18 months

Broom obsession begins!  Z said broom and began being focused on the brooms @ school (just like S was @ this same age).

Words and sounds:

Z says an “s” sound to mean shoes reliably now. He knows where his shoes are (on a rack by the door) and will go get them to get ready to go and put them away when he gets home.

He also started saying down and banana reliably as well as the following animal noises: chicken, bee, bear, snake, lion, goose, owl, train, cow,, sheep, and 3 singing pigs say “la la la” from the Sandra Boynton book.

Trash obsession starts:  ZBL started getting into throwing away trash this month (SPL loved this at this age too).  

And on the Mandarin front, he can point to his mouth, hair (tóu fa), head (tóu pronounced “toe” with a rising tone) , & ears, as well as understand eat and wash your hands *xǐshǒu" (pronounced "she shō").  He also understands “put away” (shōu qǐ lai  pronounced "so chee lie"), nose (bízi), ears (ěrduo), feet (Jiǎo), shoes (xié zi) and can reply with the correct sound to words spoken in mandarin to dog (gǒu click on the word to hear the pronunciation), cat (māo), and bird (niǎo). 

Nighttime train routine – John started a “want to ride the train?” request to get ZBL to transition to going to bed and now Z requests it.  He’ll ride on John’s shoulders and say “choo choo” to fit in with John’s chugga chugga.

ZBL’s favorite book: chugga chugga choo choo – thanks Jen and Brennan Gaunce!  

Imaginary play has started and ZBL is into playing with puppets, feeding animals, and cooking.  It’s great that we have so many toys left from when SPL was little so ZBL can play with them.

The puzzles’ craze continues and he loves the ABC, 123, and vehicles puzzles.  He is also getting into the multi piece train puzzle and is figuring out how the pieces fit together (10 pieces).

ZBL loves the microwave buttons and will play for awhile if you will hold him in front of it.  I’ve even learned new to me features of the microwave by watching him :-).

18 months was so much fun – looking forward to what’s ahead!