January 20-27

A while ago, Olivia suffered a stair regression.  She was perfectly capable of climbing stairs, but refused to do so, preferring to be carried.  I am pleased to report that in the last few weeks, she has reremembered how to climb stairs and now does so willingly.

Olivia is officially drinking milk.  I let her try a glass back when she first turned one, but she had issues with it, so we went back to just water.  This last week, though, we've been giving her a glass of milk with dinner every night and she's been fine.  I guess her system just needed to mature a bit more.  Friday we moved her milk time to breakfast instead so that she can finish it later in the day if necessary.

On Tuesday, Olivia helped me unload the dishwasher the way she usually does.  Generally she unloads the silverware one piece at a time and hands it to me to put away.  About a month ago, I tried putting out the fork and spoon bins for her to put silverware into, and she just picked out all of HER silverware and walked away.  Tuesday, though, I tried again, and Olivia sorted forks and spoons into their proper containers as she unloaded them.  She got them all right until she got impatient with the last handful and just shoved two forks and two spoons sideways into the spoons bin.

We have names!  Bryan and I do, I mean.  Olivia calls me mama and she calls Bryan deeda.  Whenever she says "deeda," I say "daddy," and then she refers to him as "dada" for a while instead.  Her default name for him, though, is deeda.  Olivia doesn't really use either name to get our attention, but when she sees pictures, those are the names she uses.

We have a bathroom cupboard that is just Olivia's size.  In it is the trash can and various extra bathroom supplies.  Usually Olivia leaves this cupboard alone, but the other day I discovered her diligently pulling things out.  3 points to the person who can tell me what she got into.  There's a picture below; don't forget the brand!  After the first incident, I put our supplies in plastic tubs.  It slowed her down a bit, but she did figure out how to get one lid off (that's the second pictures below).  Luckily, there's not really anything that's a problem in that cupboard.

Last Saturday we visited the Kleins to help them rearrange rooms in anticipation of their little one's arrival.  The boys carried furniture while us girls went shopping.  :)  In fairness, it was easier to move things without the babies underfoot, and we needed to go to the store to get ingredients for lunch.  When we got to Kroger (side note: They have the most amazing Kroger I have ever seen.  I have Kroger envy.), we decided to put the little girls in one of those car carts instead of pushing two separate carts around the store.  They were super cute, and even made it through the whole trip with no problems.  Eva did bend down too far in the checkout line, getting her head stuck under her steering wheel, and we heard a chorus of "uh-oh!"s as Olivia tried valiantly to rescue her by pulling on Eva's jacket.

This week our dishwasher played "washing machine" (it's a common game; I'm surprised you haven't heard of it) and stopped draining.  Bryan ladled the water out, looked stuff up online, tinkered around a bit, and thinks it might be fixed.  Unfortunately, we have to run it to find out, so I'm saving that for next week's project and just did dishes by hand for a few days.

Pictures:

January 13-20

I forgot to mention in one of my Christmas time posts...  Olivia won an ugly Christmas sweater contest (in her age group) at the Barhorst Christmas party.  This would be fine, except she wasn't wearing an ugly Christmas sweater.  She wasn't even wearing a Christmas themed shirt.  Poor Olivia won while wearing her cute little koala shirt.  :(  In her defense, she was the only baby/toddler that walked, so she kind of won by default.  She generously gave up her prize to a second cousin who was at least dressed in some sort of Christmas outfit.

Last Friday, tragedy struck.  My washer stopped spinning.  This doesn't seem so bad until you realize that I wash diapers twice a week.  And a load of towels every other day (since Olivia has been sleeping naked).  And clothes at least once a week.  Then it gets a lot worse to have a broken washing machine.  We tried to check and make sure nothing was caught in the basket, but washing machines are magical contraptions that cannot be taken apart.  All their screws are inaccessible.  We were out of town visiting Bryan's parents over the weekend, so Monday I called repair people, and by Wednesday our machine was fixed.  The problem?  Apparently the factory doesn't put locktite (glue, as close as I can figure) on after the nut that holds all the important parts in place.  I guess only about half the machines they sell have problems with things falling apart because of this.  As our machine was in that half, our pulley was loose and the belt fell off (at least, that's what the repair invoice says).  Luckily, it's an easy fix, and the repairman secured everything with locktite when he was done.  I threw in a load of diapers as soon as he walked out the door, and we were back on track.  :)

