Playground on Groundhog's Day

Today was so nice out I decided to take Olivia on a walk down the street to the playground. We've been down there before, but not since the summer when she was a tiny baby. Back then we just sat on a blanket in the grass with some other babies and their mommies. Today was different. We met up with a friend and his mommy and headed straight for the baby swings.

This was her first time on the swings. She was way too little over the summer. She actually really liked it. She hung on like a big girl and kicked her feet back and forth. I don't think she was trying to pump her legs or anything. She was just so excited, and when she's excited, she can't help but move her feet.

After the swings, we checked out the slide.

And finally we went over to the big-kid area. Over there they have some cars that you can "drive" and they rock back and forth. Olivia wasn't sharing the steering wheel, so it was a good thing there were two cars!

I can't believe how warm it has been this winter. If it were like today, I'd have her birthday party outside! I'm sure we'll have more snow by then. But glad we were able to take advantage of the sunshine and warm weather today.

Very Hungry Caterpillar Invitations

Olivia's birthday party invitations went out in the mail yesterday. I'm so pleased with how they turned out.

Since her party theme is The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, I decided to make some caterpillar invitations. I think my favorite part might be her cute little thumb prints on the envelopes and in the caterpillar's eyes.

Here is a picture of the supplies you will need:

The paper on the top I created in Microsoft Word. I used the dots from the book as a watermark inside a 3-inch circle text box and added the text myself. Then I printed out enough copies and cut out the circles.

You will also need an assortment of red, green, and yellow card stock, scissors, a fine-tipped Sharpie, red and green stamp pads, envelopes to fit 4-inch circles, glue, and mini brads. I found the mini brads in the scrapbook section of Hobby Lobby.

Here is what the invitations say:

Once I gathered the supplies and created my invitation wording, I got to work.

First, I cut out 3.5-inch circles from the red and green card stock. You will need one red, two dark green, and two light green for each invitation. I used my Cricuit to make them perfect. Then I cut out the circles that I created on the computer. I used scissors for these, so they are a little rustic.

Once I had all the circles cut out, I cut out small ovals out of the yellow card stock. These will be the caterpillar's eyes. I glued them onto the red circle.

After that I left Olivia help. We used a green stamp pad and her cute little thumb to make the centers of the caterpillar's eyes. I made sure the ink was washable and child-safe. And I wiped her hands as soon as we were done. It didn't take very long, and it wasn't as messy as I thought it would be. I think I may have a little crafter on my hands!

When we finished, I decided they needed a little something else. Turns out the caterpillar in the book has a nose. So we used her little thumb and gave our caterpillar a nose too. Here are the faces all finished.

After finishing the faces, glue the printed circles onto the green card stock circles. Make sure to do it in the right order, alternating between dark and light green.

Once the glue has dried, it's time to assemble them. I pushed the mini brads through edges of the cards stock circles and attached them together. I found that taping the brads to the backs of the circles made them a little more durable, since they will be moving when the invitation is opened and closed.

Here is a closeup of each of the four circles.

And here is what they look like assembled and finished. The circles are meant to be swiveled together to fit inside the envelop and then unswiveled to view.

Once we finished the invitations, Olivia and I made the envelopes to go with them.

I took Olivia's cute little thumb again and dipped it into green ink. Then we made the green wings on the butterfly and green circles on the caterpillar. Once those dried, we dipped her thumb in the red ink and made the red wings and red circles. I used the Sharpie to draw on the antennae and little feet.

Now I'm inspired to make some decorations for her party too!

Crawling

It's official. We have a mobile baby. And with that came a lot of changes. It's been a bittersweet couple of days. I'm excited to see her grow and change, but at the same time, she's not a little baby anymore. Because she can now get from place to place (what?? the baby isn't where I left her??) we have to actually baby-proof some of our home. We're not going crazy and baby-proofing the whole house from top to bottom, but there are a few things we need to get done.

