Zara turned 19th month 2 days ago. I was so busy, I only have time to write down her development (just like the previous month) today.

~ Weight 9.2kg
~ Height : 81cm
~ No new teeth sprouting. Her 4 Cuspids (canines) are still not fully sprouted.

Dexterity :
Expert in climbing and getting down furniture, but sometimes still prefer to shout out “Mummy help”
She’s jumping more and higher nowadays.

Language :
She never seized to amaze us in her language development. Speaks very well for her age, and with quite accurate pronunciation. She’s also talking non-stop now, we could always hear her chatter in the house.

New popular words:
Before & Because
~ Mummy give Zara grapes before
~ Zara sit on horsey before
~ Zara don’t want, because Zara don’t like.
~ Zara cry, because Zara angry

Very good with forming sentences now, and always picking up new words without us consciously teaching her.

She can count 1 to 6, not just saying the numbers, but actually counting items.
Knows how to differentiate a few colours, purple, green, black, orange, still mixed up with the rest of the colours.
Able to recite longer part of some nursery rhymes (Humpty Dumpty, Jack and Jill, etc), and also started singing part of some songs in tune (Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Polly Put The Kettle On etc).
She knows a baby frog is called tadpole, and a baby butterfly is called caterpillar.
Started differentiating left and right. Knows her left hand from right, and left leg from right etc(mainly her body parts which comes in pair).

Feeding and Food:
3 meals and 3 milk feeds a day.

Not very adventurous in trying out new food, but will still try with lots of persuasion and the permission given to her to spit out if she didn’t like it.

Takes most vege except those extremely fibrous and bitter.

Emotions :
I have to say she’s very loving, she gives lots of hugs, and kisses; although still not quite know how to share yet.
Although clingy (to me), and sometimes very mischievous to the extend of being naughty, she’s overall quite an easy girl. She listens to instructions and reasons (at least to the ones given by me); knows what she can and can’t do; knows what is rude and shouldn’t do (like pushing people or things away); knows her manners, i.e. greet people (by saying Hi or waving her hand) and say good bye; knows when to use please, thank you, excuse me (when she sneeze).

I just love her to bits!

She likes the flower making set that Samantha has given her, and she could play with it for a long time, making ‘umbrellas’ and ‘vege’, as she calls it. I was working from home, and when I went down for a drink, here was what she’s made.

And here is another way she spends her days at home, playing with her balls. She says she’s playing badminton, using her toy masak-masak (Malay: cooking set) spatula as the racquet. She’s muttering “Oh-Dear Oh-Dear” when her ball got kicked away from her sight, and she’s saying “What to do? What to do?”.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey-BANPlAvE]

It’s really fun to see her play, as she talks and laughs and sings to herself a lot. That’s the thing about working from home, if I hear some gigling downstairs, I can always go check out to see what she was up to.

Zara is a thumb sucker since birth. We did try to give her the pacifier in the very beginning but she used to spit it out, and stuff her hand into the mouth instead (before she found her thumb). She has a permanant bump on the thumb and sometimes when she sucks too hard, a little cut is found.

Last week, I found her thumb was even bleeding a bit from all the sucking, so I took out the pacifier and tried to offer it to her. She did suck on it, like trying out a toy. Here is a video captured with her using pacifier. She had her hand placed below her chin all the time, afraid of the pacifier falling, a sure sign that she’s not a pacifier user.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7p63bdSFP-g]

5 minutes later.. it was back to the thumb (photo below taken on a different day).

Zara’s speech development is just so amazing. There are things we didn’t consciously teach her, but she just picks up along the way. She also pronounces most words very accurately, just like an adult. At times, she surprised us with how her little mind words, stringing those words together. Here are some of what she’s able to say.

In the mornings, when Zara wakes up and hears the sound of shower in the bathroom, she’ll point to the bathroom. “Daddy taking shower in the toilet.” Points to me, “Mummy lye down on the bed”. Points to herself, “Zara sit down on Zara’s bed (her cot).”

