Another Day

Olivia had a much more interesting day today than yesterday, and though she seems to have alot of energy now at bedtime, she _seems_ to be going to sleep more easily. I can still hear the occasional "mummy" or "mama" from upstairs though, as Bob is singing her to sleep.
It wasn't too chilly and the sunlight was peeking hopefully through the clouds this morning. Then it started to RAIN. Hard. We all threw on our raingear and went outside to watch Papa trim the base of the xmas tree before it got too wet, and dragged it inside. Then, since we were already geared up and rained on, Olivia got on her bike, and we pulled on our galoshes and we went for a walk in the rain. Olivia had a great time alternating splashing through puddles on her bike and stomping in them.
Home for a warming lunch of grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup, then a shortish nap for Olivia with mama. After the nap, we put up the tree, then Bob took Olivia for a fun outing to Scotsdales to see the owls(Olivia looks forward to seeing the owls all week), xmas displays and fish(some koi are HUGE and scary but compelling). Mama stayed home to vaccuum like a fanatic and at least get _into_ the shower before they got home. Then another nap with mama for a very tired girl.
We all sat down to a nice tea of banana bread that Olivia helped papa make yesterday, hot (lukewarm) chocolate for Olivia and hot-buttered-rums for us :-) and xmas music. Then Olivia went between mama putting lights on the tree and playing with xmas ornaments in the living room, and papa making dinner in the kitchen. She spent most of dinner spinning around and having us pop the occasional bite into her mouth. Then, upstairs for a pee in the potty and getting ready for bed, and Bob is downstairs again and it's only 8:30pm. Later than usual, but nothing like as late as last night - whew!

Some new words for Olivia from last week. She said 'Olivia' for the first time! 'Got it', 'Yehwow" seems to be both yellow and hello. 'Potato', immediately shortened to 'tato'. She said 'onion' today. She named her doll Lyra (Lala).
She's been using some more signs lately too. 'I like', 'happy', 'star', 'fork', 'scared', 'dizzy'(a favourite while spinning around), and 'stop'.