Baby O Turns 2

The happy birthday girl!

Monica, Nana and the spread.

Ameilia, Monica, Daddy being sill and Aunt Sharon and Uncle Mike

The Currence family: Abby, Betsy, George and Katie.

Livi and Uncle Rich

Ladybug Pinata

Livi takes a pull

Zane's turn.

Go Tanner!

Aaron Waxler takes a tug.

Livi tries again.

Publix did another great job with her cake.

Livi tries to blow out the candle.

Mommy helps get the job done.

It's always hard to cut into such a great cake!

Daddy helping Livi chow down.

Ameilia's sweet cake face.

Tanner and Daddy, Atul, hamming it up.

Annabelle cute cake face.

Livi at home opening a gift from Mommy and Daddy.

A Ladybug Girl book!

Livi checking out the book.

Too much time has gone by since I last posted here. And suddenly sweet Olivia is another year older!

Two years ago today a light came into our life like none other. Today Olivia is an energetic, funny (oh so funny), sweet, loving little girl who crawls into spaces in our hearts that we didn't even know existed.

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl! Mommy and Daddy LOVE YOU like CRAZY!!!!

XOXO

Today we so enjoyed your party at John Chesnut Park on Lake Tarpon. We had some much funny planning your lady-bug themed day and enjoying fantastic weather with good friends and family. You were such a busy, busy little girl you didn't know which way to turn - or run. You loved playing on the playground, pushing Annabelle's baby doll stroller and just running around. All of you kids seemed to really enjoy the ladybug pinata but we had a hard time getting you to sit still long enough to open presents. Oh, well. We opened them at home and what a haul you got.

Those who celebrted with you were: Nana and Poppy, Uncle Rich, Aunt Sharon and Uncle Mike, Monica Scandlen and Amelia Lusk, Sherri, Steve, Zane and Annabelle Newborn, Betsy, George, Katie and Abby Currence, Erik and Aaron Waxler, Julie, Atul, Kamdyn and Tanner Nadkarni and Ms. Christiana and Ms. Katherine from Excel Learning Center.

It's so hard to believe that two years have flown by. You have grown so much in so many ways and you are truly amazing. We can't wait to see what your third year brings!

Fish Faces and Chasing Rubber Duckies

Checking out her certificate while dripping dry.

After grabbing said certificate and ripping it a bit, she sort of poses for the camera.

Seven weeks after beginning (the seventh was a makeup after the sixth lesson was stormed out), Olivia has completed her first swim lessons. at the North Pinellas YMCA Now, she doesn't exactly have her fins yet but her kicking skills have come a long way, she handles going under water well and she can pull herself out of the pool from the wall to safety. Not too bad for a collective three hours of lessons. Her last session might have been her best. The other two students didn't show and she really took to the substitute instructor. She was full of giggles the entire half hour and squealed often while swimming assisted to her favorite pool rubber ducky.

(She has, however, recently mastered her fish face complete with kissy noises. Man, is that cute. And no, she didn't learn that at the Y. Just a sort of related side note. )

Olivia got a certificate of completion for the parent-child class and promptly crumpled it up I'm sure it had no meaning behind that act whatsoever. We'll still keep it for her scrapbook because Mommy and Daddy sure are proud of their l'il mermaid. We'll take a break from formal lessons for a little while but for now we'll practice in Nana and Grampy's pool and in the Gulf of Mexico.

Family Night at the Trop = Red Sox Win

A Red Sox Nation Family... even in the south.

What you looking at punk?

Peek-A-Boo ballpark style
.

Where's Olivia?

Here I am Daddy!

Hats make my head itch!

We try to go to at least one Red Sox game a year and Friday night was our time. This was Olivia's third Red Sox game. She has long outgrown her original Red Sox gear so we outfitted her in new Red Sox Nation attire and headed south to Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. The game started at 7:10 p.m. and after Victor Martinez's two homers the Sox bested the Tampa Bay Rays with a 3-1 final. Unfortunately, it was the only game in the series the Red Sox would win. Maybe we were the good luck charm and should've gone to all three.

Livi, naturally, looked adorable and despite the lack of smiles in the pictures was all grins most of the night. She happily clapped and cheered no matter which team was doing well - we're teaching her about that. She'll get it soon enough. And once again she quickly became a fan favorite throughout the night. She also really enjoyed spending quality time with Uncle Rich (darn it if we didn't get pictures of the two of them - or him at all. Stupid, stupid, stupid.) who is surely going to teach her some ball skills when she gets bigger. It was a great family night out, indeed.

To make the night better, the Yankees lost their game, too. But once again unfortunately, they won their other two games over the weekend. We won't give up hope. It's not over yet. Go Sox!

A Masterpiece in the Works

So that's why it's called finger painting.

Me likey!

I wonder if I can get Mommy and Daddy to let me do this at home.

Oh, man I'm getting this stuff all over me.

