"Is she sleeping through the night yet?"...

...This is a question you should never ask of new parents.

Tomorrow Olivia turns 18 months old, and joy-of-joys last night she (and I!) slept through the night for the VERY FIRST TIME!!! YAY!!! It's quite a thing to go to bed and not wake up until it's light outside. Even if that occurs before 6am.

18 months has also been a time of other firsts- Olivia was babysat by Kate and Wim with Lyra, and get this - she had a GOOD TIME.

And she's walking up a storm. She still likes to have a finger to hold "for balance" though it really isn't helping :) but she will take you by the hand and toddle off to look at his or that, and she likes to go walking down the sidewalk near our house. Recently she's been letting go more and more, and deciding to walk by herself; the only step she still doesn't have is getting on her 2 feet without using a wall or a person to pull up on...




And we haven't yet mentioned that Olivia's now sitting in her Tripp Trapp chair without a 'baby' rail- she's very stable on it and can now climb up into it by herself! great climber!

Feeds self (messy)

These words are in our Sears Baby Book, in the development chart... and well here it is! Olivia's been eating 'finger foods' for a while now, though it's been difficult to tread the line between things soft enough to avoid the choking hazard (been there a couple of times, wouldn't mind if it never happens again!), but firm enough for little fingers to get a handle on. This week she graduated!

Olivia showing off her finger food technique on a piece of bread. She's been doing this successfully for a while now. She has also always loved to play with her spoons, and help feed herself; until today we'd put some food in the spoon for her, hand it to her and she could get it into her mouth...






And recently she's been interested in scooping food up with her spoon as well. We'd been helping her with that too (to avoid a bigger mess), but today we tried just dealing with the mess, and it was less than we'd thought! It happened a little slower than usual, and sometimes she'd scoop up a spoonful and then hand the spoon to mama or papa to feed to her, but for much of her soup, she scooped it up, and fed herself- She uses tools!

Olivia Walks!

Real walking! She's made the one-step-and-collapse moves before, letting go of the table, chair, wall, or whatever. But about a week ago she was so stable on her way down the hall (along the wall) as I was following her, that I thought all she needed was a reason. So I called Suzanne in to the living room, sat down on the floor a few feet away, and pretty much pointed Olivia at Mom and let her walk right over! It was great. Then she walked back to me, and back to Suzanne, and along the way I managed to grab the camera so we could get some footage. Hopefully this shows up well- it was a very exciting day!

Since then, she's walking more and more, though still not more than 6-8 feet before plonking down on her knees or bottom. But the best thing is how proud and satisfied she looks when (and after) she walks. It's such a joy to see.