All About Olivia!

Well, Olivia is walking up a storm. She still likes to hold a hand or two, but more often charges/teeters off on her own. Today, at the Botanical Garden, she took her stroller for a walk for the first time, pushing it around in circles and into the occasional bush. She loves the fountain at the gardens, raising her hands up and down to describe the water rising and falling. During a break in the rain, we sat at the outdoor cafe and shared a piece of fruit cake (NOT the american kind!) whilst I indulged in a cappuccino - yum.

Speaking of signing for things like the fountain, the other day I decided to write down the signs she has produced and it's about 35 now - which really blew us away. Especially, realizing that she understands many more times than she is saying herself. Kids are just amazing - every day she seems to do at least a little something new and surprising. She is reproducing signs almost a fast as we can feed them to her. Funnily enough, she still hasn't said "cat" that I could tell, although she _loves_ to watch them. Currently, she is really into signing 'bicycle' and 'car'.

Of course, she's still our 'baby', but Olivia is seeming much more like a little girl now than a baby. She has developed "looks"; some disapproving, some dubious, quizzical, frustrated, impatient, or rebellious. They can be turned into smiles remarkably quickly, though. She is expert at passive resistance. She is rarely grumpy for long.
One of her favorite things is to request "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider" by doing the hand-motions to it; for some reason, particularly during a nappy change. Her favourite books right now seem to be The Mitten, The Hat, I Love You As Much, Goodnight Moon and her book of bedtime rhymes, oh and Poppyseed. Oh, and Clap Your Hands. Hm, she seems to have alot of favorite books, I'd better stop or I'll list them all.

Olivia really likes to go outside. She will get her shoes and try to put them on then ask for help, and almost stay still long enough for us to get her ready to go outside. Once there, her favorite things to do around the house are visit the lavender for smelling (she rubs it with her fingers and puts them to her nose), touch the ceramic pig's ears and nose while snorting through her own nostrils, visit the shed where we keep the bikes, and the crown jewel...get in the driver's seat and do everything mama and papa do while driving the car. She can even get the key into the ignition. Yikes.

Right, inside the house, she has been practicing with door handles and keys in locks. She loves to play with fast-x buckles - the hitch is that she's great and getting them together, but can't get them apart yet, so this game requires alot of 'helping'.

Olivia is sleeping pretty well at night quite often now (touch wood). She has even slept through most of the night several times. Bob puts her to bed around 8-8:30pm, we get in bed around 10:30pm. Olivia sleeps on the other side of Bob, who keeps her asleep during fidgets and wake-ups, and she is usually awake and extremely ready for a breastfeed sometime between 5 and 6 am. Sometimes though, after that, we fall asleep again for a while. All-in-all, we're feeling pretty good about how the sleep thing is going.