Happy Baby

Olivia is a very happy baby, but you will have to take my word for it. When Olivia is with her mom or dad she is smiling, laughing and squealing; however she doesn’t like to show that side to anyone else. People at church, people from our building and people we see on the street always come up to Olivia and try so hard to get her to smile, some people really put on a one-man circus…but Olivia won’t crack a smile, she just intensely stares at them. I think I have figured out why this stark contrast. When Olivia is out and about she is sooo interested in everything around her she is always looking up and down and all around. When people come up to her I think she is much more interested in studying their eyes, clothes, listening to their voice,….than smiling. Unfortunately for everyone else they don’t see her beautiful smile and cute laugh, but luckily I get to see it everyday!

Bryant Park

Dad took a break from work to meet me and Olivia at Bryant Park to go on the carousel. I'm not sure how much Olivia liked the actual carousel ride, she seemed much more interested in looking all around at the people she passed. Olivia was the only person on the ride, that may have been because it was freezing. The weather man had said it was going to be a nice day, but that was not true at Bryant Park. As soon as her ride was over we went next door to Olivia's favorite place: the library.

Happy Valentines Day!

Dad surprised Olivia with a Valentines gift first thing in the morning. She likes her little bear, especially when you tickle her with it. Olivia had such a fun Valentines Day...after she had fallen asleep for the night in her crib, she woke up a little bit later very happy and ready to play. When I came out of the bedroom holding Olivia, dad said “Oh I am so happy that you wanted to wake up, now I have more time to play with my little girl.” Olivia is so loved!!!

Be My Valentine!

At only 7 months old Olivia has already been asked to be someone’s valentine. Everyone in our apartment building really likes Olivia, I’m not sure anyone in the building actually knows my name; they all call me Olivia’s mom. One of the doormen in our building loves to play with Olivia. Each time we come downstairs he calls for Olivia to come over, he is so nice to her. A couple days before Valentines Day he called me and asked if Olivia could come downstairs. He asked Olivia is she would be his Valentine and gave her a Valentines stuffed animal. That was so nice of him, Olivia enjoys playing with her pink valentines ape.

Day of Fun!

The weather was real nice so Olivia and I wanted to take full advantage of the sunshine. First we went over to a small playground down on the piers. Olivia likes to stand and watch all of the kids run and jump around. She definitely got her fill because shortly after we arrived a day care came with a group of kids. A number of those kids took a liking to Olivia and rushed over and huddled around her, pretty much smothering her. They wanted to touch her cheeks, hug her and a little 4 year old boy told her she was very beautiful.

After a nap we went back out. This time we went to a larger playground by our house. I put Olivia in an infant swing, but she seemed quite bored by the swing and wanted to watch the kids instead. It is so cute to watch her, she smiles and rocks bad and forth like she wants to run and chase the kids so bad.

After her next nap we met dad at the subway and went to Kiddie Kandids in the city to have her picture taken. I had ironed her dress and packed everything she would wear in the picture, but when we were on the subway almost to Union Square I realized I had left the bag with Olivia's outfit on the couch. We had to improvise and Olivia ended wearing nothing, but her hat and a pair of angel wings. The phototgrapher laid Olivia on her stomach on a wedge to take the picture. Olivia thought the incline was a great opporuity to work on her new trick: getting on her hands and knees and scooting backwards. This ended up being a real fun game for Olivia as the photographer would put her back on the wedge and Olivia would again scoot off. Olivia thought it was so much fun we ended up getting a real cute picture of her smiling.

She Sleeps

For the first 7 months Olivia would only sleep if she was in someone's arms during day and at night she would only sleep if she was in bed next to mom. During the night she became very active and would wake up every 2 hours and sometimes stay up for an hour or so in the middle of the night. Everyone said that nothing would change unless we let her "cry it out." I would rather amputate my leg than have her "cry it out" and so this was our routine for 7 months. Finally...after a lot of prayers and following ideas from the book "No Cry Sleep Solution" we have been greatly blessed and little miss Olivia now sleeps in a crib and has learned how to sleep through the night. She is not yet consistent at these new talents, but I am definitely OK with taking baby steps toward out goal. We have been greatly blessed. We are so grateful and are so proud of Olivia.

Mom's Comedian

The other day I was playing with Olivia and she made this smacking noise with her top lip that made me laugh. She realized that she had done something to make me laugh and it seemed that she purposefully started acting silly and repeat the noise with her lip to make me laugh. Olivia is always doing something funny, but this was the first time that it seemed she actually realized she was funny and wanted to put on a show for me. It was so cute.

She Speaks Chinese!

Ever since Olivia's 6 month doctors appointment she has really loved babbling. She loved to repeat simple syllables. Her favorites were mamamamamama and bababababababababa. Recently she has expounded her vocabulary to include Chinese. It is so cute Olivia will go on these talking sprees that sounds something like this: "do du ding dong dy de da." It is really funny, we love listening to our little girl.

Beginning to crawl??

On Olivia’s 7 month birthday she decided it was time to learn something new. She has never been a fan of being on her stomach she has always preferred standing and I thought she would just skip the crawling stage. Well now that she is 7 months she decided to give it a try. From her stomach she will press up on her arms and then push up onto her knees. She can only stay on her knees for a short period of time before she goes back down to her stomach. She will do this over and over again and smiles real big as I congratulate her on an excellent job.

Tricky Bath Time

Matthew was giving Olivia a bath last night and she took the washcloth he had used to clean her and started to suck on it. She had taken it from the water and so she was sucking water from the rag. Matthew took it and rung it out so she would not be drinking the water and gave it back to her. Olivia immediately put it back in her mouth and started sucking. Right away she realized the water was gone, which was obviously her favorite part, she dunked it in the water and started sucking the wet rag again. Very tricky…

Give Me Five...

On Sunday Matthew was holding Olivia and I asked her to give me five. I had never shown this to her before, I am pretty sure her only knowledge of “giving someone 5” was on Friday when one of Mathew’s friends at work asked her to give him 5 and I helped her slap his hand. Anyway after I asked her, I put out my hand and she reached up slapped my hand and put her hand back down. I asked her again and she repeated it again. This went on for a little while.

Tourist photo

I love taking photos of Olivia; I usually take multiple photos of her everyday. It turns out I am not the only one who likes to take photos of her. Last Friday the temperature finally rose above freezing so Olivia and I took advantage of the “good weather” and went to visit dad at his office and show his friends at work our sweet little girl. As we were walking home we were stopped for a light at the corner of 5th ave. and 42nd and a tourist asked if they could take a picture of our adorable baby girl. Olivia obliged and now there is a picture of Olivia floating around someone’s vacation photos.

She's very strong!

Olivia is very strong. Her strength combined with her great desire to grab at everything she possibly can, sometimes spells trouble. Last Sunday Olivia and I were sitting in the chapel while the Sacrament was being passed. I knew she would grab for the tray when it was passed to us and so I held her in my lap and tightly wrapped my arms around hers. My efforts were in vain because as soon as the tray was nearby she knocked the tray over and we both ended up wet. I will have to come up with a new plan for next week.