Oliver's personality

Oliver is getting such a big and sweet personality! 

He loves to play catch and puts his hands in the cutest pose to catch a ball, and then he throws it pretty well.  He was rolling a monster truck back and forth with Ben the other night and each time Oliver caught it, he turned the truck around to face front.  Ben did that too when he was little and we thought it was curious - how do babies know which side of a truck is the front?

He loves to play "Chase" with Ben too.  Ben runs away and Oliver laughs and crawls as fast as he can after him.

Oliver has been in the "diaper Olympics" stage when a baby hates to lie still and have his diaper changed.  When he is finally done and gets to sit up on the changing table, he smiles and points to the teddy bears on the shelf.  If you get one bear down for him, he gives it a sweet hug and then points to the next bear.  This continues until all bears have been hugged and returned to the shelf.

I can't believe how well he can feed himself.  He loves to walk holding our hands, like Ben did for so many months, but his legs don't seem strong enough to even be close to walking on his own yet.  He can go all the up and all the way down the staircase by himself.  He seems really careful, like Ben, but it still scares me.  He wants to practice his new skills and gets mad if you take him away.

I think Oliver's first real word is "uh oh."  He says it after he drops something, so he either understands what it means or he understands that you say it after you drop something.  He says mamamama and dadadada a lot, but I still don't think he knows what he is saying. 

Since Oliver wants to be held so much, I end up putting him in the backpack to do a lot of stuff, mostly fixing dinner.  We created a game where I turn my head and stick out my tongue and he tries to grab it.  I pull my tongue in right before he can touch it and scream.  Then he laughs.  If we play the game face to face, he sticks his tongue out too, for his turn. 

It's so wonderful to hear the boys laughing together.

First camping trip 2010

It continues to snow in our canyon, so we've been planning to go out west to the desert (Fruita, Co) for our first camping trip when the chance came, which was this past weekend.  It didn't turn out to be the greatest trip, unfortunately.  I woke up with a sore throat on Friday morning and that made me pretty grumpy.  Ben and Oliver both had really runny noses, so I guess we all had the latest daycare virus.  In addition, Ben had some spectacular stomach virus that was not easy to deal with at a campsite, poor thing. 

When Ben was in his second summer (age 14-19 months, I guess), if he was fussy at home, he would become instantly happy when we arrived at a campsite.  We hoped Oliver would be the same and stop crying so much.  He didn't really, so part of the weekend was just a bit miserable:  Oliver crying to be held, Ben refusing to wear sunscreen or a hat, Oliver refusing to wear a hat, me coughing and sniffling, all three of us using thousands of kleenexes, dinner getting pretty much ruined on the campfire, cleaning up various bodily fluids with no sink and soap, Oliver scooping dirt with a stick and putting it in his mouth over and over and then crying about how bad it tastes, Ben stepping on a cactus and getting lots of spines in his foot (and actually handling it pretty well after a little cry) and Ben begging us over and over and over to come into his tent with him (I think since he didn't feel good he just wanted to hang out in his tent). 

We debated coming home early, but asked Ben what he wanted to do and he said he wanted to camp another night.  So we stayed Saturday night too and Sunday got decidedly better.  We left early Sunday and went to a playground and had lunch and had ice cream and stopped to play in the Colorado river.  Then Ben said he wanted to go to one more playground, so we stopped at a marvelous playground in Georgetown and had a great time and then had pizza at BeauJo's.  If you tell Ben we have to leave soon he says "Let's stay TWO minutes!" and he holds up 10 fingers.  Then he says "Don't count, Mama!"  Then when we say it is time to go, he usually just says OK and comes along.  He left the playground with a smile on his face - what a sweet boy!  Oliver climbed to the top of the slide several times and almost went down the slide by himself.  He actually was about to hurtle himself down the slide.  And then our pizza order got lost so it took twice as long to get our pizza to us and both boys were just amazingly well-behaved and patient.  What sweeties!
Tim uploaded some camping photos in the previous post - I will try to label them soon.

Camping trip photos and other photos

This is Ben's self portraitTwo of us under the weatherGet this hat off of me!Look - dinosaur bones!Ben is a good hiker, even with cactus spikes in his footHanging out

What a look!!Chilly desert morningBen riding his "bikle"
Oliver walking with the walkerOliver walking at a playgroundOliver loved the tunnel at the playground

Oliver's sleep

We spent so much time and energy worrying about Ben's sleep and I guess knowing we survived has allowed us to not worry about Oliver as much.  I think it is time to start worrying since I haven't slept a full night in a year and Oliver probably  needs to learn to sleep a full night too.  A typical night:  his bedtime has recently moved from 7:00 to 8:00.  He'll usually sleep until 11:00 or 12:00 and then I'll feed him and put him back in the crib.  Then he might sleep until 2:00 and at that point I'm a zombie so I bring him to bed with me, where he usually wakes up at 3:00, 4:00, 5:00, and 6:00 and each time I feed him in my sleep.  Then at 7:00 he sits up and starts to play.  A couple of times he has slept 5 hours and one time he slept 6 hours.  Don't know why he slept longer, but it was very nice. 

