But why?

It's been a fun month getting everything ready for Christmas. Olivia got all dressed up to go see Santa and it went well, as the picture shows. The next night, we had to go back to the mall for something and when she saw Santa there again, she wanted to go talk to him again. So we did and he said, "So do you want anything more then what you told me yesterday?" It was funny and nice to know that someone else thinks she has a memorable face. The tree and all of the decorations seem to be safe with her around. She likes to have them around but nothing is getting pulled down or played with.

We have quickly moved into the "Why?" stage. I try to have my creative juices flowing each and every day when I answer the endless string of why's but it is exhausting.

She still loves to sing and dance right now. She is usually awake in her crib for about an hour talking to herself and singing every song she knows before she actually falls asleep. I really wish there was some sort of dance class we could sign her up for but they all seem to start when the kids are 3 years old. So her dance career will just have to wait a little longer. Until then, I'll just have to dance home school her. She still loves to read too. The other night from her crib, I heard her say over and over again, "Baby Jesus is here, Baby Jesus is here." I was tempted to go into her bedroom because let's be honest, if Baby Jesus was really there, I wanted to see him. But I realized it was the last line of a book that Aunt Sharon and Uncle Greg got her. The painters are coming next week to paint the spare bedroom that will be hers soon to make room for the new baby. She seems really excited about it so we'll see how all of those changes go.

Speaking of the new baby, the pregnancy is going very well. We just had an ultrasound that showed everything looking good. We had the option of knowing the sex of the baby at this ultrasound but we officially turned down the offer. Olivia went to a routine ob appt with me and she seemed to really enjoy being with me through everything that was going on until they listened for the baby's heartbeat over the monitor. Then she got a little freaked out like that noise should not be coming from my belly.

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and we'll be sure to take lots of pictures to share.

Happy Halloween!

Well, by now you all probably know that Olivia is going to be a big sister. She seems to be mildly excited about it. We got a cute card from a friend with a duck on the front and I told her it was for the baby. So Olivia said, "Awwwww, here baby!" and she lifted up my shirt and put the card up it. I asked her what we should name the baby and she said, "Beluga" which is a word that she recently made up and uses for everything. So little Beluga Blocher will be joining our little family around May 9th and I will be even worse at updating this blog, if that's possible.

Halloween was fun this year. Olivia was a spider. She is not at all into playing any sort of dress up so I was worried that she wouldn't want to wear her costume. But when we got to the mall where we went the night before Halloween to go store to store for candy, she saw all of the kids and seemed to really want to get into the festivities with them.

Generally speaking, Olivia is just the happiest child I have ever met. She loves to pretend. She pretends she is holding baby animals in her hand and asks me to pet them. She loves the part of her library class when the teacher takes his wand and gives all of the kids pretend "reading dust" in their hands. She pretends she is a puppy and has me feed her from my hand. In addition to pretending, she loves to sing and dance. With the singing, her favorites are Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the Alphabet (done with 99% accuracy). With the dancing, she pretty much just has one signature move where she sways back and forth and kicks her legs from side to side while she is swaying. It's not fancy but it just makes us laugh every single time she does it. Her other favorite thing is running around naked. She just takes off running from room to room laughing when we take off her clothes to put her pjs on. This is NOT something she learned from her parents, by the way.

Don't forget that I put a larger version of the little pictures on the left waaaaaaay down at the bottom of the blog. I remove them though when I update.

Flower Girl Summer Tour continues....

So Olivia had her second run at being a flower girl for Diana's wedding at the end of August and she did even better then before, if that's possible. She actually wore the ring of flowers around her head this time and she partied hard at the reception until 10pm when her mean Mommy and Daddy made her go back to the room to go to bed. She had an absolute blast though. On a side note, on our drive home from the wedding, we saw an RV and pulled over to check it out since we had been casually looking for one for years. We ended up buying it later that week and Olivia absolutely loves that too. She calls it Gus, as in Gus the Bus because she sees it as a bus rather then an RV.

Olivia just started swimming lessons through our township. She LOVED her first lesson the other night. Most of the kids are holding tightly onto their parents' necks and just sort of sitting in their arms. But not Olivia! She is pushing away so that she can kick and move and splash. I'm very happy we signed her up.