One of the first things we did was lower her crib mattress to the lower setting. So sad. I know it will never be on that high position again. She's a big baby now. It's really hard to get her in it now too! I'm so short, I have to stand on my tip toes and bend all the way over. We need some kind of pulley system! :)

Luckily, we foresaw this new mobility and ordered 3 baby gates last weekend. They arrived on Tuesday, and now we need to install them. We are going to corral her in the kitchen/living room downstairs (keeping the dining room, office, half bath and stairs baby free). And then upstairs she will have access to her room and our room. But a gate will keep her out of the bathroom, the craft room and the top of the stairs.

I'm still trying to figure out what to do with the bird. I knew we needed to get a new table to put him on. One that has a cabinet to hold all his food/dishes/toys, etc. And the cat brushes and other pet paraphernalia. But it didn't occur to me (until she did it) that if she were to pull up on the table, she is tall enough to stick her cute little baby fingers inside the bottom of his cage. First of all: GROSS! Bird poop! Second, he might bite her. He's a nice bird, but he has been known to bite, especially if you stick our fingers in his cage. He is a bird after all.

So we noticed she was getting ready to start crawling a few days ago. She went after the TV remote on the floor. She crawled a good six inches. When I put the remote 12 inches away, she whined, and then put her head down on the floor in defeat.

Yesterday, however, she crawled from the middle of the living room to the kitchen (a good 15 feet) without so much as a whimper.

We have a plan for baby-proofing the house. And I guess we'll just have to work on it a little at a time as she discovers what she can get into.

Amazing how fast it happened. I was sure she'd never crawl.

Bear Crawl

We've hit a mile stone today.


Olivia officially started bear crawling and scooting around the house. She moved several feet to get Daddy's flip flops. We're in trouble now!

I think it's time to order the baby gates and put in some electric outlet covers.


Pretty soon (like this week) we're going to need to lower her crib mattress too. She hasn't figured out how to go from laying down to pulling herself up, but it is only a matter of time. I'd prefer she learn how to do that AFTER we've lowered the mattress.


Since the weather was so icky today, we decided to meet up with a few of our friends at the library this afternoon. Olivia practiced pulling up on the ballet bar in the infant area--showing off her new skills to her friends and the pretty baby in the mirror.

I'm so glad we have such a great place to go play FREE! And it's nice to get out of the house and play with some of our friends.

Planning Olivia's Birthday--Already!

Time is totally flying by now. In fact, this week I realized that it is time to start planning Olivia's first birthday party. WHAT??? Where did the year go? What is happening to my baby? Pretty soon she'll be a toddler. Unbelievable.

We decided to give Olivia a family pass to the Children's Discovery Museum here in town as her birthday present from us. It will give us lots to do when the weather is crummy, and the programs start at 12 months. Perfect. It worked out that they also have a party room. Her party will be the weekend after her birthday at the Discovery Museum.

I THINK I have settled on a theme. Of course, with it being 6 weeks away, I could still change my mind. Right now I have settled on The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, It was one of my favorite books growing up, and I hope it will be one of Olivia's too.

I've been searching all over for ideas. And there are tons. Adorable cakes, decorations, and even crafts for babies. Yes, I realize I might be going overboard. But she will only turn one once, right?

Again, I'm amazed at how fast this year has gone. To see just how far we've come, here are some photos of then and now.

Christmas 2011

So I finally have a minute to write about Christmas. It was wonderful!

We got a live tree again. This year we couldn't get it from the tree farm and cut it down ourselves. They had some sort of fungus infect their trees, and they didn't really have any good ones this year. Maybe next year. We got our tree at a local nursery. It was beautiful--even though it leaned a little.

Olivia loved the tree. She loved the ornaments and she loved the fact that the cats liked to play underneath it. She even learned how to roll across the room to get to the tree. Of course we put all the breakable ornaments up high so she couldn't reach them. We've been doing that for years because of the cats anyway.

On Christmas eve, we let Olivia open one present, just like us. It was so cute to watch her try to figure out what to do with the present. Once she realized that she could rip the paper, she was all about it.

She got Christmas pajamas! As did the rest of us.

On Christmas morning both YaYa and Grandma came over to open presents. It took FOREVER! Olivia is a very lucky little girl. She received toys, clothes, books, stuffed animals, and more.

