Chasing the Dogs, with a Big Smile!

Olivia's favorite game of late is chasing the dogs around the house.  She gets this sneaky look on her face and takes off!  Then starts laughing and laughing - adorable!  Kiwi is the better dog to chase, and she'll tease Olivia by coming up and licking her face then going just out of reach.  They also play the 'lick my face' game when Kiwi is in a dog bed and Olivia crawls up to her, leans in and out repeatedly and when she leans in, Kiwi gives Olivia kisses.  Super funny!

Daycare is going well.  Olivia has a bit of a cough right now, fortunately her 18-month appointment is tomorrow and we'll have her checked right out!  Last weekend, Olivia and Kevin had a little stomach bug.  Olivia was fussier than usual and made a few messes, but we still made it to Saturday's music class and she had a ball!  Kevin, however, was an absolute mess.  Poor guy.  He was mostly sick on Sunday and took Monday off to recover.  The happy bonus was that Monday night Olivia and I arrived home after work/school to dinner on the table!  Kevin made the best green beans, cooked perfectly... and I ate every last one of them!  Mmmmmmm!  Olivia threw hers on the floor.  Hmmmm.

Olivia's vocabulary is expanding daily.  She asks "What's that?" and today was trying to say "Walter" when Kevin was pointing at the family photos on the wall.  She'll put together what sounds like ~3 word sentences.  She still loves to dance, and is such a happy girl now that she can move around.  We have to watch out because she gets into things quickly.  This weekend we may finally childproof key cabinets.  This past week, Olivia got into one and broke a glass pitcher.  Of course, I was right next to her and swooped the little one out of the kitchen and back to dad on the couch, where she belonged!

Olivia will pretend to cook at her kitchen while I'm cooking, which is adorable.  

Tonight we cuddled  a bit on the couch - she clearly isn't feel well since she never cuddles!  I enjoyed the moment for sure.

Tomorrow I have off and both of us are taking Olivia to her 18 month appointment.  Then I have an eye appointment - trying to do the LASIK again.  I'm not sure what to do in between the eye doctor and going to Anne's house to pick up some 24 month clothes.  Yay for hand-me-downs!  

Saturday we have another vet appointment follow-up, and Olivia's music class.  In the afternoon we have a playdate with Helen and Nina from Urgent Care. :)  Sunday is the Super Bowl and we currently have no plans.  

I just signed up for a 10k in May with Deanna.  So now I have to get off my butt and start stretching!  I'm getting into a routine of taking the dogs for a walk after Olivia goes down, but it would be really nice to go to Silliman Center pool and gym once a week with Kevin too.  I have to ask Charlie and Delores if they'd be interested in regular babysitting for us.

Olivia continues to be 'nothing but persoality' and I love that little girl so much!!!  I love cuddling with her in our bed early in the morning when she's had a bad dream.  She's getting so big!  

Mom and Dad Bellenger are coming to visit in a few weekends and we are all very excited for them!

Ok, bedtime!

Bubbles! New Job!

Tonight Olivia got her hands on an empty bubble container and was in heaven!  It went to the bath with her, and Olivia had super fun putting the wand in and out and chasing Trixie around, trying to "blow bubbles" for Trixie to chase.  Trixie didn't quite get the idea and was more scared and running away from Olivia than anything else.

We FaceTimed with Aunt Sarah tonight for a few minutes, which was super fun.  Holding a coherent conversation is a little challenging with Olivia going after the iPad when she sees the person on there.
Olivia's teeth are clearly hurting as the 8 come in.  She's having trouble sleeping at night.  While she goes down to sleep easily, when the first sleep cycle completes, she awakes and cannot fall back asleep.  Sunday night, Kevin helped her about 5 times through the night!  Last night, she awoke at 9:30 and I somehow administered infant motrin, and cuddled her in bed with me until she fell asleep for reals.  At 11:11pm I put Olivia in her crib and she was down for the night - thank goodness!

Kevin was in Denver last week and is in Florida this week.  I've been lucky to have help on various days and things are going well.  Olivia's ears seem to be clear now and she's happy other than the teething.