She is just talking like crazy. She loves to ask questions already. (I thought that came later.) She is nosey like her Mommy. She says, "What cha doing, Mommy?" "What chu eating, Daddy?" "You drinking beer, Daddy?" "What chu have in your bag, Mommy?" Some phrases need some tweeking but she seems to be able to say anything she wants to to get her point across. I told her it might rain today and she said, "I hope so not." She was calling me to her crib the other night when we put her down and when I finally got there (obviously not fast enough for her) she said, "I no idea where are you?"

She has a great imagination. She loves to pretend she is holding different baby animals and asks me to pet them. She likes to play the ol' "which hand is it in?" when she is eating something small. Of course she holds forward the hand that she wants you to pick which is the empty hand but it's my job to play along so I do.

I promise to be better about this blog for all of you who have been breathing down my neck.

A Mooooo-velous 2nd birthday....

We had a great (and big) 2nd birthday party for Olivia last weekend. She isn't much into any TV characters or anything like that so in thinking about a theme, I just thought to myself, "What does she like the most in the world right now?" Cows! It was the natural answer. She looks for them out the window everytime we get in the car so I did lots of internet searching to find all of the party plates, balloons, favors, etc. with cow prints. I even painted a few of them to put around the yard. (I included a few pictures of that stuff on the bottom of the blog that aren't along the left side.) We had 55 people here. It was way too much but very fun.

We just had our 2 year appt at the doctor and that went VERY well. First of all, she is now in the 80th% percentile for height which is a huge jump from her ealier appts. Her weight is in the 44th% so she is going to be tall and thin like her mother used to be. The doctor went through his usual list of tasks that she should be able to do and she breezed through those with flying colors. Then he asked about a few things that she probably is not doing yet and it went a little like this:

(Dr.) "Is she saying lots of words yet?" (Me) "Whole sentences and conversations with you."
(Dr.) "Can she use pronouns like I, You, etc.?" (Me) "Yes." (Dr.) "Hmmm." (Dr.) "She doesn't know her colors yet, right?" (Me) "Yes, she knows all of the basic colors, maybe 8-10 of them." (Dr.) "That's a 3 year old task." "She doesn't count yet, does she?" (Me) "Well, she can count to 11 but that's it." (Dr.) "Really? That's a 3 year old task." "She doesn't know the alphabet though, right?" (Me) "Well, not in order like to sing it. But she knows all of the letters if you show her one and ask her what it is." (Dr.) "Wow, that's a 4 year old task." "We usually do the screening for autism at this visit but I think it's safe to skip that with her." It made me very proud!

She loves being in the pool. She has become fearless when it comes to standing on the edge, laughing with excitement and then diving into Mommy or Daddy's arms. We love it. It's a little scary though so we signed her up for swim lessons that start in mid-September. She continues to love jumping on anything... bed, couch, floor. She loves to take pictures and actually got 2 of her own cameras for her birthday. Mike got up from bed one morning to go to the bathroom. When he opened the door to come out, Olivia was right there waiting and quickly said, "Cheese, Daddy!" and flashed it in his face. There aren't a lot of heads in her shots but she's just getting used to her new equipment. I'll have to share some of those pics when we download them onto the computer.

Some favorite phrases are currently...."How are you Mommy? (I'm fine, thank you. How are you, sweetheart?) I'm fine." She will ask over and over again. She is using "Excuse me" alot. "I almost tripped." "Be careful" And many more but like I told the doctor, it's just turning into normal conversation now. She has her 2nd trip down the aisle this weekend for my cousin, Diana's wedding. We're very excited but she has come down with a cold today. Maybe just be a reaction to the flu shot from Monday but this is becoming a bad, wedding habit for her. Keep your fingers crossed for a speedy recovery.

Sunny Florida....

You would think we do nothing but play with animals everyday, huh? Olivia does love animals so we took a drive to a local wildlife park. They have many cages of animals but the highlight is the safari tour that they offer. We got in the convertible bus with crackers in hand and off we went to feed the deer, moose, elk, etc that came up to the sides of the bus. Olivia had a great time until she saw the slide and swing set at the park and then the animals took a backseat.

