I am expecting the second one

Wow !! There is news. I am expecting the second one. I am excited. Time passes so fast. Just the other day I thought I was pregnant with Richie and here it is again. Richie toddling away and I am preparing for the coming of the second one. :)

Celebrating Hina-Masturi in Japan

The Japanese Doll Festival (Hina-matsuri), or Girls' Day, is held on March 3. Platforms covered with a red carpet are used to display a set of ornamental dolls (雛人形, hina-ningyō) representing the Emperor, Empress, attendants, and musicians in traditional court dress of the Heian period.

Richie celebrated this festival with pomp in his nursery. They made dolls depicting the prince and princess and hung them on either side of a straw. The faces of the dolls were really worth admiring.
Some kids put mouth on top and eyes below, while some put them on the side. But whatever it was, their creativity was at its best. :)

Perfect Somersault

Richie has unique ways of surprising us. As he turned 2, he has become sweeter. He understands and responds well. Says a lot of new words everyday, some in Japanese and some English.
He also tries to tell stories of his adventures in the nursery but we cannot understand much of it.
But we make it a point to listen and respond to whatever we can make out of his stories. :)

Yesterday, after dinner, I was arranging Richie's bed. Though he has his bed, he loves to sleep on our bed ;). Making his bed has just become a ritual. It gets hard to put him to bed as he does not want to stop playing. As always, this little guy was in a play mood. But today was a bit different. I saw him doing something new. He put his head down on the bed and did a perfect somersault. When we clapped he went on and on. I had not seen him practising at home even once, so when did he learn it. The only answer can be "in the nursery". Kids learn fast by watching others and definately thatz what happened.

Toilet training - milestone

Completing 2 years marks another milestone. Kids are considered to be big enough to understand their body as well understand whatz happening in the world.

These days Richie has started with potty training in the nursery. Today marked the 1st day of his training and Richie completed it successfully. Soon after he got up from his afternoon nap, he was taken to the toilet. He was told to remove his pant's nappy and go to toilet. The teacher said that Richie found it interesting to see how the pee falls. Cute lil babies. They find joy in every new thing they see and do.

Drawing a circle and a straight line

Richie loves colors and he can recognize and name most of them. He usually scribbles and makes a circular drawing. Yesterday was different. In the morning, he attempted a full circle without overwriting it .
In the evening, dada and he were playing with colors when I was in the shower. Dada did some straight lines with him with all the different colors and then went to do his work. When I came back, I saw him picking the "purple color" and with the sound of the train "zhuk-zhuk-duku -duku" he draw a straight line. It felt great. He could distinguish the circle from straight line. Another feather to his cap.

Richie - 2 year milestones

Richie completed 2 years now. Wow, kids grow fast.He is going to Japanese nursery school and learning a lot of new stuff. So his language is a mixture os Japanese and English.As you are reading through, you will realise there are lot of cute lil expressions and words he uses in both the languages.
Here are some of things he loves to do:

• running fast and balancing himself at turns.
• kicking the ball well.
• making a train out of chocolates, toys, pens etc.
• balancing himself on a beam kept on ground.
• eats well with a spoon and drinks from the cup by himself.
• given a new toy, tries to figure out how it functions on his own.
• plays board games using dice.
  
• loves to draw with crayons.
• loves listening to story books with pictures.
• learnt the numbers from 1 -10 and says them loud.
• loves to imitate dada and does sword fighting with him.
  
• loves dancing and does steps based on the tempo and style of music.
• creates and sings his own songs.
• imitates action songs.
• likes a lot of cartoons, Mickey mouse and club house, Winnie the pooh, Chip and dale, Mr. bean, Tom and jerry etc.
  
• saying color words like aka(red), blue, elloello (yellow), purple, oelegole(orange), pink, black
  
• saying body parts eyes, nose,mouth and pointing to all parts.
• saying tshirt, pant, sheez.
• saying apple,ba(nana),orange (oelegole), papaya and points to other fruits
• greetings such as hello, hi , ba-bye.
• saying ba for butterfly, bus, butter, bird, ball.
• saying book and bookapeeka.
• loves to play hide and seek.
• loves when we say "yoidon (japanese)" and runs as fast as he can.
• talking on the phone imitating us and saying "aah, mama, yes".
• saying mama, dada, pa, ma, pooh, anpanman.
• understands 2 sentences japanese and english commands (like, take the crayons and put them in the container).
• says juice,cheeze,moon,sta (star),che(chair),water, con -for corn and coin, crock - for clock, crayon, color.
• saying the letters O, T, P (pooh), J, I, K, G, M (mmm),B,D,R.
• asking questions in japanese "dare - who is this?","Nani kore - What is this?"
• saying tamachi,dangi or tom and jerry, dame da -Thatz bad, this.
• ninjin - carrot
• saying a strong no when he does not like or does not want to do something.