 

Olivia was very tired after all the gift giving and receiving. So she took a nap while we made Christmas brunch. We made a BLT Frittata and French Toast Cups with Berries and Cream. We also had mimosas. Once Olivia woke up from her nap, it was time to eat. Except for the mimosas, she tried and loved everything!

After brunch we spent some time playing with Olivia's new toys. She loved the walker her Popeye sent. And the dragon puppet from Mommy and Daddy. The outfits from YaYa, Grandma, and Great Aunt Jenny are so adorable.

Like I said, Olivia is a very lucky little girl. And we are very lucky to have her!

It was a wonderful first Christmas. It turned out almost as perfect as we'd hoped. Almost. It was not a white Christmas. And Santa did not bring Olivia her two front teeth. Or any teeth for that matter.

2011 over already?

So I had all these grand plans to blog each week so I don't forget anything that happens with our sweet baby, Olivia. That's not going so well. Turns out, babies make it hard to keep up with a blog.

She's sleeping right now, and I finally uploaded all our photos from December onto my computer. I've been meaning to do that so I could include some here.

I'm going to have to split this into 2 separate posts I think. Florida and Christmas. Otherwise it will get pretty long. Here's a recap of our vacation to Florida the first weekend in December:

My college roommate, Kim, had a baby back in October. And since I couldn't make it to her shower over the summer, she and I decided that it would be fun for our baby girls to meet after she was born. So, we booked our flight (Olivia's first) and headed to Florida the first weekend in December (Thurs.-Mon.).

Our flight was super early. In fact, Olivia fell asleep on the way to the airport. It made checking our luggage easier, but I had to wake her up to go through security. And let me just tell you a little about going through security with a baby and all the stuff that babies bring with them on a plane.

We had: a stroller, carseat, diaper bag, and my Gemini carrier for Olivia. Plus a carry on and personal item for Pete and myself. Of course, our personal items and carry ons contained all things for Olivia. I had my Kindle and Pete had a magazine, neither of which got read at any point on this trip.

We had to take Olivia out of the Gemini, take all the carry ons out of the car seat, take the car seat out of the stroller, fold up the stroller, and put the whole mess through the X-ray machine. Of course, our stroller barely fit. And yes, I have her of umbrella strollers for travel, but it wouldn't hold the car seat and I wanted to gate check the car seat for fear of it getting lost.

We ground security to a screeching halt. Amazing. I've never seen a line at our security area in our airport, but we created one that morning! For anyone else traveling out of our town that morning, I apologize! :)

On the plus side, there was room on an earlier, direct flight to Orlando. So we got bumped to that, and arrived about 4 hours earlier than scheduled! The direct flight was awesome, and Olivia did great.  She didn't cry at all. I nursed her during take off and landing, and other than that she took a 20-minute nap and played the whole rest of the time. It was truly amazing.

Once we got to Orlando, we picked up our rental car and drove over to Kim & Lou's house to meet sweet baby V. We spent the afternoon playing with the babies and eating Publix subs. Oh, Publix, how I miss you. Your deli, your bakery, and the fact that I can find everything I need in one store. Grocery shopping with you was therapeutic. But... I digress.

Friday morning, Lou had to go to work, so Kim, Pete, and I took the babies to the mall to meet Santa in the morning. The line was deceptively long. We got in what looked like a reasonable line, only to discover a while later that it snaked around and around and around. We stood in line for about an hour and a half. Amazingly, the babies did great! Olivia was fascinated with all the sparkly decorations and the other kids in line with us. Santa was great too. He had twinkly eyes and a real beard to boot.

That afternoon, Pete and I took Olivia to see our friend Jen and her sister (whom I used to nanny for) and her kids. I hadn't seen them in at least two years. The kids have gotten so big! It was nice to visit and catch up with them.

We left Jen, Stephanie, and the kids to head over to Gators (fantastic wings!) to see all our old buddies from back home. I cannot believe we forgot to take any pictures that night! I feel terrible about it. All our friends met Olivia for the very first time, and we have no pictorial record. It was so much fun getting everyone together that night. Olivia got passed around, and loved every minute of all the attention she got. Seeing everyone made me miss them all over again. I hope someday some of them will make it up here for a visit. It's nice in the summer, I swear! (And no, Dani, I haven't forgotten that you've visited twice. You're awesome!!)

