18 Months

First holiday

We had a great two-week holiday in the Jaz Mirabel Park resort in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. You loved the infant pools and the sea and got to see fish and a ray and to ride a camel. You developed so much in the time: your language improved and so did your social skills (you started saying "hi" and "bye", the former especially to children).

It's not the sort of holiday I'm used to (having spent years backpacking) but it was a great way to have some lovely time together. Your mum wants to go away again this month.

Happy New Year, my beautiful son.

Runaround

500 Days

Sweetie

Wordy

Your vocabulary is improving surely. Your favourite word for a while now has been "down". I taught you it so you could vocalise your desire to be lowered from my embrace (I was saying "up" too, when I lifted you, but you have trouble with words that begin with certain vowels). You use "down" now to indicate pretty much every desire. If you've had enough to eat and want to get down out of the high chair, it's "down". If you are trying to climb into your cot to play (a recent preference), it's also "down". Lying flat on your back when I change your nappy, "down" means "let me get up".
Your Mandarin vocabulary is also coming on. You have been drawn by barely visible planes from the window for several weeks and now have an approximation of the word. We got a new washing machine yesterday and that having been one of your favourite pictures for a short while in the Picthall and Gunzi's "first Chinese words" book I bought for you last Xmas, you have been excitedly pointing and saying "xiyiji" eveery minute or so at times.
Since we employed Alicia as your first Spanish friend/tutor, you also like saying "si" and you understand and attempt "dame manos". 
Obviously your passive vocabulary is far greater than your active one, and those words you say don't always sound like the word you're expressing but we know what you are saying, son.
Some English words you know:
baby, cat, rainbow, bunny, daddy, mummy, ball, pepper, potato, down, tea

Protestor

You enjoyed most of your first demo, though slept through part of it despite the noise, which I'd worried would upset you.