Daddy wanted to shower Zara, and told her, “Come Zara, Daddy bath you.”
Zara exclaimed, “Oh Ma (my) God!” then, she continued to say, “Don’t want Daddy do. Want mummy do.” and she ran towards me.
(don’t know if she knows what Oh My God means, but she uses it so appropriately)

I took a tub of yogurt to the car thinking of having it in the office. In the car, Zara spotted it and said, “Yogurt! Yogurt!” wanting some.
Tuyam took her Petite Miam (yogurt for kids) out, and asked her, “You want mummy’s one or this one?”
Zara said, “Zara wants this one (pointed to her Petite Miam). Mummy’s one not so nice. Zara’s one nicer.” (I was surprised she knows how to use the word ‘nicer’.)

We were in the car and Zara suddenly just said, “So hot outside. Wind blowing blowing. So nice.” (She saw some branches swaying in the wind under the hot sun.)
I was surprised at her remark, but I responded, “yeah, nice right, the wind blowing?”
Zara continued to say, “Nice. Wind blowing Zara’s face. Wind blowing Zara’s hair. In kakak’s room.” She was referring to the fan in Tuyam’s room.

She recently is also able to differentiate: market for wet market (where we “buy fish, buy vege, buy manana/banana, buy papaya”); supermarket for grocery shopping (where we “buy vitagen, buy cheese, buy bread, buy pear”); and restaurant (where we “eat dinner”). She pronounces market, supermarket and restaurant perfectly.

Here are few of her common vocabulary blips. She sometimes call a porcupine pineapple, a guinea pig guinea pork, sun as sunflower (she knows what a sunflower is before she knows what sun is). And of course she can’t differentiate Me and You, she’s always asking people to “Carry you” when she meant “Carry me”.

About 2 months back, Zara started showing some sign of independence.

She wakes up in the morning, and if we still wanted to sleep, she would play on her own (although sometimes she stepped on sleeping bodies to get down of the bed, or to reach the other side of the bed to grab things that interest her).

I could leave her in the room and take a shower as long as I have her ‘approval’.
Me : Mummy take shower Zara play on your own ok?
If the answer is : OK. It means she’ll be fine, the most she would do is come to the bath room and peek into the shower screen.
If the answer is : Don’t want or Cannot. Then it means she would cry if I really step into the shower.
She would normally busy herself with her books, or just play with the bed side table (she pretends that’s her piano).

Zara understands instruction very well, and we can tell her
“Don’t carry this because it’s heavy and it may fall on your feet (big books or small furniture)”
“Don’t climb on to the chair if nobody is around or you may fall”
“Don’t put small things in the mouth because you’ll get choked”
“Don’t put the lotion/cream in your mouth because it’ll make your stomach pain pain” and she would not ignore them.

We still of course try to make the environment as safe for her as it can be, but it’s good to know that even if she found a coin or a button on the floor, she wouldn’t put it in her mouth; and she wouldn’t climb up the book shelves or try to move the teak chair around when we’re not watching.

I caught a glimpse of what she was doing through sleepy eyes the other day. She was just playing in her own cot and talking to herself. When I saw how at ease she was playing on her own, I couldn’t help but to climb off the bed and took a few photos of the moment.

It’s also a good feeling to know that if we need to leave her alone for a moment, she wouldn’t do silly things to endanger herself.

Zara turned 18th month yesterday! Woh, she’s 1 1/2 years old now!
This is on her development, just like what I did for the previous months.

~ Weight 9kg
~ Height : 80.5cm
~ Her 4 Cuspids (canines) are still not fully sprouted.

Dexterity :
Good in climbing up furniture, but still struggle a bit when getting down from a chair or from our wooden chest.
There’s not enough practice for her to climb up and down stairs, so she can’t climb up stairs and down yet while just holding on to the wall, she’s good in going up and down on all fours though.
She can drink from a cup with a little spillage.
She’s very good in scoping things (ice, fish ball) from one bowl to another.