I'm gonna give Aiden a hand and show him how it's done.

Mason might be done but I'm not even close!

Do I have something on my face?

This is awesome!

Yes! I just might be the Purple People Eater!

Are you sure this is OK?

I think I've run out of canvas. I guess it's a wrap.

And the final masterpiece on display at school.

A few weeks ago, Olivia's teacher Ms. Christiana decided it would be fun for the kids to finger paint. So she got out the purple paint, which happens to be Livi's favorite color, and they went to town. Boy did they ever. Olivia was beside herself with joy while the other kids weren't as enthusiastic. Perhaps we have a budding artist - or just a girl who loves to make a mess. In either case, we love how happy she looks in the photos her teachers sent us.

Oh, don't worry, it's non-toxic paint. Thankfully.

Our Littlest Mermaid

First swim class: Oh, this is gonna be great!

Holy cow is that water cold! (It all goes down hill from there. Final picture of Day 1. See below for details.)

Second Class: Well, it might not be pretty but at least I'm dong something besides crying this time.

I'm holding this duck hostage. You cannot make me do that.

Seriously, Daddy can you make her stop? And for God's sake don't photograph it!

Ever since Olivia took her first dip in her Nana and Grampy's pool when she was a few months old, she has been a total water baby. Whether it's drinking it, bath time, beach time or running around in a "spraygound" our girl LOVES water. So we decided it would be a great time to start swim lessons.

A couple of weeks ago she started half-hour Saturday sessions at our local YMCA. When Mommy took her into the pool she was all smiles. For the first five minutes. Imagine our surprise when she started crying and kept crying until the end of the session. About the only lesson Livi wanted to participate in was learning how to climb out of the pool by herself. She wanted to bolt to Daddy who had stopped snapping pictures by this point for obvious reasons. I couldn't understand it. Why did our Water Baby suddenly despise any aspect of it? Was it the pressure of being in a class? Did she not like her two classmates? Was the pool too cold? Too big? Or was it something else?

It turned out it was indeed something else. Later, we discovered Olivia had a low-grade fever that lasted the rest of the day. Poor baby. Fortunately, she had recovered by the next morning.

At her second lesson this past Saturday, she sort of did things the opposite of the first day. She was very hesitant to get into the pool and once in wasn't into it for about five minutes . Then she seemed fine.

We practiced throwing a toy and with the help of Mommy swimming to it. We sang the Hokey Pokey and turned outselves around in the pool and we did another little number: "Motor Boat, Motor Boat," swirling around the babies so they would practice kicking. Again, she seemed a master at pulling herself out of the pool from the wall.

This time after the official class was done, we went over to the kiddie pool which is about chest- deep on her. We tooled around for quite awhile and she was all smiles and giggles. She kicked more than she had in class and really loved trying to float on her back and trying to blow bubbles with her face a bit in the water. Then it happened. She was giggling away just walking around the edge of the pool and Livi did what she often does on dry land. She fell.

In a second she was completely under water, head and all. It was like everything went in slow motion for a moment. I looked down under the water and saw my sweet baby in her watermelon-print bathing suit floating in the water, but she didn't look like dead weight. She was kicking and moving her arms a bit. She looked like she was swimming. As David, who was sitting nearby outside the pool, was about to jump in, I swooped down and grabbed her. It was all in a matter of a couple of seconds. I fully expected cries - or a least coughing and lots of it. But neither happened. She sat in my arms silent, her hazel eyes scanning the area like she was trying to make sense of what happened. In an instant, though, she was happily playing in the pool again.

A couple of hours later, she and I took another dip in Nana and Grampy's pool. We hope next week's lesson goes even better. We can't wait to see our Littlest Mermaid parting the water.

Pop Goes the Fourth!

Besides fireworks, it wouldn't be the 4th without watermelon and boy does Olivia love it!

Liam Miller and Olivia in the neighborhood parade. Don't they look thrilled?

Of course, Livi rather eat the glow jewelry than simply wear it.

Our Fourth of July was relatively quiet until late afternoon when we went over to our friends' the Millers' house in Wesley Chapel. They invited us and our pal, Michele, to a neighborhood cookout filled with kids, fun and good food. Us Davises, being the dorks that we are, wore matching red, white and blue shirts (each of us wore a different color). Wouldn't you know I forgot to get a picture taken?

We filled our bellies full with yummy pincic food and enjoyed hanging out with friends. After decorating their respective bicycles and even a wagon, the kids did a little street parade. Livi enjoyed joining Christine's and Jimmy's son, Liam, three months her junior, in his wagon. They wore glow-in-the-dark necklaces and bracelets and really didn't seem to know what to make of them.

We made a fairly early evening out of it, heading out as the "big kids" started their fireworks. We ended the night at home watching the Boston Pops and watching Boston's fantastic fireworks display on TV. Sure, it's not the same but I for one will take what I can get.