This week is my first real week in the new management position.  I'm slowly pulling back the layers of the onion and learning the lay of the land.  This will be a challenging position, but for very different reasons than my previous position.  I believe if I learn enough variety of things, this one will be a good thing on my resume for a career outside of LM in a few years.

I missed President Obama's 6th State of the Union tonight, but it's just all disheartening the whole way our Government is operating.

Oh, if I didn't mention it earlier, another behavior Olivia learned from the dogs is trying to catch the bubbles with her teeth!  HA!

Trixie had 4 more teeth pulled last Friday.  Very sad.  Speaking of which, I have to brush their teeth tonight.  She still has the four canine teeth up front though - so can still play tug of war!

My parents are contemplating a trip out here in February - that would be a delight!  Maybe we'll go down and visit Sarah in April before she moves to Nashville!

Okay, time to do a little personal email then switch to the work email...  Lots to learn!

Fun Olivia Tidbits

Pulls on high chair cushion with her teeth when standing in the floor... a habit or trick learned from Trixie!

Missing Kevin right now as he is on travel, asking for him and constantly looking for him around the house.  Tonight she snuck out the back door onto the patio, calling out for him.

This past week, Kevin and I FaceTimed and Olivia was SOOOO excited to see him.  She held out her arms for her Daddy to pick her up.  That pulled at my heart strings.

Olivia has learned to pull the string of her See and Say from Roxanne.  She doesn't pull it quite far enough to engage the sound, but she's *almost* there!

Olivia has eight teeth coming in.  They're the next two on either side of the four front top and bottom teethies.  I think that's why she's been biting a little more than usual.

She proved once more that she knows when Daddy goes on travel, and I received a call from daycare on Monday saying she was acting like she had ear infections.  After several hours at Urgent Care, it turned out to be excess ear wax and they dug / flushed it out.  Another pull at my heart strings was watching her be all swaddled (straight-jacketed) up and two nurses and me holding her down to do the flushing.  Olivia was looking at me, crying super hard, with a look like "save me Mommy!  Why are they doing this to me?"  She's all better now.  We'll just have to keep an eye on those ears.  She did have a little cough as well, but that has subsided.

Olivia seems to have grown an inch or more in the last couple weeks - her clothes are looking smaller!  My little girl is growing up!

I think I mentioned that I was promoted early this year and I'm working through the transition.  The more I learn, the more excited I am about the new role... and hopefully lower stress.

I'm looking forward to the weekend and hanging out with Kevin and Olivia - Saturday morning is Music Together, then I'm using up a MassageEnvy credit, then I'm hoping we'll make a family trip to Ardenwood Farm after Olivia's nap.  She'll love seeing the animals especially since she's walking now!  Tomorrow night I'm meeting with Deanna for dinner - it's been quite awhile since catching up with her.

Today Olivia was putting her sunhat on and keeping it there!  Amazing!!!!

One of her favorite toys is Mommy's cell phone (and her Kindle Fire for Kids from Daddy)

A Few Olivia Tidbits

Last night when kev asked if Olivia was ready for her bath, she picked up two stacking cups and beelined from the kitchen straight into the bathroom,  with a smile on her face.  :)  she also understands when it's time to brush teeth and heads for the bathroom.  The other night Kevin was reading Olivia a book, asked if she was ready to brush her teeth and she slid right off his lap, headed for the bathroom.

She's really responding in 'sentences' back and forth with us. 

Still plays peek a boo and is super excited to play! 

Olivia is figuring out her kitchen.  Yesterday we plated making sandwiches and eating them. 

I'm trying to teach her to bring toys over to the mat to play with them, and need to follow up with cleanup afterwards.

Yesterday, Annie and Walter joined us for breakfast and a little play time.  The kiddos are interacting more.  Walter is teaching Olivia the idea of throwing the ball for Trixie, but really, Olivia just wants all the balls herself.

My little girl was just so adorable this morning I want to spend the day with her!  She understands giving hugs.  Yesterday early morning we were all cuddling in bed and Olivia would go back and forth giving Kevin and I hugs when we were asking for them.  She came and gave me a hug this morning when I asked for one, and sometimes she'll be wandering around and then will come over just to give a hug and then wanders off.  I love that little girl! 
We now put the dogs in their houses and are preventing them from eating human food to protect their teeth.  Olivia misses feeding her buddies.

