Mini turned two

It's goes to show how busy life has been that I'm two months late writing this! Here's a link back to Mini's one year update . Year one to two was really all about her becoming her own person and her personality shining through.

Over the last few months Mini's talking and development has come a long way. Now she usually repeats new words after we say them to her and she has a great memory. There are still quite a few words and sounds that she can't pronounce properly but we have learnt from context what she is trying to say. We are able to have little conversations now which is fun! For instance, sometimes if a toy is broken, she might say "Dada fix it!". When doorbell rings she'll say "doorbell - delivery man". We've been getting a lot of stuff delivered since the Coronavirus isolation started haha. Then if I ask what's in the box, she might answer "food".

She definitely knows her own mind and can be very determined. She has strong opinions about what she wants to wear some days. I usually let her wear what she wants, within reason. Like if she insists on wearing a "party dress" but it's a cold day, then I'll just make sure to put on a long sleeved top underneath and leggings/tights. She has one doll who's her favourite and she brings her everywhere. She calls her "Dee-doll". It's very sweet.

She loves music and sings along to nursery rhymes now. She enjoys imaginary play do we'll play games such as doctor where we pretend her toys are sick or we have teddy bear picnics. Reading is also still a favourite activity and she will patiently listen to the story now instead of always turning the pages herself.

She is currently transitioning from one nap to no naps but it seems to be a very long process! Some days she flat out refuses to nap so then we bring her to bed early. The danger is when she doesn't nap but then falls asleep too early. There was one day she was out for the count at 5.15pm already so I brought her to bed then. However she ended up waking up for the day at 3.15am which wasn't so great as you can imagine! So now we try to keep her awake till 7pm on those days she skips the nap. When she does nap, sometimes she can sleep for up to three hours which is quite handy when I'm working from home. On those days she then stays up late and doesn't go to sleep for the night till around 10pm.

I was worried about how the current situation would affect her but she has taken it in her stride. I think she's enjoying not going to daycare and having more attention from us. She sometimes asks about the "Kita" (German daycare) and I just say that it's closed and on holidays for a few weeks and she accepts that. When the weather is nice we try to spend some time in the garden or go for a walk around the block.

During one of our walks recently she saw two little girls from our neighbourhood playing and she ran over to them before I could stop her, longing to join in. One of the girls then shouted "Abstand halten!" (keep back) to her. Of course the other girl was right, we are meant to keep kids apart but I couldn't help feeling a bit sad for Mini who is too young to understand.

Lately it can be real struggle for my husband and I trying to juggle home office and looking after Mini and the household. She's ending up having more screentime than we would like and our house could badly do with a good clean. However we are making the most of it as best we can. She's such a fun and sweet person and I feel so grateful having her in our lives.

First words

Mini is 20 months old now and says over words. She has really come along since I last wrote about her language development. You can count sounds that constantly refer to an object as a word. So for instance one of the first words she said was "wa-wa" to mean dog. Overall she seems to use German words more often which is probably to be expected considering she hears German at daycare and all around. 

It's really since around 19 months that the language explosion started. I think the words themselves are somewhat random based often on which is easier for her to pronounce at the moment than words she necessarily finds useful. Although it's already been great for helping me comprehend what she wants. Like at the playground a few weeks ago she started looking for something in my handbag/backpack and I wasn't sure what she wanted until she said "bap". Bap is what we call a soft bread roll in case you use a different term where you are from!

Anyway now she often says "bap" when she is hungry. She still does the sign language sign for milk when she wants to nurse but that can also just mean thirst and she uses the sign for "again" a lot. She uses "owa" the German ouch when she hurts herself but also when she or an object is stuck. So for instance if she pushes her doll pram around and it gets stuck behind a chair she'll call out "owa" until someone helps. She can't pronounce B words yet so instead of "bye, bye" it comes out like "die, die" which she says while smiling and waving at everyone!

German words: ja, nein, Müll (rubbish), Kaka (poop), bitte (please) mehr (more), owa (ouch), Gurke (cucumber), Hahn (chicken), Tassa (cup), Oma (Granny)
English words:yea, no, hi, juice, eye, knee, shoe, cheese, bap, keys, nana (banana), tights, die-die (bye-bye)
General: wa-wa (dog), neigh (horse), ee-hor (donkey), dac-dac (for duck), mama, dada, papa, uh-oh

Raising a bilingual child

Research on how many words a child should have by a certain age varies. I've read that most (but not all) toddlers can say around 20 words by 18 months and 50 or more by the time they turn two. Apparently by 18 months many toddlers can even link two words together to form mini sentences already. In my facebook group of babies the same age as Mini and there is a huge discrepancy. Some babies are apparently saying as many as 40 words already whereas others aren't saying any.

Many people believe that bilingual children take longer to talk but I've also read that is a myth so I'm not really sure about that! I've read different advice about at what point to worry when your child isn't talking. I only speak English to Mini. Her Dad speaks German to her but when we are all together, our family language is English. She gets plenty of German exposure from daycare and just being out and about.

At her last doctor's checkup I mentioned she was only really saying "mama", "dada" and babbling. The doctor said they aren't concerned here unless the children don't have 20 words by age two. However she then said that some two year olds aren't talking at all but if they show *understanding* of 20 words that's enough.

A few weeks ago Mini started saying "yea/ja" which is very cute. She's still not saying any other new words (she's 16 months) but she does understand a lot and is able to make her wants known using gestures. If I ask her to point out body parts like "nose, mouth, eyes, hair, eyes etc" she's well able to point to them. She does get mixed up though between "where's MY nose?" and "where's YOUR nose?".

If she wants to be picked up she walks over and puts her arms above her head and makes a little noise to get your attention. Or she'll take your hand and pull you over somewhere to play together. She points at doors she wants opened or things she can't reach. She'll gesture at the stair gate in our house and I'll say "oh, do you want to go upstairs?" and she answers "yea".

I'm fascinated seeing how she learns and the associations she makes. Recently, I pointed out a bus to her as we were passing during a walk and she started doing the arm movements for the "wheels on the bus" song! When we feed her, my husband often says "mmm", like "try some broccoli, mmmm, yummy". And now I've noticed she points to food and says "mmm" when she wants to eat.

I'm excited for when she started saying more words and I'm curious about whether they'll be English or German!