Language :
New popular phrases:
I don’t want!
Adding “Only” behind phrases :
~ Want mummy’s breast only
~ Want Christmas song only (she likes to listen to this Jingle Bell tune from a Karaoke VCD we have)

Making longer sentences, e.g.
“Take bath bath. Eat mum mum (Chinese : food). Christmas song. Read book book.” (telling me what we’ll do when we returned from the park)

Very good at requesting for things, and making sure we hear her demands.
“Want Bina (Ribena) ice.” (when we gave her luke warm Ribena)
“Don’t want biscuit. Want con fakes (corn flakes).”

She can count 1 to 6.
Knows the name of the colours, but still don’t know how to differentiate them yet, except for purple which is the colour of Barney.
Able to recite and sing part of some nursery rhymes (Hey Diddle Diddle, Row Row Row your boat, Cobbler Cobbler mend my shoes etc).
Knows a lot of animals names, some more uncommon ones, e.g.: Raccoon, panda bear, crab, octopus, snails, guinea pig, ostrich (thanks to my DK Visual Encyclopedia).
Knows a lot of fruits and vegetable names, e.g.: Pineapple, strawberry, broccoli, ginger, water melon, pumpkin.
Knows all my family members’ names : My sisters and their husbands, the names of their kids, my father’s.
She knows a baby dog is called Puppy, and a baby cat is called Kitten.

She knows how to use words like together (“Zara and mummy go home together“), loud and soft (for the volume of her songs), pretend (“Pretend drink tea“), shy (“Zara shy shy, don’t want to say Hi” when we ask her to greet people and she refuses), shame (“Shame shame, Zara never wear baju“) etc.

Feeding / Food :
Favourite food includes : fish, raisin, bread, fish ball, grapes, pear, wanton, water melon, spinach.
Takes 3 solid meals and have 3 milk feeds (about 4~6oz per feed, and mainly on formula now).

Emotions :
Loving, gives lots of hugs, and kisses.
More apprehensive with strangers now compared to how she used to be, will greet them, but won’t let them touch her.

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We just got back from the paed for Zara’s 1 1/2 year old jab. Dr has to administer 2 jabs. One for her booster DTP, Polio and Hib, the other is Pneumococcal vacination.

She walked into the Dr’s clinic very bravely, said Hi to the Dr. Let the Dr check her without fussing. Then took her jabs. She just complained, “Bum bum pain pain” after the Dr has administered the 2 jabs. Then shook the Dr’s hand, and waved bye bye and said “See you” and walked out of the clinic. Not a single tear nor wailing! That’s my girl!

She likes to hold on to Mr Blue in the day as a comfort object..
But in the night, she will do away with Mr Blue, preferring the linen cloth instead.
She says, “Daddy’s cloth, Mummy’s cloth (referring to our blankets), Zara’s cloth”

She saw Daddy working on our clogged drain pipe on Sunday.
When the plumber came and worked on the problem, she pointed to the plumber and said, “like Daddy.”

She thinks all trucks are rubbish trucks. She says, “Rubbish Truck!” when she sees one and then fans her nose and says, “Smelly“.

She orders her meal.
For breakfast Tuyam makes her oat, she will say, “put banana” or “put raisin”, depending on what she wants.
For lunch, she requests for “fish ball” or “bread and cheese”.
For dinner, she wants “steam fish and pork” (although we never cook pork at home and let her settle with fish).

She requests to have us read her a book before bed time.
“Read book book!” and then chooses her own book.
“Crab book” (referring to my DK Visual Encyclopedia, she likes the pictures, especially on the living things)
“Big book” (referring to her First 1000 Words Book)
“Snake book” (referring to her Size Book, as there’s a big snake on one of the pages)
(her top 3 favourite)
And on days she prefers a story to be told, “Maisy book“ or “Mr Night book“.

