21 Months

Talking and understanding are definitely the biggest changes this month. You can say your name, and other kids names that are easy to say. You are saying a few more words in Russian. I am slowly figuring that out. You say "Upal" when something falls down on the ground or when you fall down yourself, which means "to fall". You repeat and understand so much more than I realize. You often nod your head when we are talking to you and you many times give us an answer when we ask a question.

You're a good helper lately, if we ask you to bring something to us, you will usually do it. Another time you helped me unload the dishwasher by handing the plates to me. You love to move things around in your play area. Take things out of their boxes and then put them back. One of your favorite toys is a Russian nesting doll called a "matreashka", you love taking it appart and putting it back together. We haven't gotten you to clean up your play area yet, but you do help put things away when we involve you in the process.

You have fallen in love with Mickey Mouse. We have a stuff animal that we bought for Aaron at Disneyland 5 years ago and somehow we ended up with it, and now you drag it around the house, saying "Mickey". Recently daddy showed you a few cartoons with Mickey in them and now when you see the TV on, you ask for "Mickey". So now we've started to record the Mickey playhouse shows. Funny how downstairs you will ask for Mickey but upstairs you will ask for "Baby" which means to show you the baby signing time dvds that we sometimes put on in the morning while you have your milk and while we get ready for work. A few days ago, I was in the kitchen cooking when you and daddy came home and you started asking for "Mickey" again, and I said "no, not right now" and daddy went upstairs to change. I got busy getting dinner ready, only to turn in a few minutes and notice that you are up on the chair watching Lion King... I didn't even know what to say. I have no idea how you figured out to switch the mode to DVD and play it (it was already loaded). I guess you got what you wanted afterall!

Tantrums haven't really started just yet, but I am noticing more and more that when you don't want to do something or go someplace you will start wining and saying "Net" and lay down on the floor. Lately it's difficult to leave places like the park or someone's house... you don't want to leave and you start crying. I suspect this may get worse with the terrible two's coming. :)
You have definitely been testing us lately. What can you get away with? Well we introduced the corner/timeout, and although we don't keep you in the corner very long... you certainly are not happy to go there. Very often you will come over and deliberately do something that we just told you not to do. For example you like hitting the standing fan, sometimes you hit it lightly, other times you push it so hard I am afraid it might fall on top of you. The other reason we've put you in the corner was when you don't want certain food and it's placed on the tray, you start refusing it, by saying no, and you want to get it off the tray immediately. If I don't take it away, you've started to throw it, and now you throw it much harder than just dropping it on the floor like you used to, sometimes it ends up on the other side of the kitchen. So I guess the disciplining starts! I've contemplated if it might be too soon, but most people I talk to tell me that it's not... so the fun of parenting begins. :)

We've also noticed that your behavior completely changes once I am around, or when first get home from work. You start to get very winy and every little thing can set you off into crying. Not really sure why that is.

Things are the same at the daycare, you are doing well there. You only have an issue with one girl named "Nicky", not sure what your issue is, but as soon as you see her, you run up and push her. I've told you so many times to not push and be gentle, but for some reason you keep bulling this one little girl for no apparent reason.

Other times you are gentle and cute. Most of our friend's babies are boys, and so you're always surrounded by boys. Just recently we were at a friends house and you were the only little girl there. When one of the boys Maxon was leaving, his mom asked him to give you a hug and a kiss.

Usually when we ask you to give a hug, if you're up for it, you start moving forward sideways and give us the shoulder and also lean in sometimes with your cheek or lips for a kiss, it's very cute. Seems like you didn't mind getting hugged and kissed by Maxon and here is a picture Jill was able to grab with her Iphone.

Two little curly heads

21 Months @ the beach

The Lipstick Incident

Looks like you got in trouble for the first time in daycare. Well...this probably isn't the first time considering I've heard you pushing kids and etc, but this particular little incident is just too funny. When daddy picked you up yesterday, Galya told him all about what you've done. Apparently the older lady (Galya's mom or relative) who watches you guys left her jacket in a visible area and you got into it. What did you pull out? Lipstick of course... and you put it on your face, all over your face and your pjs. You also took the liberty of putting some lipstick on other kids faces. When I first heard this, I couldn't stop laughing. How did you know to put it on your face? I don't wear lipstick much so you don't see me putting it on very often so it's just really odd to me that you'd know that. May be you've seen the daycare ladies put it on. They found you jumping on the bed with it (must have been before or after naptime) and you looked very proud of yourself... or you probably looked like you knew you did something you weren't supposed to (I know the look very well!)
So when daddy went in to pick you up you were being held by one of them on her lap. They said you were just full of it that day, so much energy and so mischievous, they had a hard time keeping up with you.... little monkey girl!
As funny as this was, it made me think of the future and how you might be getting in trouble and having to deal with you being in trouble would be no fun at all.

