Gwen Hearts Auntie Olivia

Gwen has always been fond of Aunt Olivia, and this fondness only increased during the reunion as Olivia was Gwen's roommate and playmate. Gwen started each day by crawling into Olivia's bed for a snuggle and to read a few books. (One morning, one of Gwen's books fell down between the wall and the bed. Olivia rescued the book from the "crack", but Gwen felt compelled to frequently retell the events by saying "book crack, book crack" whenever we went into the bedroom. This made us chuckle because, to the untrained ear, it sounded like Gwen was saying "butt crack, butt crack".)

Aunt Olivia was always willing to entertain Gwen, from swimming to reading, to making funny faces. Olivia acted like it was no big deal, but Mom really appreciated Olivia's helpfulness.

Auntie Olivia is heading back to BYU soon, so we may not see her until next summer. Gwen will miss her until then!

Gwen's 1 1/3rd Birthday!

Gwen is 16 months old today! Her major accomplishment for the month was taking her first steps, and many more since. At first she had to be coaxed to walk to you, but now she's starting to just let go of whatever she might be holding on to and go for it! Often when she is walking towards you she dives at you when she is a step or two away, so you'd better be ready to catch her! She also seems to need to keep her momentum going because if she stops and just stands still, she can't seem to get moving again and sits down.

Gwen has started to play with some of her stuffed animals. She has two rabbits and she makes them hop around and says "bop, bop" for "hop, hop." She also is very fond of a teddy bear. When we are reading a book and she sees a teddy bear in the book she must find her teddy bear to cuddle. She also likes to put her teddy bear and other stuffed animals in the exersaucer and give them a spin!

Gwen continues to try new foods and eat LOTS of food. Just today she ate her first tuna fish sandwich for lunch. She didn't take it apart but just took bite after bite until it was gone! Bananas are still her favorite food and she asks for them every meal by saying "ba, ba, ba." We picked blueberries today and she discovered quickly how yummy they were. She picked and ate as many as she could.

Gwen's hair continues to grow longer and stay curly. I want to put pigtails or a pony tail in it, because it's certainly long enough, but it curls up so cutely without any effort that I haven't tried getting Gwen to sit still for the procedure yet. Gwen likes to comb hair. After her hair gets combed, she'll take the comb and comb our hair and her hair again.

Lately, Gwen is quite liberal with her kisses and super snugly. She loves the three blankets she sleeps with and insists on taking them all out of her crib with her when she gets up in the morning. At her sitter's house she came across a little sweater that is similar in stitch to one of the crocheted blankets she sleeps with. She carries the sweater around and takes it to bed during nap times. She'll cuddle on anything soft or fluffy...or sometimes just anything. The other night she laid her head down on the hearth as if she was cuddling with the slab of stone. She especially likes to roll around on the couch pillows. Jared pointed out that if the couch pillows were as big as us, we might like to also.

Gwen is such a cutie pie!

Good Morning

Gwen gave Dad a snuggle and a big smile before he went to work this morning.

Stand & Snuggle

Gwen is quite the stander upper these days, and she loves to snuggle with her blanket. She'll crawl to her crib, pull herself up, reach between the bars, grab her blanket, pull it through the bars, and snuggle with it by laying her head on it. So sweet!

"It's Time for Bed, Gwen!"

Mom, did you say it's time for bed?

Well, I'm kind of busy... counting my toes,

singing to my lotion and singing to my shoes,

tasting my shoe,

pretending my comb is a flutophone,

throwing my shoes and seeing where they land,

doing my push ups...

and my squats,

grabbing the camera to take a few shots,

and, finally, cuddling with my monkey!

Heeheehee... It's past my bedtime, isn't it?