[Meant to get this posted on June 12, but didn’t.  Hard to keep up with all that is going on in this household – no time to blog! :)]

Happy birthday Z!  He woke up around 6:15 am and his dad went to get him and got him dressed.  He put on his red “Two” shirt (of course) and he was ready for the day.  It was trash day today too (Thursdays in our neighborhood) so what a perfect way to spend his birthday morning.  We followed Steve and Aurelio around for about 30 mins.  Then we figured out the Caltrain schedule and made a plan to go ride it for awhile (Z had never ridden it before).  

Language explosion continues (and I gave up writing all of the words – couldn’t keep up! :)

5/12: Me: Where’s the lid Z?  Z: “I don’t know!”

5/28:  climbing

“too much ” when pouring 6/7

oatmeal 6/8 (w/o my saying it first)

• Wow!  
• Yea!
• Sentences with Sam: Sam says a word and then ZBL repeats it, finishing in a sentence
• some
• Happy yo yo (Z’s way of saying happy birthday)
• mix
• touch
• catch
• help
• done
• dig
• white
• colors: orange, blue, green, black, pink, red, yellow
• empty
• full
• lid
• dirt
• dirty
• counts in Mandarin (iphone video)
• pouch
• beans
• sunscreen
• shoot
• hoop
• may may (tomato)
• pockets
• ZBL said “Zeyad” (the name of one of his friends from preschool) all the way to the park
• dip it
• coming
• towel 
• plum
• and favorite phrase: super poop!
• do!!
• Alligator
• sweeper
• band aid
• spin (spinning on the floor on his bottom)

Chinese:

• Pointing at himself: “di di” (little brother :)
• pointed at the wings on CH’s shirt and said “fei” (fly)
• jin lai (coming)
• xīn da (new)
• a yi (auntie) – what ZBL calls Chun Hua, our nanny
• bōluó (pineapple
• pútao  (grape)
• xiézi – shoes 
• xǐxǐshǒu (prounounced shee shee show) – wash hands
• translated Han duo to “too much" 
• xie xie 6/11/14 – thank you
• niúnǎi (milk) 6/11/14 (pronounced "new nī but with the tones :)
• shuǐ (prounounced schway)
  

Morning routines:

ZBL still collects all the trash from the upstairs trash cans each morning. And he gets upset if he can’t.  After we take the trash and recycle to the outside bins, we go to the garden to pick strawberries and tomatoes ("may may” is what he calls the tomatoes).  We have been lucky this year that we have between 2 and 10 each day to pick.  I hope the season lasts a long time as Z will miss it when it’s gone.

On Mondays and Thursdays we organize the laundry. Z loves this, especially loading the drums of the machines and then watching the water come into the washing machine.

Favorite books: 

Time for Bed by Mem Fox

Chugga Chugga Choo Choo by Kevin Lewis

Wheels on the Bus by Paul O. Zelinsky (it has tabs to pull and parts that move :)

Happy Hippo Angry Duck by Sandra Boynton

Inside Outside Upside Down by Stan Berenstain

Bedtime routine:

Penguin (“Pengba”) sits with us in the glider – sometimes he’s already asleep, sometimes we wake him up (he gets grouchy when you wake him up sometimes so you have to be careful :).  ZBL especially likes the bumpety bumpety bump part of the Wheels on the Bus story and gets Pengba involved too.  ZBL loves finishing the sentences of the story and finding objects on the page.  The character with the cats in Wheels on the Bus Z has been renamed Sam :).  

What a fun month, day, and year!  Happy Birthday to our spirited, funny, strong willed, curious, curly headed, loud, full of fun and life, obsessed with trash and recycle, likes how things works, loves his brother and his penguin ZBL!  You have brought a lot of joy to our lives and we love you! Bring it on TWOs!