At the pool

Every Saturday we have been going to the pool play group and you love it. This Saturday we planned to do the same thing. It was going to be especially nice because of the 100+ degree weather we've been having. Well little did we know that the pool was actually scheduled to be closed this Saturday. We drove all the way out there for nothing. We got into the empty parking lot and realized now why a few people told us "see you in two weeks" when we were leaving last time. I thought it was just because they were going on vacation or something and were skipping a week. So we had no other choice but to leave. On the way to the pool I got you all excited about seeing your "swim friends", and going swimming that once we started to drive out of the parking lot, you began to cry. I guess you realized that we're not swimming after all and got upset. It was so hard to explain to you that the pool was closed and we couldn't go in today. You cried for a good 5-10 minutes. I was trying to distract you with all sorts of silly things, but there was no use... you wanted to go swimming. I even promised that we'd go swimming another time, may be with Kingston, at their pool. Well the next day we did just that and you had so much fun there. Here are a few pictures of you splishing and splashing!

Excited to see your buddy Kingston

Kicking those legs, kick, kick, kick

In deep thought...

A trip to the pool is not complete without daddy throwing you high up in the air


Cute bum bum

Saved the best one for last!

Making Music

I brought out a few toys which I've put away a few weeks ago. Amazing how if you don't see something for a long time, it's almost like a new toy again. These two were definitely a hit!

20 months

You are one energetic 20 month old. You get more and more independent wanting to do things on your own without any of our help. Most of your meals are now eaten with a spoon or a fork, in fact sometimes you will eat the food off the fork and refuse to have it any other way.

You're repeating a ton of words, although I've noticed that you don't talk much when we are out or around people you may not know too well. You have to be in a talkative mood. Most of the words that we've heard are in English, however your body parts you know better in Russian. When I ask you where something is for some reason it has always been in Russian, and you seem to understand it pretty well. You can say your name, you've been pointing at pictures of yourself and saying "Sascha". Also just the other day I heard you say "Net" which is no in Russian. I couldn't believe it, it's your first Russian word! haha... should have known it was going to be "NO".

You love running, and climbing lately. Sometimes your feet move so quickly that the rest of your body has a hard time catching up and you fall. You have fallen numerous times and either hitting your lip or biting it with your teeth making your mouth bleed. One time your lip got swollen pretty big, and we tried to put a cold ice pack on it, but you start crying even harder when that's attempted. The next day it was back to normal... amazing how quickly things heal when you're so little. You also love to climb, I've seen you top of coffee tables, chairs, sofas... whatever it is that you can get up on. Luckily I haven't seen you climb the stove or anything crazy like the kitchen counter top. Today I saw you hanging on a bar at daycare which you can just barely reach, you grab onto it and hang on while swinging your legs back and forth. I've never seen you do this, but you held on for a long time, and clearly were having such a fun time. Taking you to a park is always an adventure, you go on swings, and then tell us that you're all done, then slides, and I've even seen you climb up a little bridge looking structure... so indeed you are a little monkey girl!

Your love singing and hearing music. I've now figured out that one of the song you attempt to sing is "twinkle, twinkle little star" as well as the "abc" song. You start out singing and the words really resemble the ones in the song, and then it just trails off into baby talk but the actual melody stays.

When it's time to change your diaper, you now seem to know what's going on and if we're down stairs sometimes I see you carry the little mat that we change you on and lay it out, other times I bring it over and tell you that we need to change your diaper and you will just go ahead and lay down right on it. Other times you decide that you don't want to get your diaper changed and you start running away... you seem to love being chased.

Your bully reputation is still true. In addition to it, we've notice how your face changes when something you don't like is going on. You have this frown or a mean look that you give, like you're mad and unhappy. So amazing to see your personality come out in so many ways.
Well I am sure I have forgotten a bunch of other little things you do, but that pretty much sums it up for now.

Daycare & Swim play group

Just wanted to post about how well you're doing in daycare and about other little things that you do now days.