She thinks mummy is her jukebox.
“Mc Donald!” She looks at me and says. Asking me to sing the Old Mc Donald song.
or “Bingo!”
or “Baby” (and she would proceed to lie in my arms) referring to Rock A Bye Baby.

She sometimes asks Tuyam to sing too, but Tuyam will be singing out of tune or forget the words, and Zara would say, “Kakak don’t know one!“

Day 3 ~ Saturday 29th April

We hired a car with a driver for the day. Our plan for the morning was to visit the Southern coast of Bali, however, we changed our mind after speaking to Sam, from Ellie’s. Instead, we asked our driver Ketut (almost every body is named Ketut in Bali) to drive us up to Tirtagangga, East of Bali using the coastal road.

We wanted to stop to look at how salt are produced traditionally in Bali on the East Coast, but the road leading to that stretch of the beach was closed for construction. After more than 3hrs drive, we reached Padang Bai, a port on East of Bali for ferries to Lombok. We had seafood lunch there, and then headed inland.

Padang Bai : a port mainly used for travelers to get to Lombok. Clear turquoise water, very popular for snorkeling and diving.Another hour or so, we reached Tirtagangga, the best surviving Bali royal water palace.

Around the water palace, Zara was fascinated with all the sculptures, especially the ones in animal forms

What surrounds the water palace fascinates us most. The lush green hilly rice fields, with lots of walking paths, makes a very nice stop for Zara to stroll around.

Zara very happy to be ‘free’ and not confined in her carrier or the car

Rice fields at the foot of Gunung Agong, seen here with its peak shielded by the cloudsWe made another short stop at Candi Dasa, a small coastal town for coffee.

I love these photos. Zara was very chatty and was talking to me, while Daddy took these shots

It was then another 3hrs drive back down to the South. We got off at Kuta and did some shopping and had our dinner there.

DVDs were going for USD1, I bought 10 Barney DVDs for Zara, and 2 sets of clothing. I’d gone past the phase of buying attractive handicrafts which I’d no used for. If I don’t see a use for it, I don’t buy it, it helps with the pocket.

In the night, Zara slept soundly, while Daddy and I watched Four Weddings and A Funeral on DVD. (Ellie’s had an extensive selection of DVDs for loan, and each room is provided with a DVD player.)

It was a very long day, to be confined in the car most of the time from 10am to 7pm to see scenaries like this, I thought it wasn’t worthwhile.

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Zara’s moments in Bali

We brought along Zara’s comfort softie, Mr Blue to Bali, but unfortunately, it got lost in KLIA before we took off. Guess who became Zara’s comfort object? Me!

She’s always saying :
“Mita Boo, where you(where are you)?” followed by
“Want suck suck Mummy’s breast.” (her exact words, no kidding! And her pronunciation for “Breast” is perfect!)
“Want drink milk milk.”
And she continued to mumble, “Don’t want Daddy’s breast. Don’t have milk.”

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She didn’t have any bowel movements the day we did the traveling, I was getting a bit worried. Then she surprised me while we were having tea at the cafe in Candi Dasa by holding my hand and telling me suddenly, “Mummy (in a sweet tone), poo poo oh-di (already). Change dar-per (diaper) pis (please). Smeh-wee(smelly).” in one breath.

Since then, she’s telling us to “Change dar-per” every time she does her poop.

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I think I’d been telling her she can’t do this and that too often. One day during the trip, while we were getting ready to go out, she was singing (tuneless but I know she’s singing) her own invented song. She sang and swayed, “Ten-not (Cannot) Ten-not Do Do Do. Ten-not Ten-not Do Do Do.”

It was a jaw dropping moment for us, followed by lots of laughing.