Saturday, Kim and Lou took us to the Winter Garden downtown area for some baby wearing at the farmers' market and parade. The market was really nice (we got some delicious honey and Kim got several varieties of flan). It's not like the farmers' markets up here though. I mean, you can get flan! And the veggies are already clean. :)

The parade was cute. Where else can you see Minnie and Mickey Mouse in a Christmas parade? The parade is where we learned that baby V is just like her mama. Every time a band would pass that baby would quit crying. She loved the drum line! It was so cute.

Saturday night, Pete, Lou, and our friend Kevin had a guys' night out. Kim and I put the babies to bed, and had a girls' night in complete with chick flicks and ice cream sundaes.



We met up with Dani for lunch first at Aunt Catfish's. Pete and I had been craving seafood. Thanks, Dani, for being so accommodating. I know seafood is not your thing. It was great to catch up with her, and have Olivia meet another one of our closest friends. After lunch we all went out on the dock to show Olivia the intracoastal.  She was fascinated with the seagulls flying around.

We said goodbye to Dani and headed a few blocks south to Lighthouse Point Park (near the Ponce de Leon Inlet and Lighthouse). It was beautiful there. We'd never been there before. We were actually thinking of going to Canaveral National Seashore (where we usually go to the beach), but we made a wrong turn. It worked out in our favor. The beach was beautiful. The inlet, near where we parked, had a school of dolphins swimming in the surf. Olivia didn't care much for them. I think they were too far away for her to really notice.

We walked the boardwalk to the beach. Once we got there, we introduced Olivia to the Atlantic Ocean, the sand, seaweed, shells, and beach birds. She was thrilled with the seagulls and pelicans. They were close enough that she could really get a good look at them. She kept pointing to the ones sitting on top of the pilings and screeching.

She liked putting her feet in the water. The little waves that came up didn't scare her at all. Until they started to wash back out and the sand under her feet went with it. Poor Olivia really didn't like that feeling, and started to cry.

After that, she wouldn't even let me put her feet in the sand out of the water. We set a towel down, and she wouldn't sit on that either. So I held her in my lap and put some sand in my hand for her to explore. She didn't mind touching it that way. Amazingly, she didn't try to put anything icky (sand, seaweed, or shells) into her mouth.

It started to get chilly as the sun went down. So we took a quick walk up the beach to collect some shells from Olivia's first beach trip, and then we headed back to Kim & Lou's.

On Monday (in the morning before we had to be at the airport), Kim took the three of us downtown to walk around Lake Eola (where Pete and I got engaged). Her mom met us down there too. We walked the lake twice. Olivia was fascinated with the birds again. Lake Eola is famous for its swans. After our walk, we headed to a mom n pop Latin restaurant for lunch. Oh Latin food. How I miss you. Lunch was amazing (thanks, Kim, for taking us there!) Olivia loved the pork, plantains, and black beans. This was her third experience with Latin food. And it was a success. I think I need to get some recipes so I can make it at home. YUM!

After lunch we headed to the airport. Security was an even bigger nightmare this time. We waited in line. We were ready with everything folded and in the bins. We made it through without much fanfare. Then we boarded the tram to take us to our terminal. Yup. The terminals have changed since we moved, and we got on the wrong tram. We had to take the tram back to the main building and go through security AGAIN before we could take the correct tram to our terminal. Luckily we had plenty of time.

Olivia didn't do as well on this flight. She fussed a lot. I think she was really tired, but she would not sleep! We had a layover in Atlanta, and she finally fell asleep on the second leg of our journey. We didn't get home until almost midnight. But she slept great once we got home.

It was a great trip, and I'm so glad we went. It was wonderful seeing all our friends and introducing Olivia to them. I'm also thrilled that we got to meet little Miss V. The babies were so cute together. Things sure have changed since we were there last. Now instead of night clubs and beer at the beach, we met Santa at the mall and played in the sand. I wouldn't change a thing!