Just a quick update to say that Leah has finally achieved something she's been working at for the last week or so: jumping off her step stool! She did this a few times today and was really excited.
Also, before now, she could only jump up and down, but now she can also jump forward over and over, 7 or 8 times in a row! Go Leah!
Showing posts with label development. Show all posts
Showing posts with label development. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Another installment of Leah's Latest
In three short weeks, we'll say goodbye to all things familiar and board a plane to Shanghai, which will be our new home for the next three years. Until that time, there's still so much to arrange, but hopefully, with good planning (and very little sleep), we'll get it all done. The movers are coming this week, so we'll be very busy organizing and separating which stuff is going by sea, by air, in our luggage, with us on the plane, and which stuff we'll leave behind.
All of Leahs' toys will disappear and she'll have nothing to play with for another two weeks, except for a few things we'll bring with us on the plane to keep her busy during a 20-hour travel day. We have a feeling she won't let her play kitchen go without a fight. We feel really bad that she might not see it for another 2-3 months. It'll be a crazy week, especially since nothing is easy when you have an active toddler around.
So for now, here's my latest installment of what Leah's been up to lately. She's actually been doing many of these things even before I even went to Shanghai, but I haven't had much time to blog since then.
Jumping - Her jumping is getting better and better. She jumps all the time, and even did a double jump once. Oh, and when she's mad and trying to get her point across, she will not only stomp her feet, but she'll jump, too!
Singing and dancing - Leah loves music. She sings all the time now. She sings along with music in the car, and to herself whenever she feels like it. She loves to sing and dance together. And we have even seen her playing her xylophone like a piano while singing along.
Here are a few clips of her singing today.
Pretending to sleep - Something she likes to do is crawl into bed and lay on a pillow and pull the covers up and go "shhh" and close her eyes. She even does the motion for turning out the lights. If only it were that easy getting her to sleep!
Pretending to read - She runs her finger along the words in a book and pretends she's reading. Or she pretends to spell words. For instance, when I wear my Gap sweatshirt, she points to each letter and sounds like she's trying to spell the word Gap.
Oh no! - Her favorite expression nowadays is "Oh no!" and this has pretty much replaced "Uh oh". She's always exclaiming "Oh no! Oh no! Oh no!" every time she sees something is wrong. If she sees something has spilled, or the notices something in a book or on Tv, etc., she shouts this. One funny example, I had a zit on my nose for about three days, and she noticed it right away. Every day, she would come right up to me and point at it and go "Oh no!" with great concern.
Hug your ba-ba's - Whenever we say this to Leah while she's eating in her highchair, she goes crazy and thinks it's just hilarious. She grabs her sippy cups and hugs them really tight and laughs so hard!
Laugh and smile - She knows the meaning of these words now. When I say "laugh", she'll giggle. And when I say "smile" she'll do a big cheesy grin.
Cheese! - She has her own camera (an old one that no longer works right), but she loves to turn it on and take pictures. Usually she has it pointing toward her face, which is cute. The last few days, I've noticed her saying "cheese" when she's trying to take a picture. And also when I'm taking a picture of her.
All done! - She says this in a sing-song way with the arm motions, the way we learned it in Kindermusik, whenever she's done eating or taking a bath or at the end of a book.
There you are! - She says this all the time whenever one of us reappears or when she sees something she's looking for, and it really does mean "there you are/there it is". Her version sounds like "day yee ah".
I'm fine - I've been teaching Leah how to answer when I ask "How are you?". So now, when I ask, she says all by herself "I'm fine". She usually tries it about 10 times in a row, and sometimes it's very clear!
Phone calls - Her phone calls are getting better and better. We get such a kick out of watching her on the phone. Stay tuned for some good videos of her making calls.
Here she is a few weeks ago in the car right after she woke up from a nap. This went on for about 10 minutes straight and I took a bunch of videos, but here is just one.
Her step stool - Leah has discovered how handy a step stool can be. She carries it around with her all over the house to get a better view of things on the countertops and over the safety gates. So now, we have to be even more careful about what is on the counters because she's grabbing everything she can off of them. Note to self: hide the step stool.
She also loves trying on her santa hat.
All of Leahs' toys will disappear and she'll have nothing to play with for another two weeks, except for a few things we'll bring with us on the plane to keep her busy during a 20-hour travel day. We have a feeling she won't let her play kitchen go without a fight. We feel really bad that she might not see it for another 2-3 months. It'll be a crazy week, especially since nothing is easy when you have an active toddler around.
So for now, here's my latest installment of what Leah's been up to lately. She's actually been doing many of these things even before I even went to Shanghai, but I haven't had much time to blog since then.
Jumping - Her jumping is getting better and better. She jumps all the time, and even did a double jump once. Oh, and when she's mad and trying to get her point across, she will not only stomp her feet, but she'll jump, too!
Singing and dancing - Leah loves music. She sings all the time now. She sings along with music in the car, and to herself whenever she feels like it. She loves to sing and dance together. And we have even seen her playing her xylophone like a piano while singing along.
Here are a few clips of her singing today.
Pretending to sleep - Something she likes to do is crawl into bed and lay on a pillow and pull the covers up and go "shhh" and close her eyes. She even does the motion for turning out the lights. If only it were that easy getting her to sleep!
Pretending to read - She runs her finger along the words in a book and pretends she's reading. Or she pretends to spell words. For instance, when I wear my Gap sweatshirt, she points to each letter and sounds like she's trying to spell the word Gap.
Oh no! - Her favorite expression nowadays is "Oh no!" and this has pretty much replaced "Uh oh". She's always exclaiming "Oh no! Oh no! Oh no!" every time she sees something is wrong. If she sees something has spilled, or the notices something in a book or on Tv, etc., she shouts this. One funny example, I had a zit on my nose for about three days, and she noticed it right away. Every day, she would come right up to me and point at it and go "Oh no!" with great concern.
Hug your ba-ba's - Whenever we say this to Leah while she's eating in her highchair, she goes crazy and thinks it's just hilarious. She grabs her sippy cups and hugs them really tight and laughs so hard!
Laugh and smile - She knows the meaning of these words now. When I say "laugh", she'll giggle. And when I say "smile" she'll do a big cheesy grin.
Cheese! - She has her own camera (an old one that no longer works right), but she loves to turn it on and take pictures. Usually she has it pointing toward her face, which is cute. The last few days, I've noticed her saying "cheese" when she's trying to take a picture. And also when I'm taking a picture of her.
All done! - She says this in a sing-song way with the arm motions, the way we learned it in Kindermusik, whenever she's done eating or taking a bath or at the end of a book.
There you are! - She says this all the time whenever one of us reappears or when she sees something she's looking for, and it really does mean "there you are/there it is". Her version sounds like "day yee ah".
I'm fine - I've been teaching Leah how to answer when I ask "How are you?". So now, when I ask, she says all by herself "I'm fine". She usually tries it about 10 times in a row, and sometimes it's very clear!
Phone calls - Her phone calls are getting better and better. We get such a kick out of watching her on the phone. Stay tuned for some good videos of her making calls.
Here she is a few weeks ago in the car right after she woke up from a nap. This went on for about 10 minutes straight and I took a bunch of videos, but here is just one.
Her step stool - Leah has discovered how handy a step stool can be. She carries it around with her all over the house to get a better view of things on the countertops and over the safety gates. So now, we have to be even more careful about what is on the counters because she's grabbing everything she can off of them. Note to self: hide the step stool.
She also loves trying on her santa hat.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Jumpin' Jin-Ri
In the past few days, Leah has started hopping and jumping. I think her jumping butt-plops were the preparation for this. These have also gotten a lot better since that one video over the holidays, and in addition to the ottoman, she now tries it on the floor (carpeted, thank goodness), in the bathtub and made a big splash! (fortunately with a cushioned bath mat), and on the beds. She really throws her legs out from under her and plops down.
But nowadays, she is really starting to jump. And whenever we even say the word "jump", she'll do it. You can see how proud she is of herself! And we are too.
But nowadays, she is really starting to jump. And whenever we even say the word "jump", she'll do it. You can see how proud she is of herself! And we are too.
Friday, January 8, 2010
18 months old today
We can't believe Leah is 18 months old already! It's so amazing to watch her grow and change day-by-day. Cognitively, she can understand so much and can communicate so well these days. It won't be too much longer before she starts putting words together.
She was supposed to have her 18-month check-up today, but we had a snow day here and the appointment was rescheduled for Monday. Lucky for her, since she's due for some more shots, including her second H1N1 shot. Turned out we didn't get that much snow after all, so while we were out running errands, we ended up going downtown to the Korean restaurant for some delicious food. Leah loves Korean food and pigs out whenever we go there. We can't believe how much she can eat. We've become regulars there and will really miss the great food and the nice people there, and that will definitely be one of our stops during our home visits.
Over the holidays, we finally switched her car seat to forward-facing. Even though you can do this at 12 months or 20 lbs., we wanted to keep her backward-facing for as long as possible for safety reasons. But she is starting to get taller and heavier and it was becoming hard for me to get her into the car seat, plus, her feet were touching the seat back, so we decided it was time. The only bad thing is that I can't reach over the seat and hand her things anymore. Now I have to throw them, but she thinks that's pretty funny, too.
Here are some of the cute, funny, and smart things Leah has been up to lately....this is a long one.
Touchdown! Since John is a huge NY Giants fan, we've spent a lot of Sundays this season watching football together (at least until the Giants were out of the running). Leah loves hanging out with us in front of the tv and sharing snacks. We taught her how to say "touchdown" and now when she sees football on tv, even a short tv commercial or something, she raises her arms up over her head and shouts "tah dah!".
Mom-Mom. Ever since the holidays, Leah has started calling me "mom-mom". She had already been calling me "mama" before this, but just not that often. And she would say "Hi da da" to both of us. Now, I'm finally getting my turn. She loves repeating "mom-mom" or "mama" over and over again and will call out for me when she doesn't see me. If I'm upstairs or something, I'll hear her shouting "mom-mom!".
New animal sounds. She already knew duck, dog, cat, sheep, cow, etc......and now we can add horse, frog and monkey to that list.
Name that ornament. One of her favorite activities right now is to drag us over to the Christmas tree (yes, we're planning on dragging it out of here this weekend), and have us quiz her on all the ornament names. She is such a quick learner and has a great memory, so after quickly naming everything for her, she can identify and point to all the ornaments by name. In fact, she can't get enough of it and she probably won't let the tree go without a fight!