Olivia took her first flight when we went down to Florida to visit Dad while he gets his cancer treatments in Jacksonville, FL. She did so well even after being delayed an hour and 1/2 or so. We must have walked the moving sidewalks in the terminal at least 25 times to pass the time. It was hot, hot, hot when we got to FL but it made for nice naps and sleeping. The Zoo was great and she particularly liked feeding the giraffes their lettuce from the stand they come to for food. Our trip to FL was unfortunately delayed though when Olivia came down with a full body rash and a 4 day fever with temps topping out at 104.4. Doctor said it was some sort of virus. When the fever broke, we re-booked our flight and got down there to visit Nanny, Brian, Babi and Didi. As our week was coming to an end, I noticed yellow goop coming out of Olivia's eye so we went to see a doctor in FL and it turned out to be pink eye. Oh wait, it gets better.....we came home and she just seemed to be struggling with a horrible cough that would keep her up for several hours every night. So we went to our doctor and both ears are infected. I was worried about everything she was getting but the doctor diagnosed it as being unlucky. Oh well. She's on her way back to 100% and hopefully she will be there for her big 2nd birthday party this Saturday.

She continues to amaze us with her language skills, intelligence and sense of humor. Some favorite phrases nowadays are, "yesterday" as in, "Olivia what do you want for breakfast?" "Ate breakfast yesterday." She also likes to say, "I guess so", "Stop it!" and "Look at this thingy." She is also very into telling people and things that she loves them. We all love this, of course.

Can't wait to post pictures after this weekend's big birthday bash. We'll miss all of you who can't make it!

More summer fun...

We continue to be busy, busy, busy. There is a place not far from here that turns their farm into an "Adventure Farm" and it is great! The big draw is the corn maze they make but we didn't even get into that. There was just too much to do. Olivia's favorite thing was this giant inflatable pillow looking thing that is pictured to the left. It's like one of those inflatable castles but it's just open and huge. Even if it's not on an inflatable thingy, Olivia loves to jump. She'll just stop whatever she is doing sometimes to practice her jumping. It started at her 18 mos doctor's appt when the doctor was taking really long to come into the room. I was at a loss for ideas of how to keep her occupied so I said, "Ummmm, wanna jump?" She hasn't stopped since then. (Of course, now she is actually getting off the ground.)

We also made our first trip to a local amusement park. Olivia clearly loved the ride with the flying planes. But she also loved Duke, the dragon, that walked around the park. She talks about him all the time how she gave him a hug and a high five.

We're doing lots of swimming too. We were unsure if we should get a pool pass since we didn't know if she would like it but she loves it. I'm thinking swim lessons are on the list of things to do next summer.

Olivia is up to at least 13 animals and babies in her crib for nap time and bedtime. She organizes them just right, which is usually all lined up on one side of the crib, and then she wakes up in a sweat because she has 10 pounds of fur surrounding her. She repeats EVERYTHING that she hears, including "Move it, Buddy!" that Mommy said to someone who was taking his time crossing the street in front of our car. Sometimes I don't even think about what I'm saying until I hear it from her in the back seat. Today, we raced to the post office at the end of the day and Olivia would be happy to tell you that "post office closed, darnit!" She repeated a point that Bill O'Reilly was making on TV the other night which most of you know warms my heart tremendously.

We have many fun plans for this weekend so I will back to post those next week before heading to FL for a couple of weeks to visit Mom and Dad.

Weddings, carnivals, and more animals.....

Clearly, I'm bad at this but we are just having too much fun to sit down and write about it. It's been a fun start to the summer. We have a local family owned dairy that does this big "Farm Days" event every year. So Olivia got to hold chickies, pet pigs and cows and do general farm stuff which she absolutely loves. We also went to a local Carnival. We were apprehensive to get too many ride tickets when we first got there because what if she gets scared when she gets on a ride. Ummmm....NOT a problem. We left the carnival tired and VERY poor. She would get off of something and say, "Again, again!" Her favorites were the giant slide and (again) the bouncy castle. She kept falling flat on her face, literally, but would just laugh and laugh and laugh.

