Bible Talk with Nathan

Nathan was sitting at the kitchen table, colouring a picture of Jesus that he hadn't finished during Children's Church on Sunday.  He was talking to himself, saying that now he knows what Jesus looks like, amongst other things.  Then I heard him say, "It's too bad that Satan made Jesus die on the cross."  I felt that I had to correct him, telling him that God had Jesus die on the cross so that our sins would be forgiven.  I guess he assumed that it was Satan's doing because it was a mean way to die.  That boy is always thinking!

Camping Trip #1 - Cultus Lake

We enjoyed six days in Cultus Lake in the middle of May.  We had wonderful weather and the kids were really good so I was not quite ready to come home yet but kids had to go to school and I had to go to work.

And in no particular order (because I'm lazy!)...pictures!!

{Olivia carried her baby EVERYWHERE!}

{Matthew absolutely LOVED smores.  I think he had three and then a couple roasted marshmallows, and would have kept eating had I not stopped him.}

{Olivia will not wear her sandals.  If I gave her a choice, she would choose boots all the time.}

{Fighting over Olivia's baby}

{Teaching the kids how to play bocce}

{Olivia loves riding her bike}

{She was so excited to go swimming that she tried to dress herself, and got super embarrassed when we all laughed at her!}

Olivia is 21 Months Old!

Olivia weighs 26.6lb.  I know, always such a random thing to start off the 'monthly' blog post with but it's the one piece of data that I most frequently look back on because I like to compare my kids' weights to each other.  :)

 This past month, Olivia's vocabulary has taken off!  She has begun saying two-word phrases (three, if you include someone's name!).  For example, last week she said, "Mommy!  Choo-choo broke!" when she noticed that her train tracks had separated.  I love it when she tries to call Nathan, because she says his name with her mouth completely closed; all it sounds like is "hmm hmm".  She gets so frustrated when he doesn't respond to her, but little does she know that he can barely hear her!  Her most-commonly used words are: Mommy and "Mo" (No).  She hasn't said "yes" yet, but boy, does she ever know how to say "MO!".

Olivia completes her shape sorter with easy, by matching the colours.  I also just thought to show her our Melissa and Doug Stack & Sort Board, and she also does that no problem.  I haven't given her too much exposure to wooden puzzles yet, but did take out Nathan's first set of jigsaw puzzles and she was actually quite into it.  She knew that pieces had to match and connect.

Her favourite thing to do is "cour-ing" (colouring).  Her favourite thing to colour with is Mr. Sketch markers.  Her hands are often full of marker.  We have some that aren't washable, so I try my best to keep them separate so that I can manage which ones she has access to better.

Olivia still loves dolls.  She'll play with any baby doll she can get her hands on and she's very maternal in how she holds them.

{She was teaching her baby how to walk}

Olivia does NOT like to wear socks.  As soon as she has the opportunity to, she takes them off.

Olivia LOVES to wear rain boots.  They are her definite footwear of choice.  There are times that boots are the only thing she will wear, in which case I put her in the car without anything on her feet and deal with it when we've reached our destination, when she's likely forgotten about the boots.

She can still be a huge pain in the middle of the night.  One of three things happens each night: 1) She sleeps through the night.  This is the ideal situation!  2) She wakes up crying/whining/calling for me and I'm so tired that I just grab her and put her in the middle of our bed to sleep for the rest of the night, or 3) She wakes up crying/whining/calling for me and I'm quite awake so I go in there and tell her to go back to sleep and I leave the room...so she starts screaming!  Like, full on rage-filled screaming.  If Jon wakes up she sometimes will listen to him yell from our room, "Olivia!  Be quiet!" But sometimes not.  Do I blame her for getting angry though?  No, not really.  She wants to be in our bed because she knows that it sometimes happens.  It's mostly my fault :).

Olivia LOVES jumping on the trampoline.  As soon as the weather cleared up and she had opportunity to practice, she mastered doing continuous jumping.  She can even do a bum drop (but not get up again).

She has no fear when it comes to climbing.  She climbs up the small climbing wall on my parents' playground with ease, and has even started attempting to climb the completely vertical grey 8-foot climbing wall, making it about half-way before asking for help.  She's scary!  Slides don't intimidate her either.

She rides her balance bike quite well.  She naturally knew to sit on the seat and walk, rather than just standing and walking with it.  It always takes a little convincing to get her started, but once she does it she remembers how much fun it is.  It will be neat to see if/how she progresses over the next few camping trips.

Olivia loves riding the kids' three-wheel scooters.  It's so cute seeing her put one foot one and push with the other.  She loves it so much that I picked up a fourth one for her off of the facebook swap (traded a set of training wheels for it, so it didn't even cost me anything!).  I was tired of listening to her cry when the others where scootering around and not giving her a turn.

She eats the best at dinner time.  Breakfast is her worst!  I've found that she eats the best if she has a bowl of yogurt and some fruit (either a banana or frozen blueberries), so she gets that a couple times a week.  She does not care for Cheerios.  Her favourite foods are: fruit (no melons though), goldfish, and chips.  Yes, chips.  That girl loves them!  She eats them so neatly, taking cute little nibbles.

{These two just love each other (most of the time!)}