake
- Movie nights
- Imagination games
- Hot Wheels/any transportation toy
- Making melty bead creations
- Making forts and obstacle courses
7 Year Old Favorites
- Dirt Bike (hands down Ryder’s favorite and most-used Christmas present)
- NightHawk Ride-On (The big birthday gift for Ryder and Chase two years ago and the #1 toy everyone wants to play with during playdates at our house)
- Card Games (UNO, Memory, Go Fish and Crazy Eights are his favorites)
- Board Games (Ticket to Ride: First Journey, Walk the Dogs, Clue Junior, Outfoxed, Guess Who?)
- Legos
- Rocket Launcher (goes so, so high!)
- Kid Kayak (Easy for kids to use and so wonderful for lake exploration)
- Laser Tag
- Books (especially the Dragon Kingdom of Wrenly series, Arcade World series, Press Start! series and Owl Diaries series)
- Puzzles (100-300 piece puzzles are his fav right now)
- Any Craft Project
- Diamond Painting
- Picasso Tiles (Forever and always a fav and my #1 toy recommendation because they’ve been a hit for YEARS)
- Melty Beads
- Bike
- Bug Cages, Nets and this Catch-and-Release Aquarium
- Art Supplies (Gel Crayons, Kwik Stix Quick-Dry Paint Pens, Pip Squeaks Marker Tower, Crayola Retractable Markers)
- Glider Airplanes
- Legos
- Plasma Car
- Cars and Trucks + Hot Wheels Ultimate Garage
- Surprise Inside Bath Bombs
- Nerf Guns
- LeapFrog Learning Tablet (we save this for road trips)
- Watermelon Ball Pool Toy
Past Ryder Updates
- 6 Year Old Update
- 5 Year Old Update
- 4 Year Old Update
- 3 Year Old Update
- 2 Year Old Update
- 12-13 Months
- Ryder is ONE!
- 8-11 Months
- 7 Month Postpartum Update: Life with Two Kids
- 7 Months Old
- Sleep Training After the 4-Month Sleep Regression
- Postpartum Q&A: Part Two
- Postpartum Q&A: Part One
- Ryder: The Next Few Days
- Welcome Ryder Thomas! (Ryder’s Birth Story)
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“Goodnight Chase” and “Goodnight Ryder” ….just like the Waltons. 🙂 Good night MaryEllen ~ Good night John Boy.
Happy Birthday Ryder!
What a beautiful recap of parenting Ryder! HBD, little guy!
My boys are also extremely sensitive and shut down during the tough moments. I appreciate the times you bring this up on the blog and how you approach them.
Just like anytime you recommend a “slam dunk” toy or book, I tend to jump on it! My boys are Ryder and Rhett’s ages, so we are aligned but you have just a bit more wisdom and experience from Chase 🙂 so thank you for all of the ideas and inspo!!!!
Thank you so much for this comment, Ryane — love that we are so closely aligned!
Julie, can you share what you and Ryan have read or done specifically with Ryder about talking about difficult emotions? Are there different strategies you’ve used or resources you’ve tapped into? And can you talk about how it’s different than whatever you’ve done with Chase and now Rhett? I understand this may something you need to think on, but I’m sure I’m not the only one who is interested. It sounds like my one kiddo may be similar as well and I’m wondering if there are other things we could be doing or reading, etc.
seconding this!
Oh I love this idea for a blog post! One resource I’ve found invaluable is Dr. Becky/Good Inside. Her podcast and book have been immensely helpful to me with various parenting challenges, especially those related to parenting a deeply feeling child. I cannot recommend her enough!! But yes, I’ll try to think more about this and share more helpful resources.
Where do you listen to music? Or what stations do you listen to? We love music here and have Sirius XM radio. We listen to a lot of happy radio, but it repeats a lot. Any recommendations are welcomed! ☺️
Our boys love Kids place live on Sirius XM (esp their morning show, Absolutely Mindy) and we also listen to a lot of Pandora — the boys just request a Pandora station based off a song or artist they like! They love the Crazy Frog station if you’re looking for a good starting point for veeery upbeat music.
Ryder looks so much like your dad!
Aw I love to hear this!!