Days of Play

November has been really fun for our family because Olivia is so fun to play with, and does hilarious things on a daily basis. Some days it's just the things she laughs at or the faces she makes, but she's just at a really fun stage, so I have a hard time not taking a million pictures and posting them for you all to see :) These pictures come from November 6th through the 15th.

First we have a little jegging bum. I wish this picture was better, but I put her in these jeggings at least twice a week because I love how her diaper bum and skinny little legs look :)

'Look how long my hair is!' This is one of the rare occurences of her hair not in a ponytail because it's just too long and goes everywhere now.

Before I was the mom of a toddler I kind of thought that the process from crawling to walking took two weeks or so. a few days of wobbliness, and then they were good to go. I was totally wrong. It seems every week I am surprised at how much more stable Olivia's walking is, and this process began in the middle of September. She's now at the determined walk-almost-run stage, especially when we go to the park or anywhere with other kids that she can follow. This has meant that going to the park has reached a new level of fun, as I get to be one of those moms who stands by the light pole watching my kid push others and get pushed right back, follow the big kids until they turn around and pet her head, and struggle trying to go up the slide the wrong way. We go to the park a couple times each week (because it's not rainy, and a sweatshirt is the only cold protection needed). Here's some park pictures from the 12th.

Awkward sitting positions :) These always remind me of O's cousin Elli, who is 3 and still sits in ways that make me grimace just thinking of what my knees would be feeling.

That afternoon - notice the change in clothes from park clothes (which we wear a couple times regardless of how dirty/mismatched they are) to grocery shopping clothes - Olivia had one of her book play sessions. Our family has almost 200 children's books (I have a bit of a problem) and they are on a bookshelf in her room. She often goes up to them, but I usually try to distract her by pulling one and reading it to her in hopes that she won't figure out how fun it is to empty the shelf. As usual, she outsmarted me, and made this mess one afternoon while I was making lunch. She was really enjoying herself, and afterward helped me put all the books in stacks to reshelve (by height, type, and title).

On Sundays we get to go to the park with Daddy. Olivia loves this, and is always anxious, as shown by this picture of her pulling on Dad's hand with all her might.

 I love that they are both growling at each other in this one :)

This is another park trip, a quicker one to a park closer to our house. This park doesn't have a toddler area, so Olivia still needs a grown up with her all the time, but she loves the big slides and rock climbing wall. We had a mini photo shoot when she discovered leaves, but I couldn't figure out the focus on my phone camera (that's all I had with me) so they didn't turn out the way I wanted
.

The other place we frequent for a quick play time is the tennis/basketball court across the parking lot from our apartment. It's basically just a fenced in area, but O can run around and likes to play with the net and the leaves that are growing through the fence.

I know I shouldn't take so many pictures of her behind, but it's just really cute and I can't help it :). This is her standing method...

And the last thing that happened on the 15th was that I went to a salon and donated my hair. I cut off 12 inches to donate and then a couple more as she styled it, and I absolutely love my new hair. It's super easy and can go from wet to decently done in about 10 minutes. I can also take a few more minutes and make it look better, but it's not necessary on a daily basis. Also, for working out it will still go into a half pony or a full pony with some stragglers :).

(Please excuse the no-makeup face...this was the next morning when I did my hair *all by myself!!*)