We also had our first of many weddings this summer. Olivia was the flower girl for my cousin, JoAnna. Unfortunately, she happen to get a bad summer cold the very day of the wedding so we had to cut the day short. However, she was a total trooper and made it down the aisle perfectly. Mike said it wasn't looking good in the lobby of the church but when he showed Olivia all of the people sitting in the pews, she turned on a huge smile and marched down to me, sitting in the front. I'm hoping to get some good pictures of that for you but I was too busy guiding her down to take any. So as soon as I get some of those, I'll post them.

Generally speaking, her speech continues to take off. She's really putting together some nice sentences. She loves to tell you when you are being silly..."Silly Mommy!" and everything is "nice" to her right now. "Olivia, how was the park?" "Nice" She also loves the phrase, "a little bit". I told her the other night that I couldn't rub her back until she fell asleep because she needed to sleep on her own. But she looked at me and said in the saddest voice, "A little bit?" So what am I going to do at that point, say no?

She's thoroughly enjoying galloping these days. She also plays hide and go seek several times a day. She's getting better and better at it. For awhile, I would let her know where I was looking by saying out loud, "Is she behind this door?" and she would call out from whereever she was, "Noooooo." Now she knows to wait quietly.

I'll leave it at that for now but if I don't post something new every 2 weeks from here on out, please leave nasty comments.

Our little animal lover....

Our community has a Spring Fling every year so Olivia and I went to that while Mike was at work. She really wanted to get in that blow up, bouncy thing that they have for kids at little events like this. I was a little apprehensive because she was by far the smallest one in line to get in and what if she hated it when she got in? Would I have to take my shoes off, climb in and get bounced around by 5 year olds while I make my way over to rescue her and get mean looks from the other parents because, "Why would you even put her in there in the first place?" But I put her in there anyway. She LOVED it! Because she was the smallest one, she couldn't really get her feet under her much. The other kids just kept jumping and it would knock her down but that's what she loved. She thought it was hilarious that she couldn't get up. I put one picture of that on the side but you have to scroll down to the bottom, bigger pictures to really appreciate her joy. Turns out I did have to get in the thing like I feared but only because she didn't want to come out.

We went to a local dairy with our Mom's Club and took a tour. Again, she loved it. She just loves "moo moos". Every time we drive to Mike's work to have lunch with him, we stop at one of the many farms along the way and check things out. Then she tells Mike all about it when we get there. "Mama moo moo,dirty, baby moo moo, water, horsey, brown, down, white, up, knee." For those of you that don't speak toddler....that means that the big cows were sitting in the dirty barn and the babies were drinking water. The brown horsey in the pasture was laying down (and always does, not sure what's going on with that horse) but the white one was up. He got up on his knee first to stand up. I swear her vocabulary triples every week.

We went to my cousin, Diana's, shower in NY this past weekend. My mom and I were a little worried about how Olivia would take the drive but she was perfect. She thoroughly enjoyed playing with her Babi in the back seat and singing "Happy Birthday" to every family member she could name, always starting with "Annette", my aunt. For whatever reason, that is her favorite name to say right now. "Diana" is currently running a close second. Anyway, she had a blast at the shower. To prove that she is my child through and through, she got inside of the cake box and "enjoyed" the icing that was stuck along the sides of the box. We do love our sweets, she and I. The picture I have is blurry but still funny.

Today, we went to a local Alpaca Farm. It was so fun. Olivia was totally freaked out when we approached the first one because I think she just didn't know what it was. I thought it was going to be a tough trip. But when we went into this storage shed to learn about their hair, she kept saying, "Again, again, again" because she wanted to go back to see them. So she warmed up to them and as you can see from the pictures, had a great time. A friend of mine took tons of pictures on a better camera so when she sends me those, I'll put them up.

She can now count to 6 although when I was counting out days for something to myself, I said, "nine" and paused to think about something and she said, "Ten!". Like, "I'll help you out Mommy since you always help me when I practice too." She knows most of her letters in the alphabet which has me floored. She has been playing this alphabet game on the computer many times a day but I didn't think about whether or not it was sticking. Then I started quizzing her with the letters on the fridge and she kept getting them right. It was so exciting. Otherwise she has just been busy blowing bubbles outside, going down the slide and loving life in general. We have tons of fun activities planned for this summer so I'll be updating more regularly.

Where's the off button?