Dropping you off has now become harder on us than you. We are always sad to let you go, while you just run in without a problem. So no more crying, which is great. Last week you and daddy arrived at the same time as another boy and his mommy which means you didn't get to ring to door bell like you usually do. So he went in first and you hesitated and seemed like you didn't want to go in or were just being shy. Galya - the woman that runs the daycare asked the boy to take your hand and help you inside and the little boy crossed the doorway back outside and reached out for your hand, you then took his hand and you guys went inside together. How cute is that?! I only wished I was there to see that in person. Also I heard from another mommy, that her son called you a little princess. :) My little princess...I've definitely gotten so many comments about your curly blond hair and your big blue eyes. Looks like we may be in trouble later on because it seems like the boys have already taken to you.

You also started eating much better, which is a big deal because I've been so picky and are always on the smaller side wight-wise and of course it's always been a consern of mine. I still give you 8 oz of milk in a bottle in the morning and the same in the evening, you still refuse to take milk in a sippy cup. Before you wouldn't have milk with your cereal and now you do, and you wouldn't eat any of the soups that they prepared and now you even use the spoon to eat them. I am so very happy to hear that. Now I need to be more encouraging with you at home and offer meals with utensils, something I am not used to doing because you make such a mess and food gets flung all over the place. Also seems like you love peanuts, I've never given you whole peanuts before, I've tried peanut butter but you didn't seem that fond of it, but at least now I know you definitely don't have an allergy to them since you've had them a bunch of times. Galya always tells me how the day went, how you napped well, and eat well (in the last week or so), and that you are one active little girl. You seem to be one of the youngest kids there right now, but that doesn't stop you from taking toys away from others. She tells me that you know what you want and you go after it. When you don't get your way you scream, grunt, push, and some of the other kids get scared of you. I certainly hope that you don't always get your way there, and that you learn how to share better, I know that doesn't really happen until kids get older, and sometime I do see you offer a toy to other kids, it just seems like you take toys away a lot more often. I was thinking that daycare type of environment would help with this kind of behavior and I am still hoping that it will. Little miss bully. The other thing you love to do is pick leaves and flowers off plants, and they have a few in their back yard that you have now gotten your hands on. I think pretty soon, there wont' be much left.

It's always fun to pick you up, you're usually very excited to see us and you say "mama" or "daddy" and run up to us. Once we get home, I usually try to start dinner, which is such a challenge, unless it's something quick. It's pretty tough to do that and keep an eye on you. Unless I get you occupied and interested in some toy, you are roaming around all over the place, basically getting into everything that you're not supposed to be getting into. Like yesterday you moved the gate that is blocking the tv, tv components and fireplace. You got into there and grabbed the PS3 remotes and started playing with them. I removed you from there 2 or 3 times and told you No. Then you started running around and screaming, not sure if it was just excitement or because you needed to release all that energy you still had. Then you got into the cabinet near the couch that has breakable things in it. Usually you don't care much for that cabinet which is why I haven't really moved the items in there to be out of reach, but yesterday it seemed like all you wanted to do was cause trouble on purpose. You were definitely were testing my patience and at the same time I was frustrated at myself that I wasn't just paying 100% attention to you and playing with you since I miss that so much during the day... all because I had to get dinner ready too. I wish sometimes dinner would just magically appear once I got home, but that doesn't happen, unless we get take out on the way home from work.

Once we're done with dinner, you seem to have a ton of energy and not ready for bed, so we usually hang out and play for a bit. You run away and then come back to give us hugs and kisses, you sing, and dance. You're so playful that sometimes it's hard to stop and say ok... "bedtime". When you hear "bedtime" or "night night" you look at the stairs and once I open the gate you start heading upstairs. You're now pretty heavy to carry up and down the stairs so I let you crawl up or help you up by holding your hand. On the way down, we usually tell you to sit on your butt and to hop down on your butt. You know the routine now. Although daddy wants to remove the gate (mostly because it's scratching up our bottom stair), I definitely think it's way too early.

Another activity that is going on this summer is that in the beginning of July we started a swim group through a place called Aqua pros at the Boys and Girls club in Clairemont Mesa. It's a bit of a drive for us to get there, but it seems totally worth it. It's very inexpensive and a lot of fun for you. It's half an hour long and the main point is just to get babies/toddlers used to the water and learn some techniques that may help you become more comfortable in the water. You now close your eyes more often when you go under water, you still start kicking like crazy, but you're less scared of it, also when sitting at the edge of the pool, you now jump in on 1, 2, 3. When we first started going to the pool this summer you'd get a little scared and it would take you about 5 minutes to adjust and start liking the water, but now you go in without a problem. You have so much fun splashing around and singing the songs w/the rest of the group. It's your special time with daddy! I just get to enjoy watching you guys in the water.

Flying high

Twinkle twinkle little star