Olivia still tries to put her own socks I n and helps the velcro her shoes.

Ok, that's all for now.  We are almost at work.   Here's to 2015, though i wish i could be home with Olivia and taking her to the park.  Can't wait to read the Toddler activity book from Annie for some new ideas as well.

First Steps for REAL, Playing with Trixie, Prepping for Christmas

<This should have been published on 12/14>

It's been fun and exciting around the Janeiro house since Thanksgiving. 

Olivia has officially taken her first steps, as approved by Kevin.  We were hanging out in the family room, I had Olivia on her playmat and set her on her feet, let go, and she took ~3 steps to me!  Kevin approved.  Very exciting!  I think that was last Tuesday.  She stands up occasionally straight from the floor, and stands on the couch often.  Then she'll go and grab the phone, or slide off the couch to go after a toy.

Olivia has taken to babbling sentences to us, and to herself.  Although, she does not seem to have picked up many new words.  She has learned "duck" and is very excited whenever she sees one.

The West Coast has seen a couple good rain storms, including a particularly intense one last week.  I was ostensibly working from home on Thursday during the worst of it and had the local news on to watch the flooding in various areas - crazy!  Trees down, some power outages in San Francisco, and they even closed school in a number of areas to basically keep people off the road.  (Traffic was light, but several accidents)  Good news for our drought-stricken state.  It still didn't bring the snow pack to normal, but it's better than nothing.  There were large pockets of standing water on Paseo Padre as I drove home from dropping Olivia at day care in the morning.  We're supposed to get a bit more rain over the next few days as well.

Olivia now tries to put the kong balls in Trixies mouth - she holds them out to Trixie, but the dog is too scared / confused to take it.  Olivia's also slowly learning to throw the ball for Trixie to chase.  At first, when Trixie would grab the ball and run off, Olivia would start screeching and look at me while pointing at Trixie, clearly wanting the ball back.  But lately, she'll throw the ball, Trixie will get it, and Olivia will just watch her.

The shape-sorter drives Olivia crazy.  She'll pick up a shape, try it in the first hole, be ticked when it doesn't go in the first time, and then FLINGS the shape across the room.  I mean FLINGS IT!  Look out!  Today she was so upset, she picked up the whole box and threw it!  I need to do some research on how to decrease / redirect that behavior.

We finally went to the pediatric dermatologist (the morning of the "storm of the era") and discussed the lesions - this doctor also thinks it was flea bites.  But, if we see them again, we can now bring Olivia straight in to the dermatologist - good deal!

The 49ers are just stinking it up this year.  Sadness.

I just accepted a promotion to a Level 5 manager position which will start in the new year.  More work for less stress and no work travel - thank goodness!  I'm ready for a change.  While the actual tasks of my group will lead some to believe it's beneath me, I will be integrating two stovepiped teams, have more exposure to internal LM, and formally managing a team of people (I don't know how many yet) so it's a growth position nevertheless.  Besides, I won't stay in it for long, just enough to integrate the teams and set everyone moving forward together to the same beat.  Who knows, in that time maybe a new program will magically appear in Sunnyvale... maybe.  Scary times around our work.  Hopefully this position will also give me some time to learn new, marketable skills.

This past Friday I went to the work Holiday Party stag - we didn't have a babysitter, and Kevin's not a big fan of those parties anyway.  It was a pretty good time - mostly because I was excited to fit into a dress that was tailored pre-pregnancy.  I had several folks come up to say hello, and ran into my new Director, who is clearly very happy to have me joining his team.  All good things. 

Yesterday, we picked out a Christmas Tree at Home Depot, Olivia practiced walking down the aisles of HD - her own personal heaven.  (A huge space filled with bins of STUFF to be touched and all pulled out and thrown on the floor!)

Olivia likes to point to herself and say "Ma-ma".  She's really in to playing peek-a-boo where she hides her eyes with her hands... if you say "Where's Olivia?" to get her to point to herself, she starts playing Peek-a-boo; too funny!  She still loves playing with the light switch when we try to change her.  She's taken to putting the strap of the diaper bag over her shoulder, then turning to me, waves and says "Bye-bye!"  Also funny.  Olivia loves checking out my shoes and Kevin's shoes, and is always interested in my yellow list pad.  I ended up giving her an extra one and she was so tickled!  Olivia also still likes to help me type on the laptop (makes it impossible to electronically shop for Christmas gifts when she's awake).  She's just so close to walking, I can't wait!