Knock Knock. I've had the show "House Hunters" on the past few days. During the intro to the show there's a doorbell sound. Whenever Leah hears that, she says "nah nah", she made that association on her own. If she can't get a door open, she knocks on it and says "nah nah". It's really cute. She loves saying knock knock, and we always hear her saying that in the car while reaching towards the door and trying to knock on it.
Hugs and kisses. Leah is so incredibly affectionate. She spontaneously, without any prompting, gives hugs and kisses all the time. When we say "I love you" she has to give us a kiss and a hug. She often comes up from behind and just hugs us. When we're out in stores or in restaurants, she often reaches for us and pulls us over to hug our arms, and won't let go. We call it, "Leah's having a moment". It can get a little embarrassing even! But hey, I'm not complaning.
Leading us around. She still loves to grab us by our fingers and drag us around. She'll lead us over to the Christmas tree and make us lift her up, or she'll lead us to her kitchen and pull us down to sit and play, or push us up from sitting, etc. She definitely lets us know what she wants and is very strong and persuasive!
Bye! Leah loves to say "Hi" and "Bye" and wave. She says it all the time, to people in stores, to us as we are walking away from her or going to another room, in the car, or on the phone when she's making pretend phone calls. These days, with her pretend phone calls, she's actually making calls instead of just receiving them. She presses the buttons and says "beep beep beep" for dialing the phone, and then a bunch of babble, and then "Bye!".
"Hi Beppe". After over two weeks with Beppe, Leah definitely now knows who Beppe is, something which we will help to reinforce with pictures since she won't be seeing Beppe often. Towards the end of the holidays, she was starting to say "Hi Beppe".
"Drink your milk". At meals, I just have to say "drink your milk", and she'll take a sip (if she's in a cooperative mood, that is).
Tick Tock. Leah got a little clock for Christmas and I taught her that the clock says "tick tock" and showed her by putting it up to her ear. She found a clock in one of her picture books and ran over and got her clock and put it to her ear and tries to say "tick tock". Too cute.
Play kitchen. She loves playing in her new kitchen. It's her hangout, and the first thing she goes to every morning. We get a kick out of watching her stirring something and then tasting it. Today, she was pointing to the cookies in the display case and saying "ka ka" (cracker, we sometimes just call cookies crackers) and then she ran and got a little goldfish cracker and put it next to it. She also started using the price scanner as a telephone and made a bunch of phone calls today. It was hilarious. I took a video of it and will post it soon.
Hot Hot Hot. When her food is still a little hot, I've always said "hot hot hot" and blown on it. She knows what this means and will do the same. If something is a little hot, she'll say "hot hot" and blow on it.
Hup. When she wants to be picked up, she'll say "hup" or "up" and hold her arms out.
Ah-choo. Leah thinks sneezing is pretty funny. I was sneezing the other day, and then doing it in an exaggerated way, and now she knows the word sneeze and will say "ah choo".
There it is/There you are. She doesn't really enunciate, of course, but she uses the correct intonation and uses it appropriately when she sees something or when she sees us.
Potty update. I haven't pushed this at all lately. But she still climbs out of the bathtub quite often and pees in the potty. And at other times, she will just sit on it with her diaper, and when I check her diaper it is warm, so she does pee. It's funny, because even if she has her diaper on, she will check the potty to see if there's anything in it.
Stomp Stomp In one of her Kindermusik books, there's an elephant stomping. So whenever she sees an elephant, she will say "top top" and stomp her feet. The other day, she was in the closet pointing to something and stomping and saying "top top". When I looked to see what she was pointing to, it was one of John's ties (that he never wears) that has elephants on it. She loves this Kindermusik book and can do all the motions for each animal. She especially loves the page with the ladybug who can "stop and make no sound". I mentioned this already before, but she just loves doing this. She says "top", and makes the hand motion for stop and then the Shhh motion. She does this spontaneously all the time.
Other new words she says by herself are "baby", when she sees a baby, "good girl" since I say this to her a lot, "all done" and she says this with the tune and the hand motions we learned in Kindermusik, "cracker". I'm sure there are more, but this is all I can think of right now. She can repeat just about any word I throw at her. She understands so much and can follow instructions really well. She's a really fast learner and picks things up really quickly. This is such an amazing stage!
She was supposed to have her 18-month check-up today, but we had a snow day here and the appointment was rescheduled for Monday. Lucky for her, since she's due for some more shots, including her second H1N1 shot. Turned out we didn't get that much snow after all, so while we were out running errands, we ended up going downtown to the Korean restaurant for some delicious food. Leah loves Korean food and pigs out whenever we go there. We can't believe how much she can eat. We've become regulars there and will really miss the great food and the nice people there, and that will definitely be one of our stops during our home visits.
Over the holidays, we finally switched her car seat to forward-facing. Even though you can do this at 12 months or 20 lbs., we wanted to keep her backward-facing for as long as possible for safety reasons. But she is starting to get taller and heavier and it was becoming hard for me to get her into the car seat, plus, her feet were touching the seat back, so we decided it was time. The only bad thing is that I can't reach over the seat and hand her things anymore. Now I have to throw them, but she thinks that's pretty funny, too.
Here are some of the cute, funny, and smart things Leah has been up to lately....this is a long one.
Touchdown! Since John is a huge NY Giants fan, we've spent a lot of Sundays this season watching football together (at least until the Giants were out of the running). Leah loves hanging out with us in front of the tv and sharing snacks. We taught her how to say "touchdown" and now when she sees football on tv, even a short tv commercial or something, she raises her arms up over her head and shouts "tah dah!".
Mom-Mom. Ever since the holidays, Leah has started calling me "mom-mom". She had already been calling me "mama" before this, but just not that often. And she would say "Hi da da" to both of us. Now, I'm finally getting my turn. She loves repeating "mom-mom" or "mama" over and over again and will call out for me when she doesn't see me. If I'm upstairs or something, I'll hear her shouting "mom-mom!".
New animal sounds. She already knew duck, dog, cat, sheep, cow, etc......and now we can add horse, frog and monkey to that list.
Name that ornament. One of her favorite activities right now is to drag us over to the Christmas tree (yes, we're planning on dragging it out of here this weekend), and have us quiz her on all the ornament names. She is such a quick learner and has a great memory, so after quickly naming everything for her, she can identify and point to all the ornaments by name. In fact, she can't get enough of it and she probably won't let the tree go without a fight!
Knock Knock. I've had the show "House Hunters" on the past few days. During the intro to the show there's a doorbell sound. Whenever Leah hears that, she says "nah nah", she made that association on her own. If she can't get a door open, she knocks on it and says "nah nah". It's really cute. She loves saying knock knock, and we always hear her saying that in the car while reaching towards the door and trying to knock on it.
Hugs and kisses. Leah is so incredibly affectionate. She spontaneously, without any prompting, gives hugs and kisses all the time. When we say "I love you" she has to give us a kiss and a hug. She often comes up from behind and just hugs us. When we're out in stores or in restaurants, she often reaches for us and pulls us over to hug our arms, and won't let go. We call it, "Leah's having a moment". It can get a little embarrassing even! But hey, I'm not complaning.
Leading us around. She still loves to grab us by our fingers and drag us around. She'll lead us over to the Christmas tree and make us lift her up, or she'll lead us to her kitchen and pull us down to sit and play, or push us up from sitting, etc. She definitely lets us know what she wants and is very strong and persuasive!
Bye! Leah loves to say "Hi" and "Bye" and wave. She says it all the time, to people in stores, to us as we are walking away from her or going to another room, in the car, or on the phone when she's making pretend phone calls. These days, with her pretend phone calls, she's actually making calls instead of just receiving them. She presses the buttons and says "beep beep beep" for dialing the phone, and then a bunch of babble, and then "Bye!".
"Hi Beppe". After over two weeks with Beppe, Leah definitely now knows who Beppe is, something which we will help to reinforce with pictures since she won't be seeing Beppe often. Towards the end of the holidays, she was starting to say "Hi Beppe".
"Drink your milk". At meals, I just have to say "drink your milk", and she'll take a sip (if she's in a cooperative mood, that is).
Tick Tock. Leah got a little clock for Christmas and I taught her that the clock says "tick tock" and showed her by putting it up to her ear. She found a clock in one of her picture books and ran over and got her clock and put it to her ear and tries to say "tick tock". Too cute.
Play kitchen. She loves playing in her new kitchen. It's her hangout, and the first thing she goes to every morning. We get a kick out of watching her stirring something and then tasting it. Today, she was pointing to the cookies in the display case and saying "ka ka" (cracker, we sometimes just call cookies crackers) and then she ran and got a little goldfish cracker and put it next to it. She also started using the price scanner as a telephone and made a bunch of phone calls today. It was hilarious. I took a video of it and will post it soon.
Hot Hot Hot. When her food is still a little hot, I've always said "hot hot hot" and blown on it. She knows what this means and will do the same. If something is a little hot, she'll say "hot hot" and blow on it.
Hup. When she wants to be picked up, she'll say "hup" or "up" and hold her arms out.
Ah-choo. Leah thinks sneezing is pretty funny. I was sneezing the other day, and then doing it in an exaggerated way, and now she knows the word sneeze and will say "ah choo".
There it is/There you are. She doesn't really enunciate, of course, but she uses the correct intonation and uses it appropriately when she sees something or when she sees us.
Potty update. I haven't pushed this at all lately. But she still climbs out of the bathtub quite often and pees in the potty. And at other times, she will just sit on it with her diaper, and when I check her diaper it is warm, so she does pee. It's funny, because even if she has her diaper on, she will check the potty to see if there's anything in it.
Stomp Stomp In one of her Kindermusik books, there's an elephant stomping. So whenever she sees an elephant, she will say "top top" and stomp her feet. The other day, she was in the closet pointing to something and stomping and saying "top top". When I looked to see what she was pointing to, it was one of John's ties (that he never wears) that has elephants on it. She loves this Kindermusik book and can do all the motions for each animal. She especially loves the page with the ladybug who can "stop and make no sound". I mentioned this already before, but she just loves doing this. She says "top", and makes the hand motion for stop and then the Shhh motion. She does this spontaneously all the time.
