Gabriel Turns Two

Our little boy is already TWO! A quick update on his development.

Height : 87 or 88cm (He wouldn't stand still for me to measure)
Weight : 12.4kg

Gabriel at 24 months:

1. He can recite the ABCs up to Z and also recognize all the alphabets. Occasional mix-up between A and B and sometimes mixing W and M up on purpose.

2. He can recite numbers 1 to 12 but recognize only up to 10. He can count up to 12, with his fingers pointing at each object.

3. He is not very good with colours yet, able to recognize yellow and orange definitely but with the rest of the colours, he is quite mixed-up.

4. He can draw ovals and the figure "8"quite well, trying to copy the fishes that we draw for him.
5. He can complete a 24-piece jigsaw puzzle quite effortlessly.

6. He participates more actively when we read or sing to him, eg. he finishes sentences or songs that were read or sung. Can sing quite many songs, only about 50-60% of each song. Can say about 50% of "Our Father" too. :)

7. Is partial potty-trained - at home he goes diaperless and he is able to tell us when he needs to pee. Brought him out for short while grocery shopping and to the library without diaper a few times and it was good. Not 100% trained to poo yet as he does it mostly in the morning after he wakes up or after his nap, when he still has his diaper on.

8. He doesn't really like eating breakfast while he enjoys lunch and dinner more. His alltime favourite carbo food is shape-pasta, favourite snack is Glico Pretz stick biscuit and favourite drink is milk (actually, as long as it's not water, he likes it). He loves fried stuff and he can spot them from a mile (I try my very best hiding these stuff from him). He is carnivorous and loves all his meat. Sadly, he doesn't take fruits. Not at all. There's not a single kind of fruit that he is willing to open his mouth to. So, if anybody out there has a way of making your kids eat fruits, I'm all ears. I have to give him Vitagen and fresh fruit juices to substitute.

9. Can play better in group now. Less fighting over toys means less crying and screaming, and less hitting and biting too. He does get emotional at times and can get quite rough trying to show his emotions, be it happy or angry.

10. He is more independent. He wants to do many things by himself, eg. riding his bicycle (his legs are not long enough to pedal hence he pushes himself with his feet on the ground). He can be on his own to play a little longer, even longer if watching his favourite TV programme. Always says "I do myself" as "Ma do maself".. extremely cute!

11. He only wants me to tuck him to sleep and not his Daddy. He is still not able to sleep through the night yet. :( Wakes up at least once a night to get me to lie down next to him on his bed. What can I do to get him to sleep better? sigh...

12. His memory is quite amazing as he can remember things I tell him just once. He can also remember things which happen a few days ago. When you tell him that he can do something later, like when he wakes up, or when someone comes home, he won't forget about it. So once he gets up, or when the specified person gets home, he will remind me immediately.

13. He likes to organize his blocks according to colour and things according to shapes. He loves putting stuff into containers, pouring them out, organizing them in order, then putting them back into the container... the whole cycle repeats many times.

14. He's getting to be a little friendlier to people. There used to be a time (a particularly long stretch of time) when he used to go "Want erh-erhh" when someone looks at him. He also has this funny habit of stuffing his hands into the back of his pants, or diaper.. and his face shows a whole bunch of shyness. He's slowly growing out of it.. like just a few days back, he eagerly told the Indian store aunty that there was a stingray at the next door fish shop. After that he stuck out his hand to shake hands with her before leaving the store. Unheard of just about a month back!

15. He's getting cuter everyday!

What else can I say.. Fred and I love him to bits!