Kevin spent the afternoon putting up the lights, only to find at the very end that ~1/3 of them don't work.  Booooo!  Olivia and I were in and out of the house, keeping him company and practicing walking down the sidewalk and crawling through the (wet) grass.  Fun!


We went out to dinner and didn't do much in the evening.  I was suffering from allergies to the new tree in our family room, so I tried to finish some online Christmas shopping.  I tell ya, while I'll miss seeing the Bellenger family at Christmas, I am also VERY happy not to be facing two cross-country flights and look forward to time around the house to do a few projects.  Olivia will still go to daycare most days, so I'm excited to finish caulking the crown moulding, touch-up the paint around the doorframes, maybe get the last two doors (bathroom and guest room) hung, hang pics in the hallway and maybe .... insert more projects here!

Today Annie and Walter joined Olivia and I at the Academy of Sciences up in Golden Gate Park.  We used our membership to get in at 10am (an hour before general admission) an enjoyed the rainforest exhibit in peace and quiet.  Walter and Olivia were in heaven!  Annie and Kate were happy to be out of the house and checking out something new.  We only had enough concentration to last through a couple aquarium exhibits before it was lunch time and time to nap during the car ride home.  What fun!  Overall a successful adventure!  I can't wait to have more adventures with Olivia next year - need to make an annual bucket list for things to check out. :)

The pergola is coming along - the side outside the kitchen is DONE!  The side by the master bedroom is in-work.  All the wood is marked for notches and the end that goes over the roof (as I'm sitting here in bed typing late at night, the rain has started again.  I love hearing it!).  Kevin's main goal over the holiday is to finish the pergola!  It's taking much longer than any of us anticipated.  Obviously, the rain doesn't help (raining harder now).  But it will be totally beautiful when complete!  There's still the whole center section (higher and longer) to go.

The weeds are starting to pop up all around - maybe on Friday I'll do some major weed-control.  That's best done now as the ground is so soft!

Okay, nighty-night time.

xoxo
Kate

Christmas and WALKING!

I cannot believe I missed the WHOLE month of December!  Olivia started walking on 12/17 and within a couple days was walking all over the place!  She's loving the new found freedom and is exploring everywhere.  We love seeing how proud she is of herself!

Gosh, where to even begin?  We had a lovely time at the Academy of Sciences with Annie and Walter, the kiddos were good for about an hour and then we had lunch and headed home for nap time.

Kevin has been spending every spare moment on the pergola, and the final bolt was installed on 12/31, so it was technically finished in 2014!  All that remains now is tying the pergola into the house for extra support and staining it (or deciding not to).  The pergola is beautiful!  It really completes the patio and the backyard.  Over break, I also transplanted 10 plants to clear the back corner for an Olivia playhouse (built by Charlie) and to make the rest of the yard look better.  Now I'm super excited for Spring and seeing how everything fills in!

Christmas was lovely.  We remained in Cali, which took some of the pressure off, and hosted Christmas Eve.  Everyone was quite relaxed and Olivia was loving all the attention.  She was up until 9:30, and in a good mood the whole time!  The little girl received all sorts of fantastic gifts, including the rocking chair, a giant plush bear, a balloon in a box, a lady bug nightlight, books, tool boxes, ornaments, all sorts of fun stuff!!!  I've been working on a scrapbook for Olivia reflecting the first year and a half.  It's pretty cute, and I'll be glad I did it.

New Years was at home, mellow.  I'm honestly distracted by the TV.  My new job starts sometime in the next month (we have to settle on a transition plan).  I'm excited and nervous about it a bit.

I should probably get ready for beddie bye and try to clip Olivia's nails on the other hand (she won't allow it at all when awake!)  Tomorrow I'll work on taking down the tree perhaps.

Lame entry, especially after a month, but maybe after looking at photos this week I'll update it more!

Nightly Night.
Kate