A Birthday Party!

Yesterday we went to our neighbor's (Adam) 2nd birthday party. Olivia did so well! She and Avry occasionally have issues when they play together, so I was a little nervous about her being around 10+ kids. However, either she was so overwhelmed with the amount of kids that she didn't care when toys were taken away, or she's just a really well-behaved 18 month old. I'm going with the former. His party "theme" was sports and we were instructed to wear our favorite team jersey (if we had one!). We didn't have a jersey, but we did have a UT windbreaker:



Eating PB&J:





The Birthday boy! Isn't he a doll? Seriously, the most laid back, easy going little boy:



I see a play kitchen in our future:





We had a great time!

We've been trying a new bedtime routine with Olivia. I'm getting really concerned that she's so terrified to be by herself (especially at night). I want her to be comfortable in her crib and falling asleep on her own. I read an article about a "modified" cry it out technique that we started this week. Basically, we do the same routine: bath, brush teeth, read story, lay down. Except, I lay her down in her crib and lay in the floor right beside the crib. That way she can see me, I can pat her back or sing to her, just not pick her up. She was not happy the first night and Michael and I switched back and forth until she finally fell asleep (after crying). However, it's gotten easier and last night she laid right down and went to sleep. I only stayed beside her 2 minutes! Really exciting around here. Starting this week, we move halfway to the door, so she can see us, but we can't really reach her. Then next week, we move outside the door and hopefully by the 4th week, she'll lay right down and go to sleep. Fingers crossed! Of course, she still doesn't sleep through the night and she ends up in bed with us at some point, but this is a great start!

Unfortunately, she woke up with a fever last night and has had one off and on all day. I'm hoping it's from teething and she didn't "share" anything with the kids yesterday!



Ice cream seemed to help. :)

I've also been trying to move Olivia and Avry's nap to after lunch. They seem like they're trying to go to 1 nap and I would rather them take it in the afternoon, but they both seem soooo tired around 11:00 am. One morning this week, I was rushing to get their lunch ready around 11:15am. I turned on Elmo for them to watch for a few minutes and when their lunch was ready, this is what I found:



Needless to say, they had a late lunch that day! One more thing- a really sweet lady ordered a hat from my shop to match her daughter's spring coat (she sent me a picture). I thought it turned out so well, I had a hard time sending it! Olivia looked really cute, so I see another hat in her future!