Where does the time go? I can't believe I let 5 months go by without providing an update. Between preparing for Baby Luke's arrival, spending the last precious months with M, finishing off projects at work, and many of the other unexpected tasks that come with preparing for baby #2 while fighting the 3rd trimester exhaustion, I have not had much time nor energy to provide an update. But alas now is the time..
Language Development
First
I'd like to start by saying I love this age. As Makayla's language
continues to develop, we see more and more of her personality come out--
it has been such a joy to see her intentions, creativity, and desires
expressed through speech.
A few months ago, Makayla started running into our room every morning, greeting us with a very cheerful "Good morning Mommy!" and sometimes a "Good morning Daddy!" And if Daddy's asleep it's usually "Wake up Daddy!" Honestly, I can't think of a more sweeter sounding alarm clock to get me going in the morning.
Over the past few
months, her short phrases have evolved into much longer, many times
grammatically correct sentences. Just the other day I heard her
saying,"I see a monkey tree right over there!" Okay, so I have no idea
what a monkey tree is, but it made me stop to reflect on how just a year
ago she was barely pointing out single words like "monkey" and "tree"
and now she can string words together to make sentences and have
back-and-forth coherent conversations with me! And her enunciation and
facility for language has been improving day by day. I think I can
understand about 80-90% of what she says. I'm in awe of the rapidly
developing brain during these early years. No wonder child experts place
such a value on making sure children are meeting their milestones and
are placed in environments that allow them to thrive, particularly
during the first 5 years of life.
Fun phrases. She has been saying cute phrases such as "Oh my gosh!" "Whoa.. look at that!" "Oh man!" "Awesome!" "Oh that's so cool!" "Peekaboo, I see you!" "I can't wait!" My sister's also taught her to say "Doh!" (from The Simpsons) and "Did I do that?" (from Family Matters). One time well before she turned 2, she said "Watch this!" and bent over to eat a pickle with no hands, like a dog. I was both disturbed and impressed at the same time.
Fun phrases. She has been saying cute phrases such as "Oh my gosh!" "Whoa.. look at that!" "Oh man!" "Awesome!" "Oh that's so cool!" "Peekaboo, I see you!" "I can't wait!" My sister's also taught her to say "Doh!" (from The Simpsons) and "Did I do that?" (from Family Matters). One time well before she turned 2, she said "Watch this!" and bent over to eat a pickle with no hands, like a dog. I was both disturbed and impressed at the same time.
Bossy Makayla. Even
before M took the throne as Big Sister, she made sure the world knew
who was boss. She can be heard saying "Mommy, sit down properly!" or
"Lay down properly!" or "Move!" One night as I was putting her to sleep,
she reached over and held my head in her itty bitty hands saying "Look
at me! Laying down now!" She says "Come on Mommy, come on!" while taking
my hand pulling me in the desired direction.
Curious Makayla. Most
developmental psychologists believe that children have an innate desire
to learn. I definitely see this in Makayla. Her favorite things to say
are "What doing?" (What are you doing?) or "-- doing?" (E.g., "dog
doing?" meaning What is the dog doing?) or "Uh oh what happened?" or "Is
zat?" (What is that?) When we went on the It's A Small World ride at
Disneyland, I pointed out the different animals to her as we were
floating by. I would saying something like "it's a polar bear!" and she
would follow up with "polar bear doing?" and this went on and on the
entire ride.
Independent Makayla. Part of the struggle with the Terrible Twos is the desire for toddlers to be independent. When M walks up or down stairs or jungle gym, if she senses we are nearby and trying to protect her, she'll turn around and say "No, move!" M wants to eat by herself, wash her hands by herself. In fact, she's often heard saying "By myself!"
Satisfied/Frustrated Makayla. Because M is now feeling more independent, her actions, depending on her success or failure, elicit feelings of satisfaction or frustration. When she's satisfied, she often gets super excited, exclaiming "I did it! I did it!" When she's frustrated, she'll sometimes throw tantrums. For example, she gets frustrated when her blocks fall down or when she has a hard time putting a diaper on her baby doll. Sometimes she acknowledges her inability to do something with sentences like "I can't do it." or "I can't reach it."