Other new words she says by herself are "baby", when she sees a baby, "good girl" since I say this to her a lot, "all done" and she says this with the tune and the hand motions we learned in Kindermusik, "cracker". I'm sure there are more, but this is all I can think of right now. She can repeat just about any word I throw at her. She understands so much and can follow instructions really well. She's a really fast learner and picks things up really quickly. This is such an amazing stage!
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Leah's latest
Just a few things that I forgot to add in my latest update of what Leah's been up to lately. Thought I would add these now before we get carried away in the holiday madness.
Even though it sometimes seems she isn't getting much out of her Kindermusik classes, she has clearly been paying attention because she is starting to imitate things she's learned there. In one of the story books we read, there's a line that says "Ladybug can stop, and make no sound", and the teacher uses a hand gesture for "stop", and then does the "shhh" gesture. Lately, Leah has been doing that totally on her own, out of the blue. She says "stop" (sounds like "dop"), using the hand motion and then "shhh!".
And the other thing is that we have quiet time in class (where we all lay down for a few minutes while listening to soft lullaby music), and when the teacher turns the lights on and off, she says "Get out your counting fingers .....1....2....3.....shhhh!" and then she turns on/off the lights. So lately, Leah climbs up on top of her toy box where there's a light switch, and she imitates this whole sequence. She holds out her fingers like she's counting, while making her counting sounds, and then flips the light switch and goes "shhh!"
Knock Knock. Now that Leah can open all the doors around the house, I've taught her how to knock on the door and say "knock knock". Not a bad thing to learn. In Leah speak, it sounds like "nah nah". She likes to knock on the door to John's music room, which is always closed. And she has figured out that the other sliding door in her bathroom is the music room, too. She brings over the footstool to the door, and stands on it and tries to pick the lock while she knocks on the door, saying "nah nah".
Whenever she's hungry, she goes to the fridge and tries to open it. Or she leads us over to the fridge to get her something. And when she is in the fridge, the best way to get her out of it is to ask her to close the door and then praise her profusely. It works every time.
She sings all the time these days, and her singing is getting a little more complex, too. Now it goes on a little further than just the "dah dah dah, dah dah dah" (to the tune of Jingle Bells). Now she keeps going. She loves to say the word "sing" and she says it perfectly.
A new word just this week is "cracker", which sounds like "ka ko". She says it on her own and usually with a question mark, "ka ko"? And her favorite crackers are Goldfish crackers, Nilla wafers, and of course, Teddy Grahams. I usually get a few bonus hugs when we're eating Teddy Grahams.
Ever since her birthday when she got her first stickers, she has loved playing with stickers. We now have stickers stuck to just about every cabinet, door, appliance, mirror, and piece of furniture in the whole house.
She just loves coloring in her coloring books. This is one of her favorite activities these days, and she's doing this every day. Thank goodness for these cool Color Wonder markers that go on clear and only work on the special paper. She loves to hang out with me on the playmat and color together (and even throws a fit when I try to get up). She decides which marker I can have and spends most of the time taking my markers from me and then handing me new ones (So bossy!). She understands when I say "go get another marker" or "go get one for mama", and she runs and gets it. (She also loves coloring with crayons, but we have to be careful since she's already drawn on the fridge, the dishwasher, the table legs, and the walls. So let's just say we've put those away for now.)
"Wow" is still one of her favorite words. She uses it all the time. Sometimes it's a big, long, drawn out "wow oh wowow wow!" that goes on forever, or a loud "Whoah!" But the best ones are the whispered "wow's". A while back, the neighbor's cat came up on our deck and looked at us through our patio door, and Leah gasped and then did a really soft "wow". And the other day, she found a clear plastic coin bank in one of her dresser drawers (the size of a can of cola) with Korean coins in it, and every time she would shake it, she would tilt her head and then whisper "wow!" It was really funny.
She loves Korean food. She gets so excited when we go to the Korean restaurant. Her favorite things are the soup with tofu, mandu guk (dumpling soup), and chap chae (glass noodles with veggies). She gobbles it all up and has so much fun. She sways and dances in her booster seat, tries to charm everyone by smiling at them, and loves to practice her chopstick skills. The last time we were there, she actually managed to use her chopsticks to eat the chap chae noodles, and she was able to use the spoon to drink the soup all by herself.
And last but not least, she is now physically maneuvering us and man-handling us. She started this actually a long time ago, with her second Kindermusik class (when she didn't want me to lay down for quiet time). If she doesn't like me laying down, she will try to pull and push me up. She will even grab me by the head and try to lift me! And then she goes around my back and tries to push me up. If I'm sitting and she wants me to stand and pick her up, she'll grab me around the ears and make a concerted effort to try to pick me up. She's pretty darn strong, too. So far it's kinda cute that she's doing this, but I'm sure we'll have to put a stop to it eventually!
Even though it sometimes seems she isn't getting much out of her Kindermusik classes, she has clearly been paying attention because she is starting to imitate things she's learned there. In one of the story books we read, there's a line that says "Ladybug can stop, and make no sound", and the teacher uses a hand gesture for "stop", and then does the "shhh" gesture. Lately, Leah has been doing that totally on her own, out of the blue. She says "stop" (sounds like "dop"), using the hand motion and then "shhh!".
And the other thing is that we have quiet time in class (where we all lay down for a few minutes while listening to soft lullaby music), and when the teacher turns the lights on and off, she says "Get out your counting fingers .....1....2....3.....shhhh!" and then she turns on/off the lights. So lately, Leah climbs up on top of her toy box where there's a light switch, and she imitates this whole sequence. She holds out her fingers like she's counting, while making her counting sounds, and then flips the light switch and goes "shhh!"
Knock Knock. Now that Leah can open all the doors around the house, I've taught her how to knock on the door and say "knock knock". Not a bad thing to learn. In Leah speak, it sounds like "nah nah". She likes to knock on the door to John's music room, which is always closed. And she has figured out that the other sliding door in her bathroom is the music room, too. She brings over the footstool to the door, and stands on it and tries to pick the lock while she knocks on the door, saying "nah nah".
Whenever she's hungry, she goes to the fridge and tries to open it. Or she leads us over to the fridge to get her something. And when she is in the fridge, the best way to get her out of it is to ask her to close the door and then praise her profusely. It works every time.
She sings all the time these days, and her singing is getting a little more complex, too. Now it goes on a little further than just the "dah dah dah, dah dah dah" (to the tune of Jingle Bells). Now she keeps going. She loves to say the word "sing" and she says it perfectly.
A new word just this week is "cracker", which sounds like "ka ko". She says it on her own and usually with a question mark, "ka ko"? And her favorite crackers are Goldfish crackers, Nilla wafers, and of course, Teddy Grahams. I usually get a few bonus hugs when we're eating Teddy Grahams.
Ever since her birthday when she got her first stickers, she has loved playing with stickers. We now have stickers stuck to just about every cabinet, door, appliance, mirror, and piece of furniture in the whole house.
She just loves coloring in her coloring books. This is one of her favorite activities these days, and she's doing this every day. Thank goodness for these cool Color Wonder markers that go on clear and only work on the special paper. She loves to hang out with me on the playmat and color together (and even throws a fit when I try to get up). She decides which marker I can have and spends most of the time taking my markers from me and then handing me new ones (So bossy!). She understands when I say "go get another marker" or "go get one for mama", and she runs and gets it. (She also loves coloring with crayons, but we have to be careful since she's already drawn on the fridge, the dishwasher, the table legs, and the walls. So let's just say we've put those away for now.)
"Wow" is still one of her favorite words. She uses it all the time. Sometimes it's a big, long, drawn out "wow oh wowow wow!" that goes on forever, or a loud "Whoah!" But the best ones are the whispered "wow's". A while back, the neighbor's cat came up on our deck and looked at us through our patio door, and Leah gasped and then did a really soft "wow". And the other day, she found a clear plastic coin bank in one of her dresser drawers (the size of a can of cola) with Korean coins in it, and every time she would shake it, she would tilt her head and then whisper "wow!" It was really funny.
She loves Korean food. She gets so excited when we go to the Korean restaurant. Her favorite things are the soup with tofu, mandu guk (dumpling soup), and chap chae (glass noodles with veggies). She gobbles it all up and has so much fun. She sways and dances in her booster seat, tries to charm everyone by smiling at them, and loves to practice her chopstick skills. The last time we were there, she actually managed to use her chopsticks to eat the chap chae noodles, and she was able to use the spoon to drink the soup all by herself.
And last but not least, she is now physically maneuvering us and man-handling us. She started this actually a long time ago, with her second Kindermusik class (when she didn't want me to lay down for quiet time). If she doesn't like me laying down, she will try to pull and push me up. She will even grab me by the head and try to lift me! And then she goes around my back and tries to push me up. If I'm sitting and she wants me to stand and pick her up, she'll grab me around the ears and make a concerted effort to try to pick me up. She's pretty darn strong, too. So far it's kinda cute that she's doing this, but I'm sure we'll have to put a stop to it eventually!
Friday, December 4, 2009
Leah's latest
Time for another update of the funny things she's been up to lately.
Answering our questions with a really long "Um" while she looks off to the side, as if she's really thinking about it. Sometimes she'll then say "Um, no", and shake her head.
Saying "Hi dada" all day long (to both of us), every time she sees us. It usually goes like this: Leah: "Hi". Us: "Hi Leah". Leah: "Hi Dada.....Hi Dada". Us: "Hi baby, how are you?". Leah "Hi Dada".....this goes on and on for a few minutes...
Exclaiming "Wow!!" after each song on her Korean children's cd. She does this for the first 10 songs or so, and then she's all "wow'd" out.
She loves going outside, and says "outside?" really clearly while pulling on the patio door handle and crying. She usually chooses to do this while she's dressed in just a diaper on the coldest, rainiest day.
Doing somersaults off my lap while I'm holding her. She just falls forward with no advance warning, and loves to have me flip her over.
Holding our hands and leading us around the house. She never used to like holding hands, even when she was learning to walk. Now, she loves to grab us by the finger and drag us around.
Pretending to cry. She saw someone crying on TV while we were watching her favorite show, SYTYCD, and she started imitating it. Nowadays, when we say the word "crying" or "baby", she will squeeze her face tight and pretend to cry.
Answering our questions with a really long "Um" while she looks off to the side, as if she's really thinking about it. Sometimes she'll then say "Um, no", and shake her head.
