10 Months Old

Olivia turned 10 months old on Friday. I know I say this every month, but where has the time gone?!? Everybody told me that the first year would go especially fast, and I am too quickly becoming a believer. So, what is Olivia up to this month?

- She still wears size 12 clothes.
- She is still in a size 4 diaper.
- She has 8 teeth, 4 on top and 4 on bottom.
- Her good nighttime sleeping habits have returned. She is sleeping from about 7:30 or 8:00pm to 6:30am. She will usually wake up and take a bottle and then sleep another hour.
- She takes 2 naps a day and they are usually an hour each. If she has played extra hard beforehand, she will sometimes sleep longer.
- She still loves being on the floor playing.
- She is walking along the furniture a lot more and moving between pieces easily. She still hasn't taken a step without holding on though.
- She claps, plays peek-a-boo, lifts her arms when you ask how big she is, dances, and waves on a fairly consistent basis. (Although if I ask her to do any of these when a stranger is around, she doesn't usually cooperate! Ha!)
- Her eating is unpredictable. Sometimes she wants to only feed herself, and some days she won't feed herself anything.
- Her favorite foods this month have been hummus and meatball sandwich.
- She loves to kiss herself in the mirror! She also likes giving kisses to all of her animals/ dolls. However, I can't hardly get her to give me a kiss.
- She still calls pretty much everything a "duh" (duck). She has said cat a couple of times, but doesn't say it consistently.
- She LOVES books! Out of all the toys she has, she prefers books most of the time (which I will never complain about!)
- She loves playing with the dogs. (I think Phoebs is getting tired of Olivia trying to pull up on her!)
- She is always on the go. I can't turn my head on her for a second, or she's headed towards something she shouldn't be!

She is SO much fun, and I am LOVING every minute I get to spend with her!

Amy's Visit

I'm a little late in updating this week because it's been a busy week. Sometimes we don't even do anything and it feels like I'm busy, but I digress. My best friend Amy came to visit last weekend. She got here on Saturday and stayed until Tuesday. When she arrived Saturday, we went out to an early dinner. After a good meal, we came home and put Olivia to bed. Amy, Jon, and I stayed up too late playing Phase 10 and visiting.

Since Amy has never been to our favorite brunch spot, we made that a priority for Sunday morning. We all had flautas, and couldn't have been happier with our choices! Jon kept Olivia for a few hours afterwards so Amy and I could run some errands and do a little shopping. I'm so thankful that he did because it was cold and rainy for most of the day, so that would have been a pain to get her in and out of the car. Jon cooked stir-fry for dinner, and we went to bed at a decent hour.

We slept in a little on Monday and then went to lunch in Amy's old neighborhood. Afterwards, we went to Target to do a little shopping. Later that night, we (actually Amy) roasted a chicken and some vegetables for dinner. I gave her the choice of feeding Olivia or making dinner... she chose dinner. If you know Amy, you may or may not know that she cannot stand to see food all over a baby's mouth. And, in case you were wondering, that's the stage we are in now! Ha!

Amy left late Tuesday morning, and it was sad to see her go. But, I will see her for Olivia's birthday and that's not too far away (sniff, sniff). Thanks for coming, Amy! We had a great time!

As for the rest of this week, we went to our weekly playgroup on Wednesday. Yesterday, we went upstairs to a neighbor's condo. They have 2 little boys (Campbell, who will be 3 in a couple of weeks, and Emmett, who is 2 weeks older than Olivia). Their dad stays home with them, and we've been talking about getting the kids together for a while, and we finally did. They had a great time, and I think we'll start doing it more often.

We are heading over to our old daycare now, so I can visit and Olivia can play with her friends! :)



That's all I have for now. The weather has turned cold here again (it snowed a little earlier in the week, and the highs are in the 30s), so we will probably stay indoors most of the weekend. I hope you have a great one!

A Few New Tricks

I've been meaning to post for a few days, but I've been a little busy. :) Olivia has a couple of new tricks. There is a video at the bottom of this post, so be sure to watch her in action! When you ask her how big she is and say, "soooo big", she lifts her hands in the air. She likes playing peek-a-boo, and now she covers her eyes when I say, "Where's Olivia?" She gets tickled when she moves her hands and I "find" her. She will now clap everytime I ask her to. She also dances on command, and waves bye-bye on a regular basis. I think the video captures all of them, except peek-a-boo.

She has also started standing unassisted. Once she pulls up, she will let go and stand for up to 20 seconds!

We have really enjoyed the past couple of days. The weather has been nice enough for us to walk to the park and playground. Olivia had fun swinging and just being outside.

In other news, she has completely stopped nursing. It was a gradual stop, starting with the daytime feedings. For about a week, I continued nursing her morning and night, but she was losing interest, so I decided it was time. She will drink the formula from a bottle, but she won't drink much from a sippy cup. (Although, she loves drinking water from her sippy). Oh well, I guess she'll do it when she's ready...

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I hope the luck of the Irish has been with all of you!

Week in Review

As you can tell in this picture of Olivia and Jon, Olivia was feeling better over the weekend. We took advantage of it and went out to an early dinner for pizza. (You don't think she's a daddy's girl, do you?!? Ha!) This picture doesn't even do it justice... she is CRAZY about her daddy! Her eyes light up every night when he gets home and she races over to him. She has the biggest smile on her face when he picks her up. It melts my heart every time!