I was changing her diaper. She suddenly blurted : “Fish Ball!”.
I was curious why she said that, I just guessed and said, “Zara thinks Zara’s toes look like fish ball is it?”. I pointed to her toes.
Zara looked at me (as though I was stupid), then started pointing her finger at her mouth while saying, “Mum mum *point point* (Chinese: eat), Fish ball.”
(Tuyam said she does that very often, when she asked for something to eat, and Tuyam couldn’t understand her, she’ll point to her mouth and sign to us, like we’re some bozos)

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This morning, while at play, she shouted, “Mita Boo (Mr Blue), where are you? Want suck tum (thumb)!”
(She has the habit of sucking her thumb while holding her soft toy Mr Blue)

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While pushing her in the stroller yesterday, Zara counted, “For, fai, sik, sehwen, egg” And repeated. Asked her to do from One, it will go something like “One, Egg, Ten.” (She knows they are numbers but doesn’t know the sequence).

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Zara’s reciting the nursery rhyme Hey Diddle Diddle sounds like this:

Diddle Diddle, Cat the fiddle, Cow oh the moon, spot, away spoon

(Actual, Hey Diddle Diddle, The Cat and the fiddle, The Cow Jumped over the moon, The Dog laughed to see such sport, And the dish ran away with the spoon)

I have been busy, but it’s no excuse not to post Zara’s 17th month (which she turned on Friday) progress just like I always did in previous months.

~ Weight should be around 8.5kg to 9K
~ Height : ??
~ All four 1st molars are out, sprouting her 4 Cuspids (canines)

Dexterity :
Started jumping up and down, climbing up dining chairs or anything she thinks she can climb on (like a monkey), .

Trying to drink from a cup, but still needs us to control the tilt of the cup.

Language :
Developing really well in this area.

New popular phrases :
Cannot
Sked sked(Scared)
Not nice

Can tell us her experiences and feelings better :
About the park : “Ship Park. Turn turn wheels! Sit sides (Slides). Sit See Saw”
About Kidzsports : “Many balls. Tow away (Throw away). Big sides (Slides). Tuh-ner (tunnel), sked (scared).”
About a video she watched (Oliver): “Korkor (Chinese : Elder brother) so sad. No mummy. No Daddy. No kakak. Cry.”

Able to say things in different intonation depending on the purpose:
If it’s a request, she goes very sweet and nice.
If it’s asking me where I am, she shouts real loud, “MUMMY, WHERE ARE YOU?”Started using words with four syllables :
– kat-ter-eh-yer (caterpillar)
– eh-mot-on-toh (remote control)

Able to indicate sizes, quantity, ownership and use of other adjectives :
– many baju (Malay : clothes), many toys, many books, so many pebbles
– big snake, small stones, big bus
– mummy’s one, Zara’s one, ah-tie’s (Auntie’s) one
– sessy tothes (sexy clothes), dirty baju (Malay : clothes), wet for (floor), pretty bracelet, bitter cho-tet (chocolate)

Able to say the names of the people closest to her :
– my name, Daddy’s name, Maid’s name, King’s Wife’s name and King’s name

Feeding / Food :
Fish is her favourite food, followed by bread and cheese; loves vegetables which are not too fibrous (asparagus, cabbage, spinach); likes fish balls very much.

Still, taking 3 solids meals (it may sound a lot, but the quantity she’s taking is very little). Typically :
breakfast : one pot of petite miam yogurt, or half a bowl of oat porridge
lunch : one slice of bread with cheese, half a bowl of baby cereal, or half a hard boil egg
dinner : 1 small slice of steam fish fillet or 1 small whole steam fish (pomphret is her favourite) with half a bowl of porridge or rice with soup

3 to 4 (depending if she woke up early in the morning for some sip of milk) breast milk feed (3~4oz) + 1 formula feed (~5oz) a day.

In between she snacks on biscuits and fruits.

Emotions :
Very good in exerting her rights, but sometimes still confused about what she wants.

Very emotional, sometimes when we ask her to pretend to cry, she’ll act out but then suddenly it becomes real tears flowing down her cheeks.

Very loving, gives kisses (especially for me) and hugs very frequently,