Saying "Hi dada" all day long (to both of us), every time she sees us. It usually goes like this: Leah: "Hi". Us: "Hi Leah". Leah: "Hi Dada.....Hi Dada". Us: "Hi baby, how are you?". Leah "Hi Dada".....this goes on and on for a few minutes...
Exclaiming "Wow!!" after each song on her Korean children's cd. She does this for the first 10 songs or so, and then she's all "wow'd" out.
She loves going outside, and says "outside?" really clearly while pulling on the patio door handle and crying. She usually chooses to do this while she's dressed in just a diaper on the coldest, rainiest day.
Doing somersaults off my lap while I'm holding her. She just falls forward with no advance warning, and loves to have me flip her over.
Holding our hands and leading us around the house. She never used to like holding hands, even when she was learning to walk. Now, she loves to grab us by the finger and drag us around.
Pretending to cry. She saw someone crying on TV while we were watching her favorite show, SYTYCD, and she started imitating it. Nowadays, when we say the word "crying" or "baby", she will squeeze her face tight and pretend to cry.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Monkey Girl
These should be in the reverse order, but you get the picture. Don't worry, I was right there and only snapped photos when I could do it quickly.
She made it all the way up to the top all by herself. She's so strong! But she was so mad because what she really wanted was to squeeze through the banister to get on the stairs themselves! But it was time for her bath and I definitely didn't want to get her started playing on the stairs, which could last forever.
No No No, Me Me Me and other new discoveries
It started about a week ago. Leah was practicing the words "No No No" and shaking her head No when we'd ask her a question or offer her something, and using "Me Me Me" when she wanted something. She usually stomps her feet in both cases for full effect. John told me that during the week he was taking care of her, she would "Shhh!" him and shake her head No when he started singing. And one day she didn't like the outfit he picked out and she wanted to choose a different one. We've got one sassy girl on our hands, I'm afraid.
Leah has also figured out how to open doors and is letting herself out of her room in the morning. She's finally able to reach the door handles. Our house has door levers instead of knobs, and she is now tall enough to get up on her tippy-toes and open them all by herself. John said she just started doing this a few times while I was away. On the morning that he left for Shanghai, he had forgotten to put the baby gate back in place at the top of the stairs, and I found her at 6:30 am with her door open, standing and crying at the top of the stairs. Thank goodness I caught her in time since she likes to think she can walk down the stairs forwards like we do. And just today, I saw her coming out of the laundry room, and I always keep that door shut. She can open the pantry door, too.
Singing. She started this several weeks ago. Leah loves watching Sesame Street and particularly loves Elmo. I always sing the Elmo song to her, the one that sounds like Jingle Bells, and she sings it all the time now, too. When I say the word "sing" or "can you sing?", she starts "da da da, da da da". And she says the word "sing" and starts singing spontaneously just by herself. It's really cute.
Acting out songs. When I'm singing to her in the car, I can see she's doing the motions along with the song. I play the CD from Kindermusik for her in the car and sing a lot, and she is really catching on and recognizing the words. For instance, she acts out the "If you're happy and you know it" song and "Itsy Bitsy Spider", and just about any song that has the words jumping, stomping, waving, wiggling, etc.
Blowing her nose. She's been doing this for quite a while, too. Whenever I'd hand her a Kleenex, she would practice and imitate me, but now she's actually getting good at it. It's great since she always has stuff in her nose that I can never get out, so when I give her a Kleenex and say "ok, blow your nose", she'll do it, and she blows hard, too.
Trying to get dressed. She really wants to figure out how to get her clothes, socks, and shoes on. She sits there for quite a while working at it and gets really frustrated. But she doesn't quite realize that pants don't go on your head or around your neck. One thing she's gotten good at lately is unzipping things. So it's hard keeping some sweatshirts and sweaters on her because she's always unzipping them and taking them off.
Waving Hi and Bye Bye to everyone. She used to just open and close her hand, and it was usually facing her, but lately she's figured out how to do the beauty queen wave. She loves saying Hi to people while I'm strolling her around. And she says Bye Bye when we're leaving and going back to the car.
Blowing bubbles in her drink. We always give her a cup to drink from, and she can control it and drink really well from it without spilling. Nowadays, just for fun, she loves to blow bubbles in it. She's also figured out how to make a bunch of silly sounds with her mouth by patting her mouth or running her fingers over her lips.
Coughing. She just started developing a cough yesterday (we'll have to get that checked out) and she would ask "Dis?" while she was coughing. She always loves to learn the words for what she is doing. So I'd tell her that she was coughing and pat my chest and cover my mouth, and now she does that, too. When I say the word "cough", she does it. She even does it in her sleep. Last night, she started coughing in the middle of the night while she was sleeping, and asked "Dis?" and coughed a little more and then fell back asleep.
Leah has also figured out how to open doors and is letting herself out of her room in the morning. She's finally able to reach the door handles. Our house has door levers instead of knobs, and she is now tall enough to get up on her tippy-toes and open them all by herself. John said she just started doing this a few times while I was away. On the morning that he left for Shanghai, he had forgotten to put the baby gate back in place at the top of the stairs, and I found her at 6:30 am with her door open, standing and crying at the top of the stairs. Thank goodness I caught her in time since she likes to think she can walk down the stairs forwards like we do. And just today, I saw her coming out of the laundry room, and I always keep that door shut. She can open the pantry door, too.
Singing. She started this several weeks ago. Leah loves watching Sesame Street and particularly loves Elmo. I always sing the Elmo song to her, the one that sounds like Jingle Bells, and she sings it all the time now, too. When I say the word "sing" or "can you sing?", she starts "da da da, da da da". And she says the word "sing" and starts singing spontaneously just by herself. It's really cute.
Acting out songs. When I'm singing to her in the car, I can see she's doing the motions along with the song. I play the CD from Kindermusik for her in the car and sing a lot, and she is really catching on and recognizing the words. For instance, she acts out the "If you're happy and you know it" song and "Itsy Bitsy Spider", and just about any song that has the words jumping, stomping, waving, wiggling, etc.
Blowing her nose. She's been doing this for quite a while, too. Whenever I'd hand her a Kleenex, she would practice and imitate me, but now she's actually getting good at it. It's great since she always has stuff in her nose that I can never get out, so when I give her a Kleenex and say "ok, blow your nose", she'll do it, and she blows hard, too.
Trying to get dressed. She really wants to figure out how to get her clothes, socks, and shoes on. She sits there for quite a while working at it and gets really frustrated. But she doesn't quite realize that pants don't go on your head or around your neck. One thing she's gotten good at lately is unzipping things. So it's hard keeping some sweatshirts and sweaters on her because she's always unzipping them and taking them off.
Waving Hi and Bye Bye to everyone. She used to just open and close her hand, and it was usually facing her, but lately she's figured out how to do the beauty queen wave. She loves saying Hi to people while I'm strolling her around. And she says Bye Bye when we're leaving and going back to the car.
Blowing bubbles in her drink. We always give her a cup to drink from, and she can control it and drink really well from it without spilling. Nowadays, just for fun, she loves to blow bubbles in it. She's also figured out how to make a bunch of silly sounds with her mouth by patting her mouth or running her fingers over her lips.
Coughing. She just started developing a cough yesterday (we'll have to get that checked out) and she would ask "Dis?" while she was coughing. She always loves to learn the words for what she is doing. So I'd tell her that she was coughing and pat my chest and cover my mouth, and now she does that, too. When I say the word "cough", she does it. She even does it in her sleep. Last night, she started coughing in the middle of the night while she was sleeping, and asked "Dis?" and coughed a little more and then fell back asleep.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Like a Sponge
Leah's doing new things all the time, it's sometimes hard to keep up with her. Here's what she's been up to in the past few weeks....
Playing pretend. Trying to put her pyjamas on her stuffed pug and put him to bed. This is usually when I'm trying to put her PJ's on her after her bath, and she won't let me have them because she's so busy trying to dress her doggie. She gives him hugs and kisses and when she lays him down on the bed, she goes "shhhhh" and puts her finger to her mouth. Well, she doesn't quite make the right sound (sounds more like "ffff") and actually puts her finger on her teeth, but she's getting close. And she's still enjoying her tea parties, and mostly conducts these while sitting on the window sill above her toy box. She loves to offer us tea and cakes. And of course, she's always making pretend phone calls and playing with her Little People toys.
Washing herself in the tub. Just during the past few days at the beginning of her baths, she has started standing in the tub, holding her hands under the faucet and then rubbing them together trying to wash herself. When I say "wash your arms", "wash your tummy", "wash your shoulders", "wash your face", etc. she does it. She just learned "shoulders" the other day and when I say "where are your shoulders?", she shrugs them and tries to touch them. In Kindermusik class, there's a song about taking a bath called "wishy washy wee" that she loves. I sing it to her a lot and do the hand movements, so I think this is where she's getting this from.
Acting out her books. She has started acting while I read to her. The other day when our social worker was here for her visit, she was reading "Bear Snores On" to her, and Leah acted each scene out...dancing, sleeping, eating, etc. Our social worker was really impressed. Another book that Leah loves is "A Mother for Choco". She acts out when Choco is sad by rubbing her eyes and looking down, and when he is happy by raising up her arms and shouting "aay!". It's lots of fun to read to her now that she is so interactive.
Cross-referencing. In her counting book called the "123 Train", Leah loves when we get to the page where there are 8 turtles. She just beams and smiles so big. The other day, when we got to that page, she got up and got another book, "A Mother for Choco", and flipped to the page with a turtle on it. Then she did the same for the bunny rabbits. She's been doing this with other books, too. When showing her picture books of objects, she often goes and retrieves that object. For instance, we showed her a picture of keys (real keys), and she got right up and got her toy car keys and brought them over. She saw a picture of a xylophone once and got up and started banging on her alligator xylophone. She can identify so many words correctly nowadays. Her vocabulary is really expanding.
Toilet paper. Just tonight, Leah surprised us when she got hold of a few rolls of toilet paper. They were just sitting on the living room floor for a moment. Before I could get to them, she had started playing with a roll. She didn't unravel the roll or anything, but tore up a few pieces and was pretending to wipe herself! Speaking of potty learning, starting about a month ago, she has become very aware when she is going pee or poopy in her diaper. She points to her diaper and goes "das? das?" when she is going. I mentioned already how she got out of the tub to go use her potty. She's done that several times during her baths. Before that, if she was starting to go pee in the bath, she would point to herself and ask "das?".
