No!!

Hi!! I just dropped Oliver off at daycare for the morning. It's getting better but he still has tears in his eyes when I leave him and now he waves and says bye to me as he's crying :( I just have to turn around and walk out quickly and you can guarantee that when I go back to pick him up he'll be having a great time playing and will hardly notice me walk in the room!!

Oliver's talking is coming on slowly but his favourite word by far is "no" (very closely followed by Daddy!). The only problem is that "no" can mean "yes" and sometimes it's hard to tell what he means. The true test is when you ask him a question you know he'll say "yes" to, e.g., "Oliver, would you like fish sticks for dinner?". This is always going to be a yes even if he's eaten them for the past x days beforehand. I took a quick video of him this morning saying "no" but at least he managed to say "Daddy" and "burger" too :) He also loves to say "Hi Nanna" and "Bye Nanna" when he speaks to Nanna Pan on the webcam every week!!

I think he is also becoming aware of the baby. If we ask him where Mummy's baby is normally he'll point at my tummy and sometimes he'll give it a kiss as well :) But...... if you ask him where Daddy's baby is then Daddy's tummy gets pointed at and the same with Oliver's baby etc etc.!!! I finished painting the baby's room last week and a friend of mine is going to make the curtains so now all we have to do is get the furniture in there and some wall hangings. Speaking of the baby, it has started to get very active in the past few days and I am being kicked left, right and centre whenever I sit down and relax! It's a great feeling at the moment - probably not so much when the space becomes more limited ;)

Oliver has started sleeping in his big bed at nap times! I started this on Friday and so far he has napped without a problem 3 out of the 4 times. At night time he still wants to go in the cot so I'm not pushing it yet but this is a good start and I hope it continues :) The funny thing is that he hasn't worked out that he can get out of the bed himself. He'll wake up and still wait for me to come and get him!!

Thursday is Thanksgiving so Daddy gets to have a four day weekend - yippee!! Just as well, seeing as he is the parent of choice at the moment ;))

The new rubber glove fetish. It doesn't extend to actually washing the dishes though!

Oliver came to the end of class ceremony for the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office Citizen Academy that I attended and got a Junior Deputy badge :)

CAR!!!!

Halloween catchup and 20 week scan

Sorry it's been a while - we had some issues getting our photos from the camera on to the computer. Anyway, all sorted now!!

Halloween this year was great fun. Oliver dressed up as a firefighter - not too keen on the hat though!! He helped Daddy carve some really cool Sesame Street pumpkins which were greatly admired by the trick or treaters. Daddy even took Oliver out to a few houses and he came back with a huge stash of treats. Oliver doesn't know how to say "trick or treat" yet so Daddy got to say it and look silly on his behalf :)

On Halloween morning I ran in a 5K race with some friends of mine - the first race I've done in ages and probably the last for a while. I did pretty well but the bump is only getting bigger..... Speaking of which, we had our 20 week scan yesterday which went really well. Everything is looking great and baby was nice and wiggly! We didn't find out if it's a boy or a girl - we want to have the same amazing surprise we did when Oliver arrived so I'm afraid it's team yellow for us and keeping everyone else in suspense!! The baby's size looks right for the dates given at the last scan so our due date has stayed at 24th March.

So, what else?? Well, we have been having some amazing warm, sunny weather over the past week or so to make up for the early snowfall. We've even been able to go out without jackets on which is fantastic! Yesterday Oliver and I played outside in the afternoon and he had a great time kicking the ball around and drawing pictures on the driveway. He even found his first caterpillar - I saw him pulling at something in his hand and he was stretching the poor little thing!! Luckily it survived and then Oliver was scared of it!!

Last week we had a play date here with 10 kids!! It was absolute crazy chaos but so much fun. I think all the kids had a great time and no toy was left in the toy boxes :)

I have now put together Oliver's big boy bed and he has some really cool bedding with cars and trucks on it. He's not sleeping in it yet but it's in his room so he has chance to get used to it being there before we take the plunge and move the cot to the baby's room (we have to decorate the other room yet anyway). So far he seems to like it but at nap time and bedtime he still goes straight to the cot. That's OK - at least we get some sleep then!!

The countdown is on to our trip to the UK. We are trying to get organised with present buying and we have a full agenda when we are over there. I'm sad we can't see everyone but we'll do the best we can.

Halloween playdate at a friend's place - the first wearing of the firefighter outfit!

Another playdate - Oliver loves these bead toys :)



Taking the seeds out of the pumpkins - check out that face!!

Ready to go out trick or treating - looking just a little apprehensive....

The finished Elmo and Bert pumpkins - nice work Daddy and Oliver!!

Doesn't my baby look grown up in this picture?? Wearing the full Vikings outfit for the very important Green Bay game (which we won - woohoo!!)

Oliver looking small laying on his big boy bed!



Fantastic playdate at our place last week - of course Oliver climbed into the toy box!





Baby Jozwiak number 2!!