Tim and I need to plan out our strategy for staying up all night a few nights teaching Oliver to sleep without nursing.  I think it will go better than with Ben, just because Oliver is a different sleeper than Ben was, but it will be hard and exhausting.  Wish us luck!
An old photo of Oliver sleeping:

Joseph goes to the doctor

Ben just loves Joseph (my old teddy bear).  Until last week, Ben called him "Jofuff" and despite not using s in the middle of his name, he would use an s at the end when using the possessive.  So he would say "Jofuffses sweater is dirty."  Then last week, he told me his name was Joseph (with an s).  So sad to hear the Benglish go away. :-(

Anyway, Joseph hasn't had eyes or nose or mouth for many years, so we took him to the doctor (me) and gave him some features.  While I was working on him with a needle, Ben stood by me and said over and over, "It's ok, Jofuff.  I'm here and you're ok."  Then, Joseph had eyes and could see Ben for the first time!  We were all very excited.  I asked Ben if Joseph needed some clothes when we were at a thrift store and Ben said, "No, Jofuff have sweater and drammies (jammies).  That's all he needs."

Oliver loves Joseph too and loves to hug him.  Here's Joseph with his new face:

Ben's games

As with all parenting issues, there are conflicting views on self-esteem and children.  I need to read more to understand, but so far Tim and I have been doing what is instinctual and the result is that Ben has very high self-esteem at the present.  Samples of his daily affirmations: "I'm a good boy!"  "I'm a big boy!"  "I'm a fast boy!"  "I fwump (jump) so, so big!"  "I'm really, really smart!"  "I run very, very fast!"
His new Lightning McQueen shoes from Oma and Opa help make him an especially fast runner and especially big jumper.  His latest game is to jump off the kitchen step.  See below some action shots.

He also loves to ride his bike (tricycle) around the kitchen and on the deck.  One day there were deer in the backyard and he yelled and hooted at them.

Oliver turns one!

I can't believe it has been a year.  I understand why some couples keep having babies.  It just goes too fast! 

Oliver got presents in the mail from Aunt Tessa and Oma and Opa, and Grammy Pat came to visit with presents and a birthday cake.  Ben sang Happy Birthday to Oliver a couple of times and helped him blow out the candles on his cake.  Oliver was so happy when Grammy was here.  Ben and Oliver both say "Thank you to everyone for the presents!"

Oliver loves to walk holding on to our hands, but he's nowhere near walking by himself.  He'll stand for a few seconds by himself, but just like Ben at that age, it seems to scare him and he sits down and starts crying. 
He can feed himself!  And he babbles a lot, but doesn't seem to have a deliberate word.  "Diaper Olympics" have started and it is nearly impossible to get Oliver to lie down and be still for a diaper change.  He also doesn't like his car seat much these days.

At his 1 year check up, the scale said he had lost one pound, which puts him back down at 60th percentile for weight.  He was over 90th percentile at 6 months.  He was just above average on most of the developmental test questions.  I'm so thankful he is healthy and able-bodied.  I'm so grateful to have two healthy boys.

Catching up! Snow Day March 24, 2010

We were so excited when there was enough snow to close the libraries on Wednesday, March 24.  We got ready to go to Wee Creekers and nobody was there!  They ended up being closed too (the first time in their history).  So it turned out to be a fabulous family snow day!
Ben and Oliver and I went out to try to find the sled underneath the three feet of snow.  We dug and dug where I thought we left it and never found it (turns out it was across the yard).  Since we couldn't sled, we decided to build a snow fort there and spent the day in the beautiful sun and then had neighbors over for a spontaneous BBQ.  Ben wasn't as interested in building the fort as we were.  He liked knocking down the walls we were building and climbing and sliding down the walls.  Oliver enjoyed being outside and played in the snow a little and took a nap in the backpack.  What a wonderful day!!

Catching up! Christmas 2009

I have two free hours - can I catch up on four months of blogging??

Christmas 2009

I never reported about Christmas and now I don't remember much.  Ben and Oliver both loved being with family at Aunt Wende's house.  We love it too.  Aunt Wende's house is always decorated so beautifully, so comfortable to stay in, and being with family is wonderful.  Oma Donna and Opa Al were sorry they couldn't be there and sent fruit to let us know they were thinking of us.  Ben ate most of the fruit - not a surprise.
Ben knows who Santa Claus is, but we're still not sure he understood about Santa delivering presents for Christmas morning.  Two photos:  Ben loves Uncle Michael a lot and loved handing out presents.