Other than that trip to dinner, I don't think we got out of our pajamas over the weekend:


We were supposed to go to a new playgroup on Monday, but I decided that we better skip this one since she still had a little bit of a cough. Instead, we just played at home.

We went back to our regular playgroup on Wednesday and then a new one today. The one today was at a coffee shop that is geared towards kids. They have a big play area with different areas for the kids to play in. She had a really good time playing with all of the toys, and I also gave her her first lesson in basketball! :) I didn't think to take my camera, but I'll try to remember next time.

She is SO much fun these days! I feel so blessed to get to spend all day with her every day. I thank Jon every day for working so hard that I'm able to do this. She started saying the "B" sound yesterday, and she's pretty proud of herself! She also LOVES to give EVERYthing kisses. She kisses the dogs, her stuffed kitty, stuffed duck, stuffed frog, and her favorite... she kisses herself in the mirror! It's pretty cute if I say so myself. :)

I hope you all are enjoying your week!

Under the Weather... Again

Well, it has been a really low-key week around our house. On Tuesday, Olivia woke up with a little cold. She basically just had a runny nose and wanted to be held all day. (Although I hate it when she's sick, I have to admit that I enjoy the cuddle time!) I decided we should skip the playgroup on Wednesday, just in case. She seemed fine on Wednesday, so we ventured out to do a little shopping, etc. She woke up Thursday morning with a really bad runny nose again, but seemed to feel fine. By noon, she was back to her normal self... or so I thought. She played hard and we ran some errands. I put her to bed last night and she went right to sleep. I went to bed shortly after, while Jon stayed up to work on some stuff. He woke me up at 11:00 holding her and said that she was coughing really bad and wheezing. It seemed like she was having trouble getting enough air. We decided to call the dr, just to be safe. Dr. Egues told us to give her the albuterol inhaler to help her breathe, and to bring her in this morning. That's what we did, and she has bronchialitis again. :( So, basically, we have to start using the inhaler again and keep an eye on her breathing. You can tell that she doesn't feel great, but it isn't too bad. She's been playing and loving on me all day, so I can't complain!

Do you think she's changed much since the last time she had to use the inhaler?



We don't have any plans for this weekend, so we will just focus on getting her well. Hope you all enjoy your weekends!

She has enjoyed "reading" even more this week:

Weekend in Madison

On Friday, Jon, Olivia, and I drove up to Madison, Wisconsin to visit some friends. Max is one of Jon's oldest and best friends. He and his wife, Emily, have a little boy (Henry) who is about a month younger than Olivia. Another of Jon's closest friends, Joe, drove in from Minneapolis with his wife, Kaia and their little boy, Luke, who is 4 months old. This was our first overnight trip anywhere besides the grandparents, and we had a great time!

The three kids (not an easy task to capture the wiggleworms!):


Max and Emily were such gracious hosts. Friday evening, Max cooked a great dinner for all of us, as well as a few other friends who live in Madison. We stayed up way too late visiting, and catching up.

Up early on Saturday morning, Kaia, Emily, and I headed to the spa for pedicures while the guys kept the kids. It was so nice to get away for a few hours and have a little girl time. After lunch, we headed home and took over, so the boys could grab some food. Later that evening, we ventured out to dinner. (Yes, I realize that we were extremely brave in taking 3 kids under 9 months old out to eat, but they made me so proud!) The kids did so well, and we were able to enjoy a great dinner with even better friends. Back at home, we put the babies to bed and once again, stayed up too late.

After a home cooked breakfast by Emily on Sunday morning, we made our way back to Chicago. We were all exhausted, and turned in early.

It was so fun to watch Olivia and Henry play together. They are doing the same things right now, and they were so cute! And, little Luke is adorable! It won't be long until they are all running around together.

I kept forgetting to take pictures, so I stole most of the ones below from Emily.

Henry chasing Olivia:

Wishing they could break free:

Luke being such a sweet lil' guy:

Henry and Olivia:

9 Months Old

Olivia turned 9 months old on Friday. What is she up to this month?

- She still wears 12 month clothes.
- She is still in a size 4 diaper.
- She has a total of 6 teeth, 4 on top and 2 on bottom.
- Her sleeping has been very inconsistent this month. Sometimes she sleeps through the night, and sometimes she wakes up every 3-4 hours.
- She still takes 2, sometimes 3 naps. They are usually very short in length, though.
- Falling asleep is more difficult these days, as she likes to stand in her crib and look at us.
- She LOVES to be on the floor playing.
- She is still crawling everywhere and pulling up on everything.
- She is walking along the furniture now.
- She loves clapping! She will clap when I sing "Pat-a-Cake" and "If you're Happy and You Know It", or when I say "Yay!"
- She waves bye-bye.
- When I ask her where my nose is, she will reach for it (most of the time).
- We think she is saying "Duck". She loves her duck and when I ask her what it is, she says, "Duh". (Maybe it's a coincidence?!?) :)
- She likes to "dance" to the music.
- She loves playing "Giddy Up, Horsey".
- She is still a really good eater, and she enjoys picking up her food and feeding herself (sometimes).
- She likes giving big, slobbery kisses when she's in the right mood.
- Sometimes, she will "blow kisses". To her, this is accomplished by sticking out her tongue and blowing.
- She goes through shy phases. When someone strange reaches for her, she lays her head on my shoulder.
- When Jon gets home, she crawls as fast as she can to the door to see him.

I had a really hard time getting her to stay still for her 9 month photos, so here are a couple of random pictures from the week. I'll try again tomorrow and add them if I get any good ones.