"Look, same!"/"Too!" For the past few months, M has been walking around identifying things that are the same. For example, she forced Eric to draw all of the Yo Gabba Gabba characters on the easel and would then take her Yo Gabba Gabba stuffed animals one by one, walk up to the easel and saying "Look, same!" She also notices when she is doing something while I am doing something at the same time.
M: "Mommy doing?"
Me: "Mommy's eating noodles."
M: "Makayla eating noodles too!"
M will also use the word "too" to express her desire to do something that someone is already doing. One day she saw Jed kicking around a soccer ball so she said "Makayla soccer too!" which meant that she also wanted to play soccer.
Independent Makayla. Part of the struggle with the Terrible Twos is the desire for toddlers to be independent. When M walks up or down stairs or jungle gym, if she senses we are nearby and trying to protect her, she'll turn around and say "No, move!" M wants to eat by herself, wash her hands by herself. In fact, she's often heard saying "By myself!"
Satisfied/Frustrated Makayla. Because M is now feeling more independent, her actions, depending on her success or failure, elicit feelings of satisfaction or frustration. When she's satisfied, she often gets super excited, exclaiming "I did it! I did it!" When she's frustrated, she'll sometimes throw tantrums. For example, she gets frustrated when her blocks fall down or when she has a hard time putting a diaper on her baby doll. Sometimes she acknowledges her inability to do something with sentences like "I can't do it." or "I can't reach it."
"Look, same!"/"Too!" For the past few months, M has been walking around identifying things that are the same. For example, she forced Eric to draw all of the Yo Gabba Gabba characters on the easel and would then take her Yo Gabba Gabba stuffed animals one by one, walk up to the easel and saying "Look, same!" She also notices when she is doing something while I am doing something at the same time.
M: "Mommy doing?"
Me: "Mommy's eating noodles."
M: "Makayla eating noodles too!"
M will also use the word "too" to express her desire to do something that someone is already doing. One day she saw Jed kicking around a soccer ball so she said "Makayla soccer too!" which meant that she also wanted to play soccer.
Answering Questions. Early
on, M showed an understanding for how questions should be answered.
When I asked "How many... are there?" she would respond by counting.
When I asked "Why..?" she would respond with "Cuz.." When I asked
"What..?" she would respond with "Hmm.. let's see.."
Manners. Early on, M was great at saying "Thank you", now not so much. She is also learning to say "Please". Although we didn't expect it, M also found it fun to say "welcome!" (you're welcome) when someone thanked her and "Bless you" when anyone sneezed. On the cruise we taught her how to do "cheers" and she has been saying it a lot since.
Manners. Early on, M was great at saying "Thank you", now not so much. She is also learning to say "Please". Although we didn't expect it, M also found it fun to say "welcome!" (you're welcome) when someone thanked her and "Bless you" when anyone sneezed. On the cruise we taught her how to do "cheers" and she has been saying it a lot since.
"I" and "You" As
mentioned in my last update post, an important milestone in language
development is the appropriate use of "I" and "you". Makayla is now
using 3rd person "Makayla" very infrequently and instead using "I" more
frequently. For example, instead of saying "Makayla is watching TV" she
is more likely to say "I am watching TV."
Not only is she now substituting "I" where she would have used "Makayla", but she is also using "I" to create sentences. For example, she used to say "more please" but now she says "I want more please."
Not only is she now substituting "I" where she would have used "Makayla", but she is also using "I" to create sentences. For example, she used to say "more please" but now she says "I want more please."
Makayla seems to be using "you" properly. but still uses names often. For example, she still says "Mommy get it" to me rather than "You get it". She sometimes makes "you" errors which is common. When I say, "Do you want me to read to you?", she'll respond with "Read to you" instead of "Read to me."
Counting. She was able to count (more like recite) to 20 in English and count to 10 in Chinese when she was around 21 months old. In recent months, I've noticed that M is getting better and better at accurately counting objects. Specifically, I think she understands now that once an object has been counted, it doesn't get counted again. However, she doesn't have a strategy to remember which items have been counted so she often recounts items.
Physical Development
When M was 22 months old, she contracted a very mild case of the dreaded Hand, Foot, Mouth Disease. Fortunately she didn't seem too bothered by it but it gave us all quite a scare.
During M's 2 year well-check, M measured 36 inches tall, scoring her in the 96th percentile for height and 89th percentile in weight. Her height percentage is proportionally higher than her weight percentage, which means she is really beginning to thin out. Bye bye rolls!