My thought was to list the new words that Olivia has added to her vocabulary every time I add a posting. Um....that's not going to happen. She just adds words by the hour. She is even starting to put things together. A little boy rushed by her on the steps of the playground the other day. He stopped at the top of the steps to glare down at her and block her way. In her carefree, loving way she just said, "Hi boy!" She not only loves to talk but she is starting to amaze us with numbers as well. She can count to 4 already!

Olivia continues to love spending time outside so we got her her first bike. She pulls it out of the garage each and every time we go out. I was showing her how to pedal so I got in front of the bike, put my hands on her feet and showed her how to push down on each one as the pedal goes down. I said, "OK, now you do it." So she leaned over the handlebars and put her hands on her own feet to push them down for herself. It was so funny. Literal, but funny. We had some hot temps here last week so I experimented with pigtails as you can see in the one picture. She was a little apprehensive at first until I let her see a mirror and then she was SO excited. She had the cutest smile on her face and she just shook her head to watch them bounce.

Another cute story, we were in church and it came to Olivia's favorite part, the hand shaking, "Peace be with you" part. She always likes to shake hands with people around us. But last week, she got down from my arms and made her way down the entire length of the pew, shaking every hand along the way. She looked like she was running for office. It was hilarious.

Olivia doesn't really watch TV yet. She just has no interest in it. But I did have Dancing with the Stars on tonight right before she was going to bed. She LOVED it! She was just fixated on it and sat there trying to do the moves that she saw. When they finished, she clapped along with the audience and looked at me and said, "Again!" So of course, I let her stay up for another contestant to perform. I'm dusting off my old ballet shoes tomorrow!

Don't forget to check out the larger version of the pictures down at the very bottom of the blog. It is a long way down.

Quick note about the blog..

Just wanted to mention that I've heard from lots of people that the pictures are so small that they wish they could click on them to see them bigger. Well, you can't do that and I can't do anything about the size of the pictures because of the setup that I chose. However, everytime I add pictures, I will add those same pictures to the bottom of the blog too where they are MUCH bigger. You have to scroll quite a ways down to see them. When I add a new entry though, I plan on deleting the old pictures and swapping them out with the newest ones so you better be keeping up if you hope to see those big pictures at the bottom. Hope that helps!

Our professional flower girl...

Although Olivia looked absolutely adorable in her Easter dress, I have very unimpressive pictures to share. I'm hoping someone else will send some to me and I'll pass them along. We were all fighting off a 2nd round of cold/cough stuff so with the cold temps outside, we really didn't have an egg hunt either. But it was nice to be with so much family. Because of the passing of my grandfather, Olivia's Uncle Marc and Uncle Greg flew in for a couple of days as well and she really seemed to like their silliness. Probably the most exciting thing though was Olivia being asked to be a flower girl for her 2nd wedding this summer!!! My cousin JoAnna is getting married in June and we're very excited that Olivia will be helping her down the aisle.

Olivia continues to surprise us with a new word everyday. So far, she has the following under her belt: Mommy, Daddy, Babi (Ukrainian for Grandma), Didi (Ukr. for Grandpa), Nanny, Pop Pop, yes, no, milk, jeans, bunny, book, boogie, baby, hat, peas, water, juice, up, out, shoe, boy, girl, away, bus, off, bubble, cheese, hotdog, monkey, sticker....I feel like I'm forgetting some but those are the ones that we hear pretty regularly. And she's so close to a ton of other words. Oh, it's so fun!

Hockey and a Hair Cut....

OK, OK....I will post my entries more regularly. I'm getting a lot of slack from some people but that's good. At least I know you're reading.

This is SUCH an awesome age! Olivia is so much fun. She just loves to be tickled, walk around with her hands in her pockets and be just plain silly. Her vocabulary is growing and growing every day. It is so crazy to hear it. She can even tell long stories. She will tell you, "Clop, clop, clop....Big...(stomps floor)....away." Translation: "I saw a horse (with a buggy) at the grocery store yesterday. It was a big horse. He went like this with his foot. Then he went away and went home."

We took Olivia to her first Bears hockey game. I was hoping that she would at least stay put for the first period so I could watch. However, I am happy to share that we got to see the entire game. I kid you not. She just hung out and people watched, or she enjoyed her hot dog and popcorn or she played with her friends who were also with us. But she was totally content to be in her seat area for 3 periods of play. She even clapped when she heard everyone else clap, which wasn't all too often in the 1-0 loss. Her highpoint was probably meeting Coco the Bear while we walked around the concourse between periods. Although repeating the words "Hot dog" over and over again came in a close 2nd.

