Babywyx at 17 months

Been awhile since the last noting down of babywyx’s milestones. She turned 17 months young a few days ago!

She started walking independently a few days short of 16 months. It happened overnight; I bumped into my pri school friend a week early and we shared our daughters’ milestones. She recollected that her daughter started walking at 16 months, and only after stepping on a huge, grassy field in Australia. She felt that babies felt safer to pick up their first walks on a large, cushioned ground. Thus, a few days later I tried the same with yx; brought her to a vast open space (albeit cemented). Noticeably, she was more adventurous at walking and did so more confidently. A few trips and loss of footing were inevitable, but through the process yx discovered her newfound freedom! After that day, yx started standing up and walking on her own. Tada, #mythproven!

Other things yx can do at 17 months:

- Runs to mummy when she sees her at the end of the day. Only to mummy!

- Loves food! When we dine at home, wifey and I will take turns to eat so the other can jaga yx. So one day I was playing with yx in the living room and wifey was eating in the kitchen, and then wifey exclaimed that the steamed chicken rice I cooked was “hen2 hao3 chi4!” what happened next was hilarious – yx immediately put down her toy, stood up and dashed to the kitchen to ask mummy for some food. So entertaining! On the same note, yx has a sharp sense of hearing. She can pick out the dog barking from the void deck, the bus arriving at the bus stop downstairs, and the occasional baby cries from a neighbor unit.

- A for “apple”; B for “(ba)nana”; C for “cat/cake”; D for “dog”; M for “mama”; W for “wow” – she answers those words in apostrophes

- Very shy around stranger adults.

- Amazingly understands adult speech. She knows when we are talking about her and she will grin abashedly or snigger sheepishly. Also understands simple questions and instructions, such as “where is your book?”, “do you want to drink milk now?”, “go see who is at the door?” and “who are inside the photograph?”

- Shower time: learnt that after her clothes are removed, she shall take it to the kitchen and dump it in the dirty clothes basket. And it shall be fully inside, not partial hanging over the top of the basket.

- Recognizes many colours! Red, black, white, green, pink, purple, yellow.

- Absolutely still adores Barney. Takes the TV remote control and passes it to us, muttering “Bar, Bar”.

- Beginning to impressively mimic words she picks up, e.g. “yellow”, “red”, “H”, “M”, “duck”, “book”, “tang1”, “yes”, “one”, “nine”.

- Likes to dance? Sways her body from side to side even to Lion Dance drum & cymbals! Also, recently I was singing one of the songs from her fav Barney shows, “Sitting in an airplane, looking out the window, watching the clouds go by…”. To my surprise and amazement, for the last line, she lifted out her hand and swung it slowly from front to the side, JUST LIKE HOW THE KIDS IN BARNEY SHOW DID IT!  I was awed! Hasn’t occurred to me that all the time her eyes were glued to the screen the many times when Barney is being shown, she was actually picking up all these gestures???! Gosh, must avoid showing violence, horror and anything rated above PG…

- Likes to look for us especially when we are in the bathroom. Will open the door, stick her head around the corner and look at what we are doing... o_O if we’re on the throne, she will go “mmm mmm…!”

Continue to amaze us, babywyx J