22 months old
Wow, yesterday was the 13th — and I’m only 1 day off in posting his monthly update! No video/photo montage yet but will work on that.
Counting: SPL has been working on his counting and usually will make it to 3, sometimes to 5 and with help, all the way to 10. His "joke" now is to say "1, 2……9!" as it gets laughs from both me and John. He started off saying this just as his way of counting and when it resulted in parental laughter, he realized it was a joke and now often employs it :-).
Singing: Singing has been big this month. He now knows many of the words to both English and Mandarin songs and frequently will sing his own medley of favorites :-). These include "Tick Tock" (from swimming), "Nee Jou" (the name song from Mandarin Music class), "ABCs (he can get most of them except for "Elemeno" :-), and "Adios" (SPL’s name for the goodbye song @ Mandarin Music class). He loves to sing to himself and we’ll often catch him while he’s playing independently or we’re riding in the car. It’s fun to listen to.
Biggest accomplishment: climbing INTO his bed. I was surprised when I realized he could do this — and man, was he proud of himself! I tried distracting him from doing it routinely but that only resulted in an emotional outburst (I’ve found when he accomplishes something "big" on his own (e.g. something he figured out entirely on his own), he’s very hard to dissuade — and since he does it only when an adult is present, we’ve decided to add it to our bedtime/naptime ritual. The gate must be down for him to do it and he gets one climb per bedtime :-). John and I realize that climbing out may not be too far behind ……sigh.
Words: This month his ‘big concepts" were "missing", "almost", "around", colors, and ABCs.
** Missing came about from swimming class and the fact that we were often late and would miss his favorite song, Tick Tock. He then applied it to the alphabet puzzle when the letter E went missing for a few days.
** "Almost" has been fun too — it started with "almost home" and then he started being interested in our bowls and plates @ mealtime and if they were "almost" empty or still full. 🙂
** "Around" — this came out at Bryan and Lisa’s wedding last weekend (5/5). He was running around the "bobos" (bear statues that populate the downtown area of Hendersonville, NC, Lisa’s hometown). He also loved running around the trees in his Grandee’s yard and would ask anyone who was standing near him to run the other way (so that a "crash" would occur — which resulted in many giggles from SPL).
** Colors: He’s added blue, red, pink, white, and black to his "everything’s green" approach. He’s also good w/ purple and orange. Yellow’s still a bit tough but he’s getting there.
** ABC: He knows the song pretty well now and can fill in the letters wherever you leave off, for the most part. He also can recognize S and H (refrigerator magnets or puzzle pieces) and is pretty good with E, A, and Q (not sure where the H and the Q came from — E is for Emily (babysitter and cousin) and A comes from his name (Aunt Daesman and Uncle Rodney sent him big letters for his bedroom wall and we’ve talked about them ever since 🙂
Games: he and his babysitter, Emily, made up this game I’m calling "Not me." SPL grabs the water/squirt bottle (used for plants) and chases her/me/his dad around the yard and squirts us when he gets close enough. Then he’ll giggle with delight when we yell "Not me!" and scamper away 🙂
Legos: I have to credit his babysitter, Emily, with this too — last week he learned how to stack the Legos as well as build towers on the lid (which has the "bumps" on it and is a good base/foundation). Saturday (5/12), I was playing with him and this new found ability surprised me. 🙂
Books: this month he’s really expanded the stories he can "fill in the blank" with. He had Inside, Outside, Upside Down and now he’s added Scarecrow (a story about a scarecrow who loses his hat in the wind), Barnyard Dance (by Sandra Boynton), Pajama Time (also by Boynton), Dinosaur’s Binket, and Dinosaur Oh Dinosaur (hmm….all these are by Boynton :-).
Stay tuned for the video/photo montage.
Happy 22nd month, SPL!