Getting up on kitchen chairs. Once again, we've had to rearrange the furniture because Leah has managed to get up on the kitchen chairs by herself. I've even tried using a few different types of chairs from around the house, but she can get on all of them. She's so proud of herself. One day I found her sitting on the chair looking at my laptop on the kitchen table. Another time, I found her standing on one. It's just a matter of time before she's starts climbing onto the table and kitchen counters. So, while we're telling her not to do that, we've also just started taking the chairs out of the kitchen when we're not using them.
Talking. She's saying more and more words. When she's in the right mood, she will pretty much attempt just about any word or person's name I give her. I just say "Can you say.....?" and she tries it and then nods her head and smiles proudly. She'll usually get the right sound or the number of syllables. And some words she says perfectly. Some of her favorite words right now are "Oooooo, Wow!", which she exclaims very dramatically all the time when she sees something she likes. Plus, she says "Hi" and "Bye Bye" and waves to us all day long. She also says "Bye Bye" and waves when she closes something or puts something away. Plus, she uses her sign language for "hungry" and "more".
Playing pretend. Trying to put her pyjamas on her stuffed pug and put him to bed. This is usually when I'm trying to put her PJ's on her after her bath, and she won't let me have them because she's so busy trying to dress her doggie. She gives him hugs and kisses and when she lays him down on the bed, she goes "shhhhh" and puts her finger to her mouth. Well, she doesn't quite make the right sound (sounds more like "ffff") and actually puts her finger on her teeth, but she's getting close. And she's still enjoying her tea parties, and mostly conducts these while sitting on the window sill above her toy box. She loves to offer us tea and cakes. And of course, she's always making pretend phone calls and playing with her Little People toys.
Washing herself in the tub. Just during the past few days at the beginning of her baths, she has started standing in the tub, holding her hands under the faucet and then rubbing them together trying to wash herself. When I say "wash your arms", "wash your tummy", "wash your shoulders", "wash your face", etc. she does it. She just learned "shoulders" the other day and when I say "where are your shoulders?", she shrugs them and tries to touch them. In Kindermusik class, there's a song about taking a bath called "wishy washy wee" that she loves. I sing it to her a lot and do the hand movements, so I think this is where she's getting this from.
Acting out her books. She has started acting while I read to her. The other day when our social worker was here for her visit, she was reading "Bear Snores On" to her, and Leah acted each scene out...dancing, sleeping, eating, etc. Our social worker was really impressed. Another book that Leah loves is "A Mother for Choco". She acts out when Choco is sad by rubbing her eyes and looking down, and when he is happy by raising up her arms and shouting "aay!". It's lots of fun to read to her now that she is so interactive.
Cross-referencing. In her counting book called the "123 Train", Leah loves when we get to the page where there are 8 turtles. She just beams and smiles so big. The other day, when we got to that page, she got up and got another book, "A Mother for Choco", and flipped to the page with a turtle on it. Then she did the same for the bunny rabbits. She's been doing this with other books, too. When showing her picture books of objects, she often goes and retrieves that object. For instance, we showed her a picture of keys (real keys), and she got right up and got her toy car keys and brought them over. She saw a picture of a xylophone once and got up and started banging on her alligator xylophone. She can identify so many words correctly nowadays. Her vocabulary is really expanding.
Toilet paper. Just tonight, Leah surprised us when she got hold of a few rolls of toilet paper. They were just sitting on the living room floor for a moment. Before I could get to them, she had started playing with a roll. She didn't unravel the roll or anything, but tore up a few pieces and was pretending to wipe herself! Speaking of potty learning, starting about a month ago, she has become very aware when she is going pee or poopy in her diaper. She points to her diaper and goes "das? das?" when she is going. I mentioned already how she got out of the tub to go use her potty. She's done that several times during her baths. Before that, if she was starting to go pee in the bath, she would point to herself and ask "das?".
Getting up on kitchen chairs. Once again, we've had to rearrange the furniture because Leah has managed to get up on the kitchen chairs by herself. I've even tried using a few different types of chairs from around the house, but she can get on all of them. She's so proud of herself. One day I found her sitting on the chair looking at my laptop on the kitchen table. Another time, I found her standing on one. It's just a matter of time before she's starts climbing onto the table and kitchen counters. So, while we're telling her not to do that, we've also just started taking the chairs out of the kitchen when we're not using them.
Talking. She's saying more and more words. When she's in the right mood, she will pretty much attempt just about any word or person's name I give her. I just say "Can you say.....?" and she tries it and then nods her head and smiles proudly. She'll usually get the right sound or the number of syllables. And some words she says perfectly. Some of her favorite words right now are "Oooooo, Wow!", which she exclaims very dramatically all the time when she sees something she likes. Plus, she says "Hi" and "Bye Bye" and waves to us all day long. She also says "Bye Bye" and waves when she closes something or puts something away. Plus, she uses her sign language for "hungry" and "more".
Monday, October 12, 2009
Learning is fun
In the past week, Leah has suddenly started repeating words back to us. It started with the word "down". She started saying "dow" when I said it, and now says it all the time when we set her down. We play a game of "up/down" now all the time, where she stands up and we say "up" and then she sits down or falls back and says "dow".
The same day she started doing that, she started repeating a whole bunch of words or sounds back to me. When I say "Can you say.....?", she says it back to me! It's so exciting hearing her "talking". She says "blue", "mommy" (yeah!!), "mamaw", "wow", "ow", "boom", "baby", "boo boo", "bob", "roar", "moo moo", "ayayaya", "love", etc...
This is from the day she had her dentist visit.
It seems her receptive language skills are just taking off. She understands so much of what we say to her. She follows simple commands, like "go look in the mirror", "time to put your toys away", etc. She knows things like: upstairs, downstairs, outside, car, on, off, sleepy, tired, hungry, more, pants, shirt, socks, shoes, zipper, button, cloud, tree, sun, moon, flowers, plants, cheese, crackers, juice, milk, water, shower, bath, bed, book, stickers, all the names of her toys, names of all the animals, home, mirror, names of fruits, etc, etc. This is just what I can come up with, but she probably knows way more than we even realize.
She has started feeding us, which is really cute. She imitates everything, like licking her fingers when she turns pages in a book or magazine, blowing on her food and fanning it when it's hot, pretending to put lotion on her face or mine, and trying to put on her pants and socks and shoes.
We received as a gift a neat picture bingo game, where there's a board of nine pictures and then nine tiles that match the pictures. We have three boards with all different pictures. For about a month already, Leah has been doing this completely on her own. She doesn't even need us there and does it by herself. It's the coolest thing to watch and I can tell it's become really easy for her already. It's so much fun watching her do new things every day. This is such an amazing stage.
The same day she started doing that, she started repeating a whole bunch of words or sounds back to me. When I say "Can you say.....?", she says it back to me! It's so exciting hearing her "talking". She says "blue", "mommy" (yeah!!), "mamaw", "wow", "ow", "boom", "baby", "boo boo", "bob", "roar", "moo moo", "ayayaya", "love", etc...
This is from the day she had her dentist visit.
It seems her receptive language skills are just taking off. She understands so much of what we say to her. She follows simple commands, like "go look in the mirror", "time to put your toys away", etc. She knows things like: upstairs, downstairs, outside, car, on, off, sleepy, tired, hungry, more, pants, shirt, socks, shoes, zipper, button, cloud, tree, sun, moon, flowers, plants, cheese, crackers, juice, milk, water, shower, bath, bed, book, stickers, all the names of her toys, names of all the animals, home, mirror, names of fruits, etc, etc. This is just what I can come up with, but she probably knows way more than we even realize.
She has started feeding us, which is really cute. She imitates everything, like licking her fingers when she turns pages in a book or magazine, blowing on her food and fanning it when it's hot, pretending to put lotion on her face or mine, and trying to put on her pants and socks and shoes.
We received as a gift a neat picture bingo game, where there's a board of nine pictures and then nine tiles that match the pictures. We have three boards with all different pictures. For about a month already, Leah has been doing this completely on her own. She doesn't even need us there and does it by herself. It's the coolest thing to watch and I can tell it's become really easy for her already. It's so much fun watching her do new things every day. This is such an amazing stage.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Staycation
We had a great staycation (stay-at-home-vacation) and our little family bond has grown even stronger in these last two weeks. During the last three months, John's work and travel schedule has been pretty relentless and he hasn't been home much, so this was a much needed break for him and it was really nice to have him home for a change. Leah gets noticeably happier when the three of us are hanging out together, and she was just thrilled to bits having us both around 24/7 day after day. It was like a never-ending weekend.
Leah has become so lovey-dovey and affectionate lately. Without any prompting, she runs over to us and gives us tight hugs and sloppy kisses all the time. In restaurants, she often grabs our arm (whoever is sitting next to her), pulls us toward her, and gives our arm a really long hug and a kiss. What a sweetie!
Other new things she's doing lately:
Running around in a deliberately silly and exaggerated fashion when she's really happy. Stomping and pounding her feet, running in place, or stomping one foot as she walks, just because.
Making animal sounds. She does this all day long every chance she gets! She's still crazy about dogs and cats, and points them out wherever she sees them, saying "doggie!.......woo hoo ooo", "cat!......maah, maah, maah". I've even heard her do this in her sleep! She has also starting making the sounds for sheep, bear and duck. She has even started crawling around on her hands and knees pretending to be a dog....going "woo woo hoo".
Saying "Hi!" and "Bye bye" and waving. She says these very clearly and enthusiastically. When I walk into the room, she says "Oh Hi!" in her cute high voice.
Shaking her head "yes" and "no". She has even started shaking her head "no" when I start singing to her. We have a whole repertoire of silly made-up songs in Dutch that we sing to her all the time (which she used to love), and sometimes I start singing and she shakes her head no for each one and makes noises like, "uh-uh-uh-uh, hey stop that". So she won't let me finish any of my songs! Well, can you blame her? But there is one song that she demands all the time, and that's the one that Beppe taught her in Dutch. She loves that song and pounds on her head when she wants to hear that song because that's one of the hand gestures in the song. When she does let me finish a song, she claps enthusiastically at the end of it.
Speaking of clapping, when she sees people clapping or cheering on tv, she always imitates it. If people have their arms in the air, she does that, too. She also loves waving her arms around imitating the orchestra conductor when she is watching one of John's classical music dvd's.
