Oliver's early birthday wish

It's my birthday on Monday and today after Oliver ate lunch he was saying what sounded like "happy" for the first time. When I asked him if he was happy, he said yes. Well, it turned out to be my very first birthday wish from my baby!

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Oliver's Creations

Today we tried a Gymboree Art class for the first time and Oliver had so much fun. We started out by playing with play dough. This was Oliver's first experience with Play dough and I think he liked it. We had rolling pins, pizza cutters, and cookie cutters in various shapes. Oliver really enjoyed cutting the play dough with his pizza cutter and had so much fun cutting out shapes of a bunny, a dinosaur and a duck. Today's theme was fish. Our next activity was painting and Oliver learned to say the word paint. He painted the prettiest little fish I have ever seen with blue, green and purple paint and then he added sequins for sparkle. Next it was snack time and we had gold fish crackers and water while Ms. Holly read us a story about Nemo and Dori. After that, we had a tactile activity where Oliver was able to play with an assortment of toy fish in water with bubbles, all the kids loved this. And finally, Oliver glued a picture of a fish on a big blue piece of paper (water) and Oliver was able to use markers for the first time to color the fish and he finished it off with some awesome stickers. Great work Oliver! Mommy and Daddy love your creations and we will treasure them forever!

Oliver can put himself to sleep. Hooray!

Now many of you already know that we have been actively helping Oliver fall asleep since he was born, and by helping I mean nursing to sleep (until 14 months), then rocking to sleep, and finally rubbing his back to sleep while he was in his crib until recently. Since about 10 months, he has slept through the nights most nights and has taken good naps, so we were okay with this slow progression. However, one night about three weeks ago, Oliver decided it was time to put himself to sleep. So after a couple of nights of crying for a few minutes, and a couple more nights of being up until about 9:30 or 10:00pm trying to put himself to sleep he has finally got the hang of it. For the last few nights we go through our routine and then leave the room, and it has only taken about 2o or 25 minutes for him to fall asleep.

Well today, I decided that it was time for him to try to put himself to sleep for a nap. I left the room and on the baby monitor I could here him talking to his bunny (his lovey) for a few minutes, and then he was out for 3 hours and 20 minutes. Perhaps it would have been longer, but I woke him up at 4:20 for fear he wouldn't go to sleep that night. I was able to snap these sweet pictures of him before I woke him up. We are so very proud of our big boy! Sleep Oliver, sleep!

Oliver invents a new way to ride a tricycle

Oliver may still be too small for his tricycle, but that doesn't prevent him from coming up with ways to ride it. This morning, Oliver sat on the back step, turned the handles around, and pushed it with his two feet. He could go forward and backward. I thought it was so cute! Here is a short video clip of him riding his tricycle.

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Oliver moves up a level at Gymboree

Oliver has been attending classes at Gymboree Play & Music for 6 months now, today he advanced a level and is now with the 22-28 month old children. At this level, the focus is on imaginative play and the class has more structure instead of play time. Today we made pizza. Before we started, his leader, Ms. Julia brought out pictures of people making pizza and pictures of pepperoni pizza and asked who knew what it was. Little Oliver was the first to say peet-zaaa; I was so proud! He had so much fun pretending to make pizza, with yummy toppings. I think we will love Gymoree Level 5 just as much as we have loved levels 3 and 4.

Last night Oliver wanted to try on Daddy's shirt. He looked so little in this huge shirt!

This afternoon Oliver had a party for his stuffed animals. Oliver picked out a special food for each one of his friends. Oliver had a tomato, and Mommy got pasta. Yummy!

Oliver playing with his souvenir zoo train

Oliver is too funny, he actually wanted me to take his picture this morning. After I took the first picture he came right over to see it, then after he agreed it was cute he ran over and posed for another picture with his zoo train.

Oliver Clayton Royal is Twenty-One Months Old!

Oliver is learning and growing every day. He really does have a great disposition and is so much fun to be around. We love every 25 pounds of him!

Oliver & Mommy go to the zoo with Aunt Tricia & Ace

Today we had so much fun at the Dallas zoo. Oliver & Mommy met Aunt Tricia & Ace at around 9:30 and we spent the morning exploring. The first thing we did was ride the monorail to explore the Wilds of Africa. This was Oliver's first train ride and he wanted to be a big boy and sit in his own seat, rather than on Mommy's lap. Next, we went to the children's area where Oliver & Mommy fed birds, then Oliver & Ace rode horses (both real and wooden) and were able to pet a guinea pig and rabbit for the first time. Next we saw the monkeys, tiger, giraffe, then the elephant, and last it was time for a carousel ride. Oliver picked out a camel for his first carousel ride and he had so much fun. We loved spending the morning with Tricia & Ace, thanks for coming guys!

Video of Oliver riding a wooden horse

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Oliver loves to play outside

As is common amongst most children, Oliver loves to be outside. However some days it is just too hot and humid to be out exposed to the elements. When that is the case, we open the garage, bring out a fan, and play with his outside toys (trucks, train, lawn mower, wheel barrow, tricycle, bubble blower, etc.). Today was a very hot day and Oliver would take breaks in front of the fan and long drinks of water to help cool himself off. Here are some pictures of our little playing dressed only in his crocs.

Oliver's hand & foot paintings

Oliver had so much fun creating pictures with paint today, although I think most of the paint ended up on him rather than the paper!

Happy Independence Day!

We woke up early this morning and went to the Plano Independence Day Parade. We found a nice place to watch the parade under some huge live oak trees that provided lots of shade. This was Oliver's first parade and he loved seeing the people, the motorcycles, the fire engines, the floats, and everything else about the parade except the heat. We took these pictures while we were waiting for the parade.

On the way home Oliver was practicing his counting: one, two fire engines!

Daddy was able to snap a rare peaceful moment of Oliver and I snuggling before bed time.