20-month and counting

Kah Yen is growing up really fast. She is going to be 21-month old soon. For her language development, she is picking up words daily and she can repeat short sentences after us. She speaks both English and Chinese. For her physical development, she barely walks now, she runs all the time when we are out in the park. For her behavior, she seldom has tantrum or meltdown, except when she was not feeling well, she may be a bit more whining.

She likes to observe what bigger kids are doing and follow them. For example, sitting on the "swing" side by side with this Jiejie in the playground. This big girl is a sweet four years old whom I see very often in our neighborhood. She adores Kah Yen and even asked once if I can leave Kah Yen with her to babysit while I go alone with my grocery shopping.

Being like one of the big kids

And since big kids can climb up this structure she also wants to give it a shot.

Doing what the big kids do

She doesn't have much chance to play with other toddlers because she doesn't attend any playgroup yet and most of our friends with kids are not staying nearby, hence it is hard to arrange any playdate. I try to bring her to the neighborhood playground as often as I can, so that she has a chance to play with other kids. Although most of time they still play on their own, it is still heartwarming to see moments like this, when they start to show some social interaction.

Trying to be social

She is also able to focus much longer during playtime. Her favorite activites are still drawing board, sticker book, building blocks, crayon and ball. This tiny toy was in her toy basket since she was born but she never played with it for more than a minute - usually involved only shaking it and throwing it. The other day she took it out by accident and I like how engrossed she looks while playing with it after I showed her how.

Learning to be focus

She continues to love books and library trips, although the two do not link at all to her, because she hardly sits still and read books in the library. It is more of a place for her to run about, play hide-and-seek, pull as many books as possible off the shelf and bring to Mummy. She enjoys her library trip so much that we have concluded it is the cheapest and happiest trip of all for her and for us. If your family has not started going to library as a ritual, you totally should. This is from our last trip to the library, again she can be doing anything other than reading books, anything also includes being like a real model.

Acting like a grown up