Twirling. She loves to twirl, and when we say the word twirling, she starts twirling. She even starts twirling on her own a lot and asks "Dis?" as if she's asking "what's this called?" When we say dancing, she starts dancing, and when we say jumping, she starts jumping. It can be quite entertaining!
Pointing to all her body parts. She is getting really good at pointing these out accurately when we ask" Where's Leah's.....". I have to get this on video soon. So far, she can point out her head, hair, eyes, ears, nose, mouth, teeth, tongue, cheeks, tummy, belly button, arm, leg, foot, toes, fingers and thumbs.
Holding out her counting fingers when we ask "How many.......are there?". We've been working on counting for a long time, and started showing her how to count on her fingers. Beppe got her a really great book for counting animals, and she loves it. She brings it to us all the time to read to her and always holds out her fingers like she's trying to count.
Blowing bubbles in the bathtub. She loves laying on her stomach in the bathtub, blowing bubbles in the water, and dunking her ears in the water. She also makes swimming and kicking movements. I think we'll definitely need to sign her up for baby swim classes soon since she loves the water.
Learning so much. It seems like her receptive language skills are just taking off lately. She learns new words so quickly. We label and name things all the time for her, especially since she's always asking "Dis?" "Dat?" over and over again. When we're looking at a book or magazine or something, we only have to say a word a few times and then when we ask "Where's the.....?", she can accurately point to the object. She can follow simple directions, too, like Go show Daddy, Go give that to Daddy, Come here, Stand up, Sit down, Give Mommy/Daddy a kiss/hug, Go get your teddy bear/doggie, Give your teddy bear/doggie a kiss/hug, etc. She can pick words out of conversation and point to things that we're talking about.
Speaking funny jibberish. Her babbling has become very interesting and entertaining lately. There's definite rhythm and pattern to her sounds. She is so expressive and vocal. We love how she's always "ooohing" and "aaaahing" about everything. Plus when she takes a first bite of something she likes, she goes "mmmmmm!". And she has started making really funny, new sounds which always cracks us up. She speaks to us like she's conversing. We just answer back and pretend along with her. It's really cute. We can't wait until she can start putting words together. It will be so fun to hear what she has to say.
Pretending. She puts her doggie/teddy bear to bed and covers them in a blanket and says night night or bye bye. Plus, she tries to brush and floss their teeth. I got her a new electric toothbrush recently for her, which she likes a lot better than a regular toothbrush. She has even started cooperating with having her teeth brushed now that we have this new toothbrush. So when I'm done doing her teeth, I sometimes let her play with it, and she tries to use it on her stuffed animals. How cute is that?
Pretending. She puts her doggie/teddy bear to bed and covers them in a blanket and says night night or bye bye. Plus, she tries to brush and floss their teeth. I got her a new electric toothbrush recently for her, which she likes a lot better than a regular toothbrush. She has even started cooperating with having her teeth brushed now that we have this new toothbrush. So when I'm done doing her teeth, I sometimes let her play with it, and she tries to use it on her stuffed animals. How cute is that?
Monday, September 7, 2009
Kissing and Flossing and Brushing
These days, when we say "can you give mama/papa a kiss?", she'll give us a sweet kiss on the cheek or on the mouth, along with the sound effect "mwah, mwah". When she's playing with her Little People figures, she'll also have them kissing each other. It's so fun now that she's at the stage where she understands and can respond to things we say. I'll say, "go give that to papa', "go find papa" or something like that, and she'll run over to him.
Whenever I'm flossing my teeth, I always have to get an extra piece or two for Leah and it becomes a big sit-down affair. She loves to pretend to floss her teeth and started this quite a while ago, actually. But nowadays, the funny thing is, is that she tries to floss our teeth, too. We sit down on the floor, and she goes right up to us and is in there with both hands trying to floss, quite determined to figure out what she's supposed to be doing. It's cute because she'll be in our mouths looking really serious,but then look up and give us a big smile.
She definitely does not like getting her teeth brushed, however, and would prefer to be the one brushing our teeth. It's always a struggle, even with the two of us holding her down. But with almost a full set of teeth, there's no way around it. Pretty soon, I'll bring her in to see a pediatric dentist for a quick check to see how her teeth are doing and how well we're doing with the toothbrushing.
She can accurately point out all kinds of things now, when we say "where are your......?" So, when asked, she points to her nose, toes, eyes, mouth, tongue, teeth, fingers, hair, belly button. We're still working on finding her ears, though.
Whenever I'm flossing my teeth, I always have to get an extra piece or two for Leah and it becomes a big sit-down affair. She loves to pretend to floss her teeth and started this quite a while ago, actually. But nowadays, the funny thing is, is that she tries to floss our teeth, too. We sit down on the floor, and she goes right up to us and is in there with both hands trying to floss, quite determined to figure out what she's supposed to be doing. It's cute because she'll be in our mouths looking really serious,but then look up and give us a big smile.
She definitely does not like getting her teeth brushed, however, and would prefer to be the one brushing our teeth. It's always a struggle, even with the two of us holding her down. But with almost a full set of teeth, there's no way around it. Pretty soon, I'll bring her in to see a pediatric dentist for a quick check to see how her teeth are doing and how well we're doing with the toothbrushing.
She can accurately point out all kinds of things now, when we say "where are your......?" So, when asked, she points to her nose, toes, eyes, mouth, tongue, teeth, fingers, hair, belly button. We're still working on finding her ears, though.
Daddy!
Leah just loves her daddy. And just recently, she has started calling him Daddy. This is interesting to us because we have always referred to him as papa, in the typical Dutch style (mama and papa instead of mommy and daddy). She uses papa and dada while babbling, but just lately, she's very deliberately calling out to him, "Daddy!". During the long holiday weekend, she has been saying "Daddy" all the time. She shouts out to him when she's looking for him and wants his attention. It's super cute. She is also using mama while babbling and seems to be calling me "Ma!". But sometimes she uses this when calling him, too. So far, no "mommy", so I guess I'll just have to wait my turn!
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Weekend update
This weekend, Leah and I are on our own since John is super busy at work and spending the whole weekend at the office. Poor John! So yesterday, after a really messy lunch that required a bath,
then a long nap in the car, I took her to the playground. Well, she zonked out the minute I pulled into the playground parking lot. Fortunately, the weather was mild and breezy so I could just keep the windows open and read while she slept for an hour and a half. It was a nice break for me. After she woke up refreshed, it was time to play. She loved the swings, going down the slides, and running around the big-kid ramps. She's very social and likes to go up and stand next to other kids and smile at everyone.
She's just a sponge these days, learning so much and doing new things all the time. It's so fun to teach her things and watch her grasp them. I forgot to mention in the last post that she's starting to shake her head "yes" and "no". So I'll ask her questions a lot, and she'll nod her head. Mostly "yes" at this point, which is cool. She also vocalizes a lot when being asked a question, as if she's conversing. I've been trying to teach her some baby signs. So at the playground, she started putting her hand up to her mouth and acting as if she's eating. I said "oh, are you hungry?" and she nodded "yes". "Do you want to go home and eat now?" and she nodded "yes". I had some snacks and crackers with me, of course, but it was great because she didn't even make a fuss getting back into the car seat this time.
Getting her into the car seat. That's been one of my new challenges lately. For a while there, she was great. But she does not like being strapped into the car seat anymore. Or the high chair for that matter. This started a few weeks ago, probably because the car was getting so hot in the summer sun when we've been out shopping, and she doesn't want to get back in. So I always turn on the car and blast the AC first. She arches her back and practically does a back bend and then twists around and stands up facing the front of the car and wants to stand there and play instead. She would love to explore the entire car if she could. Eventually, I have to force her in, and she's not happy about it. To make things easier, I raised the height of the shoulder straps since they've been the same height since we got her. That already makes things easier. And now every time I take her out of the car seat, I make the shoulder straps really loose, so when I put her back in, it's a lot easier to get them buckled even while she's twisting and arching. Then once she realizes she's caught, it's a matter of just adjusting the straps.
She's learning body parts and can point to things when I ask "where's Leah's nose?", she points to her nose. "Where's Leah's hair?", she runs her fingers through her hair. "Where's mama's hair?" She touches my hair. "Where are Leah's toes?, she points to her toes. She also knows eyes and mouth. She loves to comb her hair and my hair all the time. She also knows a lot of other things, and when I ask, where's this? where's that?, she either points or just looks at it.
She can stack 5, sometimes 6, wooden blocks by herself. She loves playing with the blocks, and she loves to stack them and notice the little pictures on them. When they fall over, "Uh-oh!". She can do the ring stacker in the right order now. And she can do the shape sorters by herself, too. She loves to play with her new little Fisher Price piggy bank and mail box also. She puts the coins or letters in the slot and takes everything out and starts over again. And we got her the little corn popper, too, which she loves to push and pull.
She's also starting to imitate some animal sounds. So when I say, "what does a cat say?" She says a really quiet "maw, maw, maw". "and what does a dog say?" and she makes a funny grunting sound. I have to go out and get her something with the animal sounds, because she's really catching on.
And just as I have guided her fingers to show her how her toys work, she has started to grab my hand and use my fingers to push the buttons on her electronic toys.
She says "dada" and "papa" all the time now while playing and babbling, especially when she's playing with her toy house. I always show her how papa comes in the front door and says "Papa's home", and how guests come over and ring the doorbell and sit at the table. It's really cute to watch her play pretend.
And she's started calling out "Ma!" really loudly to get my attention. She is also saying "mama" when she babbles, but I think she's decided to call me "Ma". It's kind of like "Om-ma" in Korean, where the strong emphasis is on the second syllable. She definitely knows who her mama and dada are.
then a long nap in the car, I took her to the playground. Well, she zonked out the minute I pulled into the playground parking lot. Fortunately, the weather was mild and breezy so I could just keep the windows open and read while she slept for an hour and a half. It was a nice break for me. After she woke up refreshed, it was time to play. She loved the swings, going down the slides, and running around the big-kid ramps. She's very social and likes to go up and stand next to other kids and smile at everyone.