She got her first official haircut last week too. I snipped her bangs when she was tiny but this was her official "professional" haircut. She was perfect, perhaps a little confused about why she was sitting in that chair with a cape around her neck, but she just sat and watched and waited for the girl to finish. Don't worry, she will have long hair to put in ponytails but we just had to even up the back since it grew in at different lengths.

Hope everyone has a Happy Easter and we'll be sure to post some egg hunt pictures.

Chatty Cathy!

Sorry for taking so long. Olivia has been fighting a cold, croup and now a dry cough so I wasn't exactly getting prize winning photos of her lately. But perhaps her sore throat is a result of all of the talking she has been doing lately. Not everything is a clear word but she tries to repeat everything she hears now. It is so fun to hear. And if she can't say a word, she finds another way to communicate her thoughts. Mike was getting her ready for bed and he pulled out her butterfly pjs. Olivia said no and started scratching under her arms and making monkey sounds. She wanted to wear her pjs that have monkeys all over them.

Another cute story....she was standing on the kitchen table bench with me (well, I was sitting of course, not standing. Don't want you to think we get completely out of control when Mike leaves us alone for the day.) and I picked up my cup to take a drink. She grabbed her bib that was laying on the table and ran over to me to put it under my chin like I do to her when she practices using a cup. It was so cute.

We're getting ready for Easter now. Babi bought Olivia a BEAUTIFUL Easter dress so I'll be sure to take lots of pictures of that.

18 months old...

We had our 18 month check-up at the doctor's yesterday and it went very well. Olivia is 22 lbs 11oz which is in the 25th % and she is 32 in tall which is 60th%. She has met all of her developmental milestones and (spoken like a mother) actually met them several months ago. Based on what we were telling the doctor about what she has been doing lately, he gave us one stern warning. If we plan on having any other kids, they will NOT be like Olivia. She is just too perfect. Oh sure, that last sentence wasn't a direct quote but he did want to make sure that we knew that she was not a typical 18 mos old.

She had a little cold the last couple of days so we haven't done anything too exciting to share but today she had had enough of being in the house. She got her shoes out from her closet, did her best to put them on, got her coat off it's hook in the closet and put it on (just one sleeve and upside down), and patted her head to tell me to get her hat. She was going outside, with or without me. We can really tell that her speech is about to take off. She has really started using "Mommy" and "Daddy" a lot and she has recently added "Babi" and "Didi". Oh, and she loves to say "Bye" when someone is leaving or when she is leaving the room or when you flush a bug down the toilet. She has a lunch with friends this Thursday and dinner with a different group of friends this Friday so I should have some good stories and pictures for you after that.

Time for a tu-tu!

It warms my heart to share that Olivia has been walking around the house a lot on her tip toes. I'm going to start saving now for those dance lessons. She is definitely drawn to music. She loves to dance and her foot stomping is usually pretty darn close to being on the beat. In another example of "Like mother, like daughter", she also beats her little fist on her chest after she burps or coughs. It's amazing (and a little scary) how much a child picks up from you without you thinking about what you're doing. She is still working hard to form real words. She currently has her own partial words for "bug", "apple", and "bird" among others.

I've been a little behind with my postings but I'll try to be better about this. I must say, comments that are left definitely motivate me to get my butt in gear. It also let's me know that my husband isn't the only one to read these. So c'mon people!!!! Give me some feedback, would ya?!

Some recent good times...

Although a bit of a stomach virus has torn through our house recently (which Olivia started!), we did manage to have loads of fun the week leading up to it. Olivia normally enjoys taking a bath. She loves taking off her clothes and running around the house until we can corral her. She loves dumping all of her toys into the water to create her "fun pool". And she loves to play with those toys once she gets in. But one day last week, she just took it to a new level. She decided that life was too short and she was going to take the most fun bath that she has ever taken. She was just going crazy in the water with non-stop splashing so I sent Mike for the camera and we captured this beauty of a photo to the left.