Gross Motor Development
She started jumping a few months before turning 2 and is enjoying her new achievement all the time. She especially loves jumping if she's particularly excited to see someone.
Fine Motor Development
She started jumping a few months before turning 2 and is enjoying her new achievement all the time. She especially loves jumping if she's particularly excited to see someone.
Fine Motor Development
M
is very good at self feeding. She prefers a spoon to fork which makes
things quite messy but it's great that M is so much more self sufficient
during mealtimes.
Socio-Emotional Development
M has been learning about emotions and has also been actively using emotion words. She has become increasingly fearful of things-- bugs, dogs, cats, the dark, sometimes babies.. Even Mommy or Daddy. Basically anything that moves on its own. I've also heard her say "Why are you so sad?" "I'm so mad!" during pretend play. A lot of times she'll comment on a dog being sad. I suppose dogs do always look a bit sad!
Most of play at this age is still parallel play where kids play alongside each other but are not playing with each other. M has always been pretty good at interacting with other adults. Now, I'm beginning to see M interact with other kids. M tried to tickle her friend Sharon. M ran around chasing her friend Daniel. M always tries to engage me in play. She doesn't like it when we are sitting at the park playing sand and she is playing but I'm not. She says "Mommy shovel!"
Interestingly, her choice of toys also reflects in increased interest in social interaction. At home, she has plenty of toys, but she seems to prefer her Sesame Street and Little Peoples figurines. She likes making them talk to each other and even occasionally changes the intonation of her voice to pretend her figurines are talking.
Also, her pretend play is getting more sophisticated. For example, in a little corner in her room, she reaches for her pretend rocks and hands them to me and Eric. She likes to make pretend soup. At the park, she loves making birthday cakes in the sand, then she'll stick a twig in them and blow on them as if she's blowing out a birthday candle.
She is also beginning to understand the concept of taking turns. A lot of times she'll say "my turn!" when she wants to do something. Although there's not much need to take turns at home, we point out to her that sometimes we wait in line for our turn. For example, when we went to visit Elmo at Sea World, M was so eager to cut in line to see him. I had to explain to her that we had to wait our turn. One day, Raissa told all the kids to clean up, and M says to her "your turn!" :)
2ND BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION
For M's second birthday, we decided to keep it low key but at the same time make it memorable. We had a small family dinner for her in LA and her godparents and godsis celebrated with us over dinner and some cake.
We also wanted to spend some quality time with M during her last month as an only child. The weekend before her birthday, we took a short trip to San Diego, spending 2 days at Sea World. M enjoyed seeing the animals, particularly the beluga whale. She also had a blast at the Sesame Street Bay of Play and got a bit starstruck meeting her Sesame Street friends in person!
On M's birthday, we took her to Disneyland for the day. It was a bit overwhelming for her, but in a good way, I think. She got a bit starstruck meeting Minnie Mouse and Princess Belle. She seemed to enjoy all the rides and since Mommy was pregnant, M got to enjoy the rides with Daddy.
PREPARING FOR BABY LUKE
The month prior to Baby Luke's arrival, I made sure to spend lots of quality time with M. Some highlights included going to the awesome pumpkin patch at the Irvine Regional Park, Pretend City, and of course Sea World and Disneyland.
I
was confident that M would absolutely love her baby brother but that it
would take a bit of adjustment so we prepared her by simply talking to
her about Baby Luke being in mommy's tummy (one night she pointed to my
belly and asked me to open it!) and reading some big sister books.
We
also had her pick out a present to give to Baby Luke. Clever Makayla
ended up picking out toys that she liked and saying she wanted to give
them to Baby Luke (e.g., a princess grocery cart). I'll save the update
about Makayla and Luke for another post.
Some fun places M's visited:
Kidspace Museum
La Habra Museum
Newport Beach Library
Trick or treating
Pretend City
pumpkin patches
Sea World
Disneyland
What's been on Makayla's mind lately?
Water table
Shovels
Lollipops
Spinning teacups
What's been on Makayla's mind lately?
Water table
Shovels
Lollipops
Spinning teacups
Princesses
Spoon and cups
Mickey and Minnie MouseBoots
Shopping carts