Shortly after moving into our house, we bought a coat tree to put near our front door.  Actually, I seem to remember carrying the coat tree in one hand and Olivia in the other, so it must have been a little later in the year.  Probably closer to winter, when our coats would have made an appearance.  Regardless.  We had a coat tree.  Several months ago, one of the branches on our tree broke off.  No problem, we have five more.  Then another one fell off last month.  And then suddenly, our branches were dropping off like leaves in the autumn.  We decided to replace our denuded tree with a much more practical coat rack.  Did you know that coat racks are incredibly hard to come by?  After searching area stores with no luck, Bryan said he'd make one.  We went to Home Depot to buy wood and lo and behold, they had an 8 hook coat rack that you can hang on the wall.  It would have cost more to buy hooks and make it ourselves, so we bought theirs.  It's less intrusive than the tree and looks like it should last longer.  I don't know why we didn't think of this in the first place, but I blame my family and their beautifully sturdy coat tree (that they replaced with 2 coat racks apparently sometime after we bought our tree).

Pictures:

January 6-13

A friend recently asked if I've noticed any difference between this pregnancy and the last one.  After a moment of thought... no.  However, I have noticed things that I forgot about returning to haunt me once again.  For example.  About halfway through my pregnancy with Olivia, I was thrashing squirming about one night trying to get comfortable.  Bryan asked what was wrong and I told him that my legs were too awake for me to sleep.  He suggested that I do a couple rounds of 6 inches to tire them out.  This worked, but took longer (and more ab muscles) than I wanted.  After that, I took to doing a few squats by the side of the bed whenever my legs bothered me.  As I was generally up to go to the bathroom at some point anyway, I'd just toss in between 10 and 20 squats before climbing back into bed.  With Reggie, the restless legs hit last week.  I had forgotten about them, but the memory quickly returned.  In an attempt to stave off the need for 3 am squats, I added them to my tooth brushing routine.  You should have seen Bryan's face the first time he saw me doing squats while I brushed my teeth.  :)  I told him about my restless legs, and he, too, had a moment of recognition.   My squats were approved as a suitable solution, and he decided it wouldn't hurt for him to do some, too.  So now squats are the exercise of choice during tooth brushing.  You should try it.  As an added bonus, you can tell if you brushed long enough by how sore your thighs are the next morning.  :-P

Olivia is now as close to running as short toddler legs with a diapered behind can get.  She walks very fast, and it's not exactly the same motion as her normal walk.  As a result of all her movement, Olivia is losing her baby fat.  We can't tell when we look at her (especially right after a meal -- she's still small enough that you can tell if she's eaten or not just by looking at how fat her belly is), but she definitely looks fatter in pictures from a few months ago.

At what age do kids start posing for pictures?  I didn't think it was until later, but Olivia is to the point where I can tell her to hold still and smile for the camera and she will.  She's not old enough to have a goofy smile yet, either.  See below for a posed picture or two.

I am now the inferior parent.  I used to be the favorite, but now I am associated with only bad things.  Diaper changes?  Mom's domain.  Bedtime?  All mom.  Not letting kids do fun things like eat crayons, have cookies for dinner, or climb on the back of the couch?  Mean mommy strikes again.  Bryan, on the other hand, is associated with playtime.  When he comes home for lunch or at the end of the day, Olivia immediately brightens up and runs (or crawls) to the door, screeching excitedly.  When I'm gone for a day and come home, I get greeted with "meehhh."  No, you probably didn't say that right.  Try again, with more whine in your voice.  I regain my favored status at church on Sunday, when I am the only correct choice and must hold Olivia for at least 85% of the service.  It must be in the fine print of my contract.