She's just a sponge these days, learning so much and doing new things all the time. It's so fun to teach her things and watch her grasp them. I forgot to mention in the last post that she's starting to shake her head "yes" and "no". So I'll ask her questions a lot, and she'll nod her head. Mostly "yes" at this point, which is cool. She also vocalizes a lot when being asked a question, as if she's conversing. I've been trying to teach her some baby signs. So at the playground, she started putting her hand up to her mouth and acting as if she's eating. I said "oh, are you hungry?" and she nodded "yes". "Do you want to go home and eat now?" and she nodded "yes". I had some snacks and crackers with me, of course, but it was great because she didn't even make a fuss getting back into the car seat this time.
Getting her into the car seat. That's been one of my new challenges lately. For a while there, she was great. But she does not like being strapped into the car seat anymore. Or the high chair for that matter. This started a few weeks ago, probably because the car was getting so hot in the summer sun when we've been out shopping, and she doesn't want to get back in. So I always turn on the car and blast the AC first. She arches her back and practically does a back bend and then twists around and stands up facing the front of the car and wants to stand there and play instead. She would love to explore the entire car if she could. Eventually, I have to force her in, and she's not happy about it. To make things easier, I raised the height of the shoulder straps since they've been the same height since we got her. That already makes things easier. And now every time I take her out of the car seat, I make the shoulder straps really loose, so when I put her back in, it's a lot easier to get them buckled even while she's twisting and arching. Then once she realizes she's caught, it's a matter of just adjusting the straps.
She's learning body parts and can point to things when I ask "where's Leah's nose?", she points to her nose. "Where's Leah's hair?", she runs her fingers through her hair. "Where's mama's hair?" She touches my hair. "Where are Leah's toes?, she points to her toes. She also knows eyes and mouth. She loves to comb her hair and my hair all the time. She also knows a lot of other things, and when I ask, where's this? where's that?, she either points or just looks at it.
She can stack 5, sometimes 6, wooden blocks by herself. She loves playing with the blocks, and she loves to stack them and notice the little pictures on them. When they fall over, "Uh-oh!". She can do the ring stacker in the right order now. And she can do the shape sorters by herself, too. She loves to play with her new little Fisher Price piggy bank and mail box also. She puts the coins or letters in the slot and takes everything out and starts over again. And we got her the little corn popper, too, which she loves to push and pull.
She's also starting to imitate some animal sounds. So when I say, "what does a cat say?" She says a really quiet "maw, maw, maw". "and what does a dog say?" and she makes a funny grunting sound. I have to go out and get her something with the animal sounds, because she's really catching on.
And just as I have guided her fingers to show her how her toys work, she has started to grab my hand and use my fingers to push the buttons on her electronic toys.
She says "dada" and "papa" all the time now while playing and babbling, especially when she's playing with her toy house. I always show her how papa comes in the front door and says "Papa's home", and how guests come over and ring the doorbell and sit at the table. It's really cute to watch her play pretend.
And she's started calling out "Ma!" really loudly to get my attention. She is also saying "mama" when she babbles, but I think she's decided to call me "Ma". It's kind of like "Om-ma" in Korean, where the strong emphasis is on the second syllable. She definitely knows who her mama and dada are.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Playing catch-up
I feel like I haven't been that good about keeping up with my blog lately. I've had other things to take care of, plus Leah's just been getting into everything and has been keeping me pretty busy these days, so I've been going to bed when Leah goes to bed. And since the only time I can sit behind the computer undisturbed is in the middle of the night, I've been just too pooped to blog lately. I've barely even had time to figure out this awesome new Macbook we got recently! And that's also partly the problem. I've had to spend some time transferring things over from the old computer to this new one, while getting up to speed with how iPhoto and Mobile Me works. Plus, I was running out of space for photos on Picasa and had to start a new account. So, anyway, it's in the middle of the night but I've had some coffee, so here goes nothing.....
Ever since we said goodbye to the ducky tub (which is now a fun toy to play with in her room), Leah has been having so much fun during her baths. She has always enjoyed bath time in her ducky tub, but now we've taken it to whole 'nother level. She loves her new Boon Flo faucet protector since it creates a cool waterfall effect and is very interesting to look at and play with, and I like it because it keeps her from hitting her head on the sharp faucet fixture, plus she can't take it off no matter how hard she tries. She loves to open up her mouth and drink the water and stick her hand in it while the water's running.
She really loves having the whole tub to run around in now. She stomps her feet, dances and twirls around because she's having so much fun. It's really hard getting her out of the tub. She'd stay in there forever if she could. Even after I've drained the water out, she still loves to play for a while and I have to be creative in coaxing her out of the tub.
She has become quite the little monkey lately. She's just climbing everything in sight. A while ago, we had to move the couch away from the wall because she was able to stand up on the back of the couch and hike her leg up on the ledge between the kitchen and family room. Nowadays, she has started to stand up on the back of the couch without any support. I'll hear her laughing or doing something to get my attention while I'm in the kitchen, and when I look over, there she is, standing up on the back of the couch smiling at me, teasing me. Now, I have to be really careful and pretend not to react while I walk over to her because she thinks it's really funny and will start laughing hysterically and dive back onto the couch shrieking and giggling. It's a bit nerve-wracking, but fortunately, our couch is not that high off the ground and we have carpeting.
She's also decided that the musical table is a lot more fun to play with when you're standing on top of it. I'll be doing something in the kitchen and will hear the table sounds thinking she's just playing with the table, and then I'll look over and there she is, standing on it making all those sounds with her feet.
I've had to rearrange the upstairs furniture again because she was climbing off the arm of the the glider chair and trying to get on top of the dresser. And now that the chair is back in her room again, she's constantly trying to push up the seat cushion and stand on the metal seat frame, which I really had to put a stop to since it's so dangerous.
She's also started to climb on the subwoofer downstairs to try to get onto the TV console. She's always been fascinated with our TV and really wants to touch it, so I'll have to do some rearranging again to make sure I don't find her one day with her face pressed up against the TV, drooling all over it.
In the kitchen, she loves hauling things out of the pantry and the fridge. We've decided it's just too hard keeping her out of there since she makes a mad dash every time she sees them open, so the lower shelves are full of things that are ok for her to play with. And she's also finally trying to get the kitchen cabinet doors open. There are a few single cabinets that we can't use a sliding lock on, so I've basically just given those over to her. It does mean that she's making a huge mess wherever she goes now and I'm spending a lot of time picking up after her.
The other day, I took her to another library to play in the children's section. This library had a lot of toys and puzzles to play with and the other kids there had fun with her. They thought she was so cute. She also had a lot of fun looking at the magazines and books, pulling things off the shelves, and so I just basically followed behind her putting things back where they belonged. She had so much fun, she didn't want to leave, so we'll be back soon. I'm going to start taking her to story hour at the library. Plus, I'm going to sign her up for a music and movement class this fall.
This weekend, we decided to hit some museums. Yesterday, we took her to the Natural History Museum and she actually got really into it. She loved looking at the animals and the other exhibits, and was wide-eyed and gasping and pointing at everything. She loved running around and was really taking everything in. We thought it was pretty neat that we could take a 13 month old to that kind of museum and have her actually get something out of it.
And today, we took her back to the Children's Museum and she really enjoyed herself again. In the little "grocery store", it was so cute watching her push her little shopping cart around, picking items off shelves and putting them in her shopping cart.
Other things she's been doing lately...
Getting all her teeth in.....canine teeth and first molars are all coming in. She's drooling like crazy these days and must be having a lot of discomfort. Poor thing!
Clapping her hands and smiling when she sees people on TV applauding (yes, we're probably watching too much TV).
Making phone calls. Beware! You may be next! Our new phones somehow make it easy for her to get into our phone directory. She used to play with our old phones and never managed to do this. But she's already called Beppe (John's mom) a few times, babbling into the phone. But Beppe didn't mind! She's also figured out how to leave voice memos on our phone that play on our answering machine. (I had to look in the user manual to figure this out). So we now have 3 really adorable little messages from her that we can't erase. And she just loves to listen to them. She knows they're of her, and she listens intently and giggles and thinks they're really funny.
Falling asleep in her high chair. She gets really drowsy while eating lunch and will sometimes zonk out for a whole hour and a half. Funny thing is that when she wakes up, she resumes eating like nothing happened.
Saying Uh-Oh! She started this about 10 days ago, and now she says it all the time when she (deliberately) drops something.
Pointing out dogs, cats and ducks everywhere. Whether it's on TV, or in a book or magazine, or on something in a store, she's still obsessed with dogs and cats. She sees them everywhere when we're out in a store. She shouts "dog" "cat" over and over, and when I look around to find what she's looking at, sure enough, way off in the distance, or on a greeting card or magazine or on some product, she'll see dogs and cats. When I strolled her through the pet supply aisles of Target, she was so excited, she couldn't believe her eyes! So many dogs and cats! We've taken her to a few pet stores lately just to look at the animals there. And the first words out of her mouth every morning are still "dog" and "cat". But today, it was Uh-Oh!
Ever since we said goodbye to the ducky tub (which is now a fun toy to play with in her room), Leah has been having so much fun during her baths. She has always enjoyed bath time in her ducky tub, but now we've taken it to whole 'nother level. She loves her new Boon Flo faucet protector since it creates a cool waterfall effect and is very interesting to look at and play with, and I like it because it keeps her from hitting her head on the sharp faucet fixture, plus she can't take it off no matter how hard she tries. She loves to open up her mouth and drink the water and stick her hand in it while the water's running.
She really loves having the whole tub to run around in now. She stomps her feet, dances and twirls around because she's having so much fun. It's really hard getting her out of the tub. She'd stay in there forever if she could. Even after I've drained the water out, she still loves to play for a while and I have to be creative in coaxing her out of the tub.
She has become quite the little monkey lately. She's just climbing everything in sight. A while ago, we had to move the couch away from the wall because she was able to stand up on the back of the couch and hike her leg up on the ledge between the kitchen and family room. Nowadays, she has started to stand up on the back of the couch without any support. I'll hear her laughing or doing something to get my attention while I'm in the kitchen, and when I look over, there she is, standing up on the back of the couch smiling at me, teasing me. Now, I have to be really careful and pretend not to react while I walk over to her because she thinks it's really funny and will start laughing hysterically and dive back onto the couch shrieking and giggling. It's a bit nerve-wracking, but fortunately, our couch is not that high off the ground and we have carpeting.
She's also decided that the musical table is a lot more fun to play with when you're standing on top of it. I'll be doing something in the kitchen and will hear the table sounds thinking she's just playing with the table, and then I'll look over and there she is, standing on it making all those sounds with her feet.