We finally got some snow. Maybe 2 sad inches but it was something. So we suited up and took Olivia out for her first sled ride. Everyone had a good time flying ("flying" being a relative term, she is only 1 and 1/2) down our street which is a hill. (with speed bumps, for extra added fun!) She seemed to have more fun just walking around the yard through this odd, white stuff until we witnessed Daddy accidentally running over our new sled in the driveway with his truck. No worries though....best $12 we ever spent. There wasn't a scratch or crack on it.

Ah, the sounds, the sights, the smells...

We visited the PA Farm Show tonight. It was so much fun. Olivia seemed cautious at first. Why was she standing 3 inches from these massive cows that she sees in her books everyday? But when we made our way into the poultry wing, she really came alive. Every time a rooster cockadoodledooed, she swung her head around to try to catch which one it was. The turkey cages were on the floor so she got down to wander down that row and she loved that. She pointed to each one and "told" us her thoughts on them. She pet a bunny and a guinea pig, saw horses, pigs and chickies, ate a hot dog, wings and ice cream, played in a corn box and rode on her first carousel. We will be regular visitors to the annual Farm Show, that's for sure.

O Christmas Tree....

Olivia found putting away the Christmas decorations much more enjoyable then putting them out. For the past month, she heard, "No" over and over again as she tried to touch the ornaments. But last weekend, we decided to let her help us take them off the tree and pack then away and she thought she was in her own little piece of heaven. Mike handed her an ornament and sent her to me with it so that I could put it in the box. When she realized that this wasn't a very efficient plan, she started holding out her other hand to let him know that she could handle 2 ornaments at one time. But again, not efficient enough. So she piled 2 ornaments on top of each other in one arm while using her chin to steady the ornament on top and then held out her free hand for a 3rd ornament. It was SO cute! (And very smart too.)

She is "talking" so much these days. Oh sure, we have no idea what she is saying but she really seems to understand herself. She sounds like she is just talking in her own language and she looks at you when she finishes a sentence, waiting for you to respond to what she just "said". She is getting very good at mimicing sounds and sound combinations so I think it's just a matter of time before she is talking up a storm. She loves all of her new puzzles that she got for Christmas and it's quite impressive to watch her work on them. I've tried tricking her by handing her pieces upside down but she isn't fooled. She just spins the piece around in her little hands and puts in the right place, the right way. Looks AND brains!

Happy New Year!

Who says you have to be up til midnight to have a good time on New Year's?! We decided to have some neighbors over and make it a family event with lots of food, fun and kids. Everyone had a really good time until the party had to break up around 8 pm. (That's bedtime for about 50% of the guest list.) Olivia loves playing with her neighborhood friends so I really wanted to capture the moment so that when they all graduate from high school, they can look back at these photos of themselves "partying" at age 1 and laugh. (The youngest friend is 6 months and the oldest is 4, by the way.) And laugh they will because all of the photos were so bad that it was comical. YOU try to get 6 kids on a couch together to pose for a picture. The picture to the left doesn't do the detail justice so I've attached a bigger version to the bottom of this blog for awhile. Max, in the back, didn't even want to sit with the others so his Mom is holding him up from behind the couch. No one is smiling, or even looking at the camera really. And Olivia is saying, "Forget this, I'm sliding off and getting back to the dance floor." In the 2nd shot,which I didn't post, she is out of the picture all together because she had fallen off the couch. It really was a good time for all though. It was the 2nd year in a row that Mike and I weren't awake to ring in the New Year. Oh well, it was there when we got up the next morning.

Generally speaking, Olivia continues to amaze us every day. She currently loves to climb things and sit on things, even if they aren't meant to be seats. She LOVES to read, which makes us very happy. Her favorite place is sitting in her new bean bag (that Santa brought her) where she just picks book after book off of the bookshelf that Pop Pop built her. I"m going to add a list of books to the blog so that everyone knows what she already has. I can't figure out how to make it something that you just click on to see so it will take up a bit of space. Everyone looks at Olivia and comments on how much she looks like me. They ask what she got from Mike and we definitely have an answer to that....her culinary tastes. She has currently enjoyed italian sausage and sauerkraut, turkey chili, prime rib and sour pickels. Getting her to eat is not an issue in this house.

Happy New Year's everyone!