Sigh.. more sleepless nights. Those back teeth are BRUTAL. More on that later. On a positive note, Makayla has transitioned from 2 naps to 1, which makes things so much easier during the day. This month Raissa gave birth to her baby boy so our moms and dads graciously came over to watch Makayla for a month. M had a great time with them :)
Cognitive development:
Attention- M continues to be much more attentive to books and toys. She's received a few compliments on how focused she is.
Recognition- M knows which house is our house which is actually quite difficult because all the houses in our community look the same. M also recognizes her books. I took her to Barnes and Noble the other day, and she walked around the children's section picking out all the books she already owns! She also immediately spotted the Elmo section, of course.
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| ELMO! |
Matching- We have a yellow and purple floating frog toy each with a matching lily pad. Makayla consistently matches the frog with the corresponding lily pad.
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| Yellow frog, yellow lily pad |
Language development:
Receptive language- It is increasingly evident that Makayla's receptive language is a lot more sophistocated than we know. She surprises us every day by the commands she'll follow or the objects she can correctly identify. I will just name a few. During bath time, I'll ask Makayla "where's the fish?", "Where's the frog?", etc. She correctly identifies every toy: frog, fish, turtle, boat, penguin, starfish, crab. She has been so great at responding to the commands: "close the refrigerator door", "take off your socks", "sit back", "take off your jacket", "give this to daddy", "say bye"...
Expressive language- New words she verbalizes spontaneously and correctly this month are sun (shuh), hippo (apple), apple, hello, turtle, Emy (Emily), wiggle (while wiggling), shoe (in chinese), kitty (didi), light (in chinese), water, Pooh Bear
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| Fun with Auntie Emy! |
She also has been REALLY into the show Yo Gabba Gabba. When she wants to watch, she points to the TV and says "do da da" (Yo Gabba Gabba). She knows the characters Foofa and Tootie ("Didi"), the two female characters. She says "choo choo" when she see Thomas the Train.
Her favorite word has been "yeah". Although she doesn't always mean "yes" (most of the time she does), she always responds "yeah" to questions as opposed to statements.
She nods her head for yes and shakes her head for no.
She puts her finger to her mouth and says "shh". Believe it or not, it's a developmental milestone.
She can count to three.
She signs "thank you", "baby", "light"
She does hand motions and sings along to many songs. "Wheels on the Bus" is one of her favorites. She loves singing and motioning to "swish swish swish", "wah wah wah", and "shh shh shh". She also enjoys "If you're happy and you know it", "ABCs", "Twinkle Twinkle", "Mary had a little lamb". She also loves her mygym songs like the bye song, and the clean up song (helps to encourage her to clean up). She also loves her Yo Gabba Gabba songs "Hold Still", "Goodbye", "Naptime". I've actually put her to sleep singing her the Naptime song. Although she lacks tone, she's got great rhythm :)
Socio-Emotional development:
Makayla spent a lot of time at the park with the grandparents. At the park, she seemed to gravitate toward the other kids.
M is becoming quite the jokester. When we ask her to point to different people, she will usually point to them correctly. However, when we say "where's mommy?" she looks at someone else. One time we caught her offguard and saw that she looked at me and looked away immediately with a huge smile.
When our parents were watching M at home, she would bring them their shoes to let them know she was ready to go out.
M feeds her dolls.
Gross motor development:
M kicks balls. Continues to turn in circles very well.
M now backs into chairs to sit down instead of climbs into them.
Fine motor development:
Still very much into buckles. She also has shown an interest in zippers, belts, velcro and buttons.
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| I still love buckles! |
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| I like wearing buckles, too! |
Physical development:
Teeth- Just recently, Makayla sprouted 4 new teeth all at the same time. This is the first time she's waken up from naps sobbing, unable to be soothed :( Her molars and canines on the top are coming in.
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| I've still got rolls! |
Adaptive development:
M likes to help Grandma clean!
Fun moments:
M loves to do somersaults (with assistance, of course).
M loves the ocean. We took her to a beach for a photoshoot and she kept running toward the water. YIKES!
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| Check out my ride! |
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| Up to no good! |
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| Cheese! |
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| Thank you Grandma for the sand toys! |
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| My favorite snack! |
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| Just being silly! |
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| I still love being a baby sometimes. |
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| Shopping! |
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| Baby Andrew's First Birthday |