I've had to rearrange the upstairs furniture again because she was climbing off the arm of the the glider chair and trying to get on top of the dresser. And now that the chair is back in her room again, she's constantly trying to push up the seat cushion and stand on the metal seat frame, which I really had to put a stop to since it's so dangerous.
She's also started to climb on the subwoofer downstairs to try to get onto the TV console. She's always been fascinated with our TV and really wants to touch it, so I'll have to do some rearranging again to make sure I don't find her one day with her face pressed up against the TV, drooling all over it.
In the kitchen, she loves hauling things out of the pantry and the fridge. We've decided it's just too hard keeping her out of there since she makes a mad dash every time she sees them open, so the lower shelves are full of things that are ok for her to play with. And she's also finally trying to get the kitchen cabinet doors open. There are a few single cabinets that we can't use a sliding lock on, so I've basically just given those over to her. It does mean that she's making a huge mess wherever she goes now and I'm spending a lot of time picking up after her.
The other day, I took her to another library to play in the children's section. This library had a lot of toys and puzzles to play with and the other kids there had fun with her. They thought she was so cute. She also had a lot of fun looking at the magazines and books, pulling things off the shelves, and so I just basically followed behind her putting things back where they belonged. She had so much fun, she didn't want to leave, so we'll be back soon. I'm going to start taking her to story hour at the library. Plus, I'm going to sign her up for a music and movement class this fall.
This weekend, we decided to hit some museums. Yesterday, we took her to the Natural History Museum and she actually got really into it. She loved looking at the animals and the other exhibits, and was wide-eyed and gasping and pointing at everything. She loved running around and was really taking everything in. We thought it was pretty neat that we could take a 13 month old to that kind of museum and have her actually get something out of it.
And today, we took her back to the Children's Museum and she really enjoyed herself again. In the little "grocery store", it was so cute watching her push her little shopping cart around, picking items off shelves and putting them in her shopping cart.
Other things she's been doing lately...
Getting all her teeth in.....canine teeth and first molars are all coming in. She's drooling like crazy these days and must be having a lot of discomfort. Poor thing!
Clapping her hands and smiling when she sees people on TV applauding (yes, we're probably watching too much TV).
Making phone calls. Beware! You may be next! Our new phones somehow make it easy for her to get into our phone directory. She used to play with our old phones and never managed to do this. But she's already called Beppe (John's mom) a few times, babbling into the phone. But Beppe didn't mind! She's also figured out how to leave voice memos on our phone that play on our answering machine. (I had to look in the user manual to figure this out). So we now have 3 really adorable little messages from her that we can't erase. And she just loves to listen to them. She knows they're of her, and she listens intently and giggles and thinks they're really funny.
Falling asleep in her high chair. She gets really drowsy while eating lunch and will sometimes zonk out for a whole hour and a half. Funny thing is that when she wakes up, she resumes eating like nothing happened.
Saying Uh-Oh! She started this about 10 days ago, and now she says it all the time when she (deliberately) drops something.
Pointing out dogs, cats and ducks everywhere. Whether it's on TV, or in a book or magazine, or on something in a store, she's still obsessed with dogs and cats. She sees them everywhere when we're out in a store. She shouts "dog" "cat" over and over, and when I look around to find what she's looking at, sure enough, way off in the distance, or on a greeting card or magazine or on some product, she'll see dogs and cats. When I strolled her through the pet supply aisles of Target, she was so excited, she couldn't believe her eyes! So many dogs and cats! We've taken her to a few pet stores lately just to look at the animals there. And the first words out of her mouth every morning are still "dog" and "cat". But today, it was Uh-Oh!
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Week in review
Leah has become a great mimic these days. She's always watching everything we do and then tries to do everything herself. She combs and brushes her hair, brushes and flosses her teeth, tries to put on her shoes and socks, tries to put on my shoes, pretends to wipe or blow her nose with Kleenex, and copies funny sounds and gestures we make, like gasping, screeching, gulping, and sighing, especially when she's in the highchair or in the car.
Last week, for her birthday, she received a little baby tea party set. I demonstrated how to pour the teapot and pretended to eat the little cakes and drink the tea. I only did this a few times, and just today saw her doing all of this by herself. It was so cute. So now we sit together and have a little tea party!
She also plays a lot with her Little People house. We get such a kick out of watching her pretend play. She puts the little people through the front door, sits them in chairs and on beds and puts the baby in the cradle. We've been noticing how well she plays alone and how focused she can be.
I've started naming her dolls and stuffed animals, and nowadays she will go and get them when I say, "Where's....? Go find.....". If we make them dance, she starts dancing, too!
Just over the weekend, she started twirling and spinning around in a circle! She can go around 3 or 4 times before falling. Something I've always done with her is carry her and spin her around really fast, so maybe she's copying that. She has also started dancing around in a circle, and bobs up and down like she's doing squats when she hears music. She did this at gym class last week and people thought it was really funny. They were impressed with her deep squats!
When I say "hello" or "yoboseyo" (the Korean way of answering the phone), she puts her hand up to her ear like she's answering the phone. She still makes pretend phone calls all the time. We got new phones for the house recently, so I've given her our old ones to use as toys and she runs around making phone calls all the time.
Speaking of running, she runs all the time now. She runs into our arms with the biggest smile. Sometimes we have to be careful because she basically throws herself at us. She goes off to play, but always checks back with us, often bringing us something, giggling and running at full speed. It's the cutest thing. You can tell she's so excited about her new abilities.
I got her her first pair of Nike running shoes last week, in fact. She's outgrowing some of her first soft-soled shoes and needed some shoes she can wear outdoors now that she's running. I was really looking for some sporty sandals, but they didn't have any so I tried these on her instead and she was so excited. At first, she was walking around taking big, funny steps while she was getting used to the feel of them. But soon enough, she was laughing at herself in the mirror and stomping and pounding her feet and running around. I wish I had thought to videotape it because it was hilarious. The sales guy thought she was really funny. After all that excitement, of course she didn't want to get back into the stroller, so I had her follow me all the way through the store to the cash register, and finally I was able to coerce her back in, although she was not happy about it.
Over the weekend on Saturday, we went to baby Sophia's first birthday party and had a great time. Sophia wore her beautiful hanbok and had her turn at the Tol table. Apparently, she will grow up to be a scholar and a good cook, since she chose the pencil and the knife. Don't worry, it was a plastic knife!
And yesterday, we went to the zoo, and boy, was it hot out! It was about 92 degrees, but felt like it was over 100 degrees. We put a lot of sunscreen on Leah, and she even wore her little zoo hat again, but we didn't want her to overheat so we only stayed for a few hours. We were so surprised she kept her hat on since she usually doesn't keep anything on. But at least she seemed more interested in the animals this time. She was pointing at things and really paying attention to everything.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Leah's latest
Leah is still very excited about dogs and cats this week. They're pretty much the first and the last things she talks about every day. When we're upstairs, she asks me to pick her up all the time so we can look at my pug calendar. We count how many pugs are on each page and go through it forwards and backwards a couple of times and she just beams and thinks it's so fun. The other day, I saw her digging through all her Baby Einstein flashcards and heard her saying "dog" over and over. And when I looked over, she was holding the one with a dog on it and pointing at it. Also, the past few days when the TV has been on, I've heard her say "dog" while pointing at the TV every time the PetMeds commercial or another commercial with a dog is on.
She started drinking from a cup last week. Whenever I'm holding her and drinking something, she always wants a sip. She thinks it's pretty cool and actually does a good job of not dripping. When she's in the highchair, we also practice drinking water from a cup. She seems to prefer this over her sippy cups. Of course, I have to hold the cup myself since she'd rather stick her hand in it or dump out the contents.
She's been climbing into and onto just about everything lately.
We brought home a box of diapers the other day and she was using it as a piece of furniture...sitting and standing on it for a long time.
She also climbed into a little pink bin that had her books in it. At first she was sitting among her books and then I took them out and she climbed back in it and was just lounging around and "reading" her books for quite a while. She looked really comfortable. It was pretty funny so I took a ton of pictures.
Now that she's been climbing up onto everything, getting back down is the next step. We started teaching her how to get off the couch a long time ago, but just this week, she has started to slide off the sofa by herself. I still always sit with her whenever she's on the sofa since she's pretty rambunctious, but it's great to see she's catching on.
At her gym class today, there was a stair exercise and she ran right over to try it. Climbing up was no problem, of course, but she climbed down all by herself without any help, too. She loves her gym class. It's a great way for her to burn off some of her energy since she's such an active girl. Afterwards, she's usually pooped out and takes a nice nap.
This afternoon, we had a fun playdate today with a friend of ours, Leo, and his 5-year old son, Deniz. They played really well together. At one point, we spent quite some time trying to distract her and wrestle Leo's sunglasses out of her hand. It took many attempts, but we finally got them back undamaged!
She started drinking from a cup last week. Whenever I'm holding her and drinking something, she always wants a sip. She thinks it's pretty cool and actually does a good job of not dripping. When she's in the highchair, we also practice drinking water from a cup. She seems to prefer this over her sippy cups. Of course, I have to hold the cup myself since she'd rather stick her hand in it or dump out the contents.
She's been climbing into and onto just about everything lately.
We brought home a box of diapers the other day and she was using it as a piece of furniture...sitting and standing on it for a long time.
She also climbed into a little pink bin that had her books in it. At first she was sitting among her books and then I took them out and she climbed back in it and was just lounging around and "reading" her books for quite a while. She looked really comfortable. It was pretty funny so I took a ton of pictures.
Now that she's been climbing up onto everything, getting back down is the next step. We started teaching her how to get off the couch a long time ago, but just this week, she has started to slide off the sofa by herself. I still always sit with her whenever she's on the sofa since she's pretty rambunctious, but it's great to see she's catching on.
At her gym class today, there was a stair exercise and she ran right over to try it. Climbing up was no problem, of course, but she climbed down all by herself without any help, too. She loves her gym class. It's a great way for her to burn off some of her energy since she's such an active girl. Afterwards, she's usually pooped out and takes a nice nap.
This afternoon, we had a fun playdate today with a friend of ours, Leo, and his 5-year old son, Deniz. They played really well together. At one point, we spent quite some time trying to distract her and wrestle Leo's sunglasses out of her hand. It took many attempts, but we finally got them back undamaged!
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