18 months deserves its own celebration really.  There is such a difference between one year and two, that the half-way point is also deserved of notice.  Olivia has really blossomed in the last couple months.  This is one of my favorite ages.  Their personalities really shine through and the language and developmental explosion is amazing.  It seems everyday they are doing and saying something new.  Olivia is suddenly talking up a storm, or I should say…she is suddenly talking up a storm in intelligible language.  Before, we just had no clue what she was saying!  In the past month, she is suddenly speaking in short sentences and with much clearer pronunciation.  I don’t know if it is the age or the ear tubes that have allowed her to hear much better.  Her personality is really shining through too.  She is such a fun balance of gregariousness, mischief, sweetness, and independence.  She is still content to do her own thing, but she also never shies away from people or the spotlight.  She like to play with other kids and just jumps right into whatever is going on.  When that ends, she just moves on to the next thing.  No big deal.  She loves to play “out-si” and read stories.   She also loves playing any type of ball game (future softball player?).  She is starting to count and knows the letters A and O (good ones to learn in our family).  She has started to develop temper tantrums when she doesn’t get what she wants.  I try to ignore these and move away, although sometimes she follows suit.  Recently, she was throwing a real whammy and I just started cracking up in the middle of it. All of a sudden she stopped, looked at me, and cracked up too!  What a stinker.  We have started implementing time outs for bad behavior, and after the first one (where we made her apologize and say “sorry”) she now just immediately jumps to “sorr-we” whenever we scold her.  When she thinks she is really in for it, she smiles and hugs you and nestles into your chest as your are carrying her to time out saying “Sorr-we Mom-mie”.  She knows what’s up! This one is going to be difficult.