this boy

this boy has changed so much in the past couple of months. he really is much more a little boy than he is a baby. i love it and it breaks my heart at the same time, but i do think watching him learn and grow and become his own little self takes away most of the sadness involved.

he is becoming so much more social. for so long, he would stick by my side at playgroups, not wanting to play with the other kids. now he can hardly wait to take his shoes off and get going! he knows many of his friends by name and if i telling him we're going to see them, he says, "fwend! fun!" he loves all his friends and loves to play and interact.

being a late walker, ollie was also behind with the climbing stage, but has recently started up. a couple weeks ago, i moved a chair to the kitchen sink, put him on it and turned the water on. i gave him measuring cups and bowls and pots and he played for and hour and a half! now he moves the kitchen chair by himself, climbs up and says, "wata? wata? pease", while doing the sign for please. he also puts a chair up to the counter and watches me make dinner, doing whatever i will let him. he is a climber and a doer; he loves to be involved in everything i am doing. 

his language skills are exploding. almost every day he says a word that i had no idea he knows! honey, hungry, dog, car, truck, van, tractor, water, milk, bread, play, fun, friends, watch (as in, "watch this!" where did he learn that?), puzzle, book, shark, horse, draw, paper, plane, 'copter, bun, cinna (he sees a lot of cinnamon buns pass through our apartment) shoes, jacket, jeans...the list goes on. it is so fun to watch his little world expand as he learns more about his surroundings. he's always been pretty keen and alert, and only seems to be more so as he grows. he loves to learn. 

his newfound love of babies is adorable. just three or four months ago, he would try to push any babies out of my arms if i held them. now, he talks about the baby and pats my growing belly. whenever i hold a baby, he wants to "hold" that baby and screams if anyone tries to hold it. it's pretty cute, but i'm also wondering what my life might be like in 5 months...nursing a newborn with a two year old sitting in my lap, "holding" the baby, probably. ha ha! fun. he says, "bay-bee! bay-bee!" and wants to see/touch hands, feet, face, etc, of all babies.

this boy is growing and changing and brings a smile to my face and makes me a little crazy everyday. he is definitely becoming a toddler and i am learning how to parent him differently. it's been a challenge, but i'm so glad for his happy little personality. most of our days are filled with "fun!" and "fwend!"

halloween celebrations!

halloween was a blast this year. ollie had a number of different occasions to wear a costume (four, to be exact!) so we had two different costumes for him; an indoor one and an outdoor one.

he wore his cowboy costume to our monday playgroup at the church. we had a potluck lunch and a whole bunch of mama's and littles came out to play and eat. the babies all looked so darn cute in their costumes. my mom brought ollie those amazing boots a few months ago and i knew he needed to be a cowboy for halloween! he struts his stuff when he's wearing them, too.

 we decided to take ollie trick or treating this year, mostly because i really wanted to eat some candy. we dressed him up in his warm tiger costume (which he continues to request to wear whenever he sees it hanging in his closet.) he wore it a few times before halloween too, and has his growl perfected. he was the cutest little tiger who became a mute on peoples doorsteps and refused to growl for them. oh well. they still gave us lots of candy and we had fun walking around our beautiful neighbourhood in the gorgeous autumn air.

he drank some warm milk from his tiny mug when we got home. he loves his little ollie sized mug! look how pleased he is. 

i just really love babies in costumes. happy halloween!

little boy

ollie is becoming less of a baby and more of a boy every day. most days, it's fun. he is getting to be more adventurous and daring, but he is still a little timid. he is mostly gentle and calm, but he's definitely approaching his terrible twos. my favourite part of my sweet baby turning into a little boy is hearing him learn how to talk, listening to his little vocabulary expand, though it still seems like most of his words are vehicle related. his voice is so cute. some of my favourite words that he says are bear, turtle and juice. other words he knows and uses regularly include water, hungry, truck, bus, tractor, honey, outside and eggs. he just started saying his name in the past week or so, and it comes out sounding a little like robot talk; ah-ee. i love it.

his lopsided, one dimpled camera smile.

just last night, ollie was walking around after dinner eating a cookie. brian asked him if he could have a bite and ollie looked at him, shook his head and said, pointing to himself, "me. ah-ee" and then proceeded to eat the rest of his cookie. this little boy is our favourite.

and he really likes his new plane pj's.

"pane! pane!"