Olivia has this thing she does: if she's no longer satisfied with the food that is being offered for a meal, she shakes her head and imperiously points towards the kitchen.  The implication being, "go find me something more worthy of my consumption, minion!"  Sometimes it works (mostly when dad is home), sometimes it doesn't (more often when mom is in charge).  She tries anyway, though, in hopes that she won't have to eat whatever she has deemed inedible.

Pictures:

December 30-January 6

On the 1st day of Christmas...  We opened presents with Bryan's family.  Bryan got tools, I got cooking things, and Olivia got toys.  She also got a new carseat, which was my favorite gift because she's just about grown out of her old seat.

On the 2nd day of Christmas...  We drove up to visit my family and also managed to catch brunch with friends.  Olivia was displeased that she was required to SIT (in a chair, no less) during meals.  Presents were opened later in the day.  Movies, more cooking supplies for me (my kitchen will explode), and some books for Olivia.  Bryan and I enjoyed seeing if our predictions of excitement levels were accurate for each gift.

On the 3rd day of Christmas...  We hung out with my family.  Lots of movie watching and game playing.  I also took my sewing machine to a shop to see if they knew what was wrong with it.  They're going to get back to me someday.  In the meantime, I am sewing-machine-less.

On the 4th day of Christmas...  Mom, Justine, and I went shopping for granola ingredients (there's no bulk foods store conveniently close to me) and a new crib mattress for Reggie (also no Babies'R'Us, and I had a coupon).  We left the babies at home with the daddies and all survived.

On the 5th day of Christmas...  Justine and I got to play duets, Alison graced us with her presence (probably due to Bryan's incessant nagging), and Olivia felt under the weather.  That evening, we came home.  Seth and Amanda stopped by our house on their way back to Virginia, bringing their golden retriever, Apollo, with them.

On the 6th day of Christmas...  Apollo came with me to get Olivia from her crib in the morning.  Much excitement (Olivia's) and apprehension (Apollo's) ensued.  The emotions reversed when Olivia was down on the ground and realized how big Apollo was.  Our annual Eve of New Year's Eve party happened, and we got together with friends to play games.

On the 7th day of Christmas...  We slept.  And lounged around, refusing to leave the house.

On the 8th day of Christmas...  Bryan and I accidentally celebrated the New Year at midnight because we were both used to being up late from the last few days.  I was reading and he was on the computer when suddenly we heard... fireworks?  Here?  Oh, yeah, it's the New Year.  We felt old and went to bed.  After sleeping, we headed to church and then to the store to get Olivia a toy box of sorts to hold all her new toys.

On the 9th day of Christmas...  Bryan went back to work.  Olivia noticed that we still had unopened presents under our tree and decided it was probably her job to remedy this.  Will she the remaining presents make it the last 3 days?

On the 10th day of Christmas...  I finally mailed our Christmas letter.  It was written on the 21st of December this year, and some people even received their copies BEFORE Christmas (shocking, I know), but I didn't make it to the post office until today.  The plus side to doing it this way is that I only had to buy 12 stamps, because we'd seen all our other letter recipients during the holidays.

On the 11th day of Christmas...  Olivia got a new book from Fr and Presbytera (at the Greek church) that quickly became her favorite.  She actually got it yesterday, but it didn't ascend to favorite until today.  Where's Spot? by Eric Hill.  Best book ever.  She's very careful as she opens the flaps to look at each animal.  She's also learning what sound monkeys make.  Bryan says, "ooh ooh aah aah" and Olivia replies with, "ooh eee ooh eee."  Okay, maybe she's learning what sound daddies make.

On the 12th day of Christmas...  I finally finished catching up on dishes and laundry from our vacation.  I would have been done two days ago, but the 11th day was my normal laundry day and it was time to wash diapers again.  Olivia finally caught on to our "move the wisemen one step forward" routine and didn't try to exile the wiseman she was moving.

I added pictures to last week's post.  I could use some from our visit to my family (hint hint, siblings).  I also updated two of the earliest posts, July 31-August 7 and August 7-14, so feel free to go check those out.

Pictures: