This past week our Olivia turned 15 months old!
This is the month that Olivia really took off with walking. At 14 months, she was just taking a few steps here and there. Now Olivia takes 20 steps or so at a time. She constantly wants to walk around with someone holding her hand. Olivia also still loves the walker and spends a lot of time getting around the house with it. When Olivia doesn’t feel like walking, she still knee walks a fair amount and crawls sometimes.
Olivia is obsessed with all things baby. My mom got her a book with baby faces, and she looks at it every single day, saying “baby” over and over again. We have a few baby dolls, and Olivia plays with them all the time. Both she and Tommy will push the babies in the little baby stroller. Olivia has also started using the word “baby” for other things she likes, mostly food. She’ll ask for a snack in the kitchen or in the car and say “baby” or just B. Now that Olivia knows where there are snacks, she asks for them constantly.
Olivia makes the best excited faces these days. She’s also taken off with her dance moves. Almost every time music comes on, Olivia starts dancing. She loves playing her own music with her toys and books and dances to it as well.
Olivia still wants Mom or Dad within eyesight at all times, preferably within arm’s reach. As she spends a lot of time literally climbing all over us, it’s more exhausting than ever.
Olivia gets so excited when Dad comes home from work now. My kids have seen my parents every week or every other week since the summer of 2020. The last month Olivia has started getting so excited when they first arrive, too, especially my mom. I’ve left Olivia with my mom a few times to pick up Tommy from school or run an errand, and she hasn’t been phased at all when I’ve left.
In the past few weeks, Tommy has resumed school and the classes he was doing before Genevieve was born. The girls and I go out and do something in the morning at least one of the days that he’s at school.
This past month, I took the girls to the Orchid Show at the Chicago Botanic Garden.
We did a second round of the trains show at the Domes. It wasn’t very busy when we were there. Olivia was able to get out of the stroller and walk around a bunch. She had as much fun watching the trains as Tommy did this year.
We also went to the children’s museum. Olivia had been before but only in the stroller. This is the first time she’d gotten to play. It was sensory overload, but she had a good time.
Tommy’s loved Ritz crackers for months. They’ve often been a treat at Grandma’s house. I started buying Ritz for at home lately. He and Olivia will take down a sleeve of Ritz like it’s nothing. Her other favorite snacks right now at the HappyTot ABC cookies, Cheez-Its, and goldfish crackers. Olivia loves eating a variety of crackers and chips. She’s done pretty well with bread, too, including French toast. Otherwise, Olivia is still primarily eating purees and getting little tastes of other foods that we’re eating on any particular day.
Olivia topped out at seven ounces of milk in a single sitting. I’ve dropped back to giving her five or six ounces. She still has about five bottles a day. I’ve been offering her water or milk in a sippy cup a couple of times a day. In the past week or so, she’s done better with the sippy cups. She’s still nowhere near being ready to transition off of bottles.
Olivia wakes up once at night wanting one more bottle. About three-quarters of the time she wakes up before 11 p.m., so I’m able to give her the bottle before I go to sleep. Olivia’s only had a handful of nights that she woke up again after she had her bottle. Almost every time she does, she settles again very easily.
You can find all of my baby/toddler updates for all three kids as well as general family updates and other family-related posts in the family section of the blog.
