immi says…

December 10th, 2009 | By Kyoko

I haven’t metioned immi’s linguistic developement much partly because there’s really no photo that would go with it, and other part because it’s been much the same for a long time. Shes been saying a whole lot of words, mostly just important ones — ice cream, pickles, tea, popcorn, rice, cookie, balloon — but not sentences or phrases. She also have made up words that she uses consistantly that sounds nothing like the actual word like “ishkie” for music, “kudrukudru” for salt (she wants to put salt on everything, we just pretend sprinkle!) “chukumaichukudai” for want. How she came up with those I have no idea! There’s been some evindences that suggest she can either read numbers or recognize the shapes of them and anyhow be able to tell them apart.

One interesting thing is that she immitates sounds at least as much as (probably more, actually) saying words (sound of spray bottle, sound effects in movies etc.). When she sings (which she is getting better at!), sometimes she sing vocal part, but a lot of the time she immitates drum or synth sound. She just might be a beatboxer:)

I’ve never heard immi mention anyone by name…until just a few days ago. The very first and luckiest person who got called by name by immi is Ashland! Immi had been calling him “baby”. Ashland is still too little to appreciate how special this is (though he seems to really like his sister a whole lot) but see, even Oskar is just a “meow” just like billion other cats in the world who are also a “meow”.

thursday

June 25th, 2009 | By Kyoko

Today is the last day Todd’s away (he is coming back sometime past midnight) and we are having pajama day:)

This is the amount of stuff immi carried from the living room to her room (the two purses have both been stuffed with all the little items prior to the departure) just to get her diaper changed. I find that I need to give her a 10 minute warning before I can get her to go anywhere…

Immi and her pink cat are playing with dominoes — she enjoys taking them out and putting them back in the box.

I dreamt that (dreaming often is supposedly a pregnancy side effect, and I have been dreaming often lately in my sleep) that I was pregnant and that immi speaks Japanese. I woke up to find that I am pregnant and immi does actually speak Japanese. Normal dreams are the strangest ones! I’m telling you this just to preface that immi said an entire phrase is japanese:

“Aaah-ah. O-i-shi-ka-tta!”

She said this after she *finished* eating her lunch, and it means “Hmmm!. That WAS tasty!” She used the past tense correctly…! And this is interesting to me also because the first thing she said in english was “Hmmmm. It’s so yummy!”. I’m glad she thinks that food is good (I would never know from how little she eats!).

immi says…

February 21st, 2009 | By Kyoko

Immi has been saying all sorts of things lately. Addition to regularly used words are ‘ice’ and ‘lights’. When we walk into a dim room, immi always asks for lights to be turned on.

She also said ‘key’ (I think I’ve heard her say that long time ago…) and ‘popcorn’ (we made some last night). These days, immi has been saying quite an assortment of words that I can’t exactly remember all of it.

Immi is also getting quite good at dressing herself. She can — some with more effort than others — put on skirt, pants, socks, shoes, jackets and shirts. Tights and Onsies (those buttons on the bottom!) are still a bit difficult to put on correctly.

misc.

February 7th, 2009 | By Kyoko

Immi said “chip!!!” yesterday — she wanted some tortilla chips. I guess she is going to say all variety of food names before much of anything else. (apple, cheese, cracker, banana, ice …she tried to say yogurt the other day, but it came out sounding more like “gurgurt”)

Today she came to me and said “cheese!!!” because she wanted some. She usually pulls on my arm to get me to fridge and point at the cheese drawer, so telling me what she wants, I think, is a milestone:)

We got immi another potty, this kind just sits on the floor. She has been sitting on it periodically when she comes into the bathroom. Yesterday, she wanted me to take her skirt off (but didn’t want her diaper off) and sat on her potty. Then, she made a funny squeezing face and …tooted. I think that it was a nice try anyhow.

immi says…

January 25th, 2009 | By Kyoko

…”quack quack” when she was playing with her duck in the bath tub.

And then she pointed at the photo of herself at the beach and said “me!!”

And then when her dad was having crostini and hummus, she did the ‘want’ gesture and said “CRACKER!”. I thought it funny that she knows the word cracker (even though we often have crostini and rarely other kinds of crackers…) and decided that the crostini is a kind of cracker.

immi says…

January 18th, 2009 | By Kyoko

“I like!!!”

…while pointing at Hello Kitty on my PJ. I’m glad she likes Hello Kitty since she has accumulated some HK things. And Todd and I joked a long time ago that the first thing she’d say would be “I hate Hello Kitty!”.

She has also been saying “up! up!!” every time she takes a step up on the stairs.

She absolutely LOVES the multi-color light in the living room (when we moved the living room to my former studio room, we simply didn’t need very bright overhead lights so Todd put in those fun ones).

When it gets dark, immi wants these lights on and points at them, and then at the switch for them on the wall. When we turn them on, she points and says “light!!” and giggles happily.

immi says…

December 16th, 2008 | By Kyoko

“What are you doing??”

…to her dad when he was cleaning his desk with  Mrs. Meyers (I’ve been Mrs. Meyers fan for many many years now!).

I guess immi is going to spill her speaking skills one sentence at a time. It’s really funny when she talks in English: it sounds very intelligible and her intonation is just like an adult’s!

house

November 2nd, 2008 | By Kyoko

We are at Immi’s grandparents’ for dinner. They got a little Hello Kitty house for viisiting immi to play in! Immi likes to bring in her toys and get comfy on pillows.

Immi said “Hi kitty!” to Mr. Seagal today. She also has a new word that she uses regulary now and it’s “this”. …as in when I ask “what do you want?” and Immi points and says “This!!!”.

tuesday

October 28th, 2008 | By Kyoko

Immi is sweeping!

…and then making a big mess.

Immi’s grandmom and I made popcorn balls (it’s a halloween tradition, todd got one every year growing up) while Immi and her dad cleaned the kitty litter box and vacuumed back at home (I definitely got the better end of the deal don’t you think?). We’ve finished making them and they came over to have some treats.

I forgot to mention yesterday, Immi said “duck” while putting the duck puzzle piece into the correct spot and then said “spaghetti” when we were having some for dinner, and then “What’s this?” as she held out a plastic toy banana.

…i haven’t heard her say any words today though.

immi says…

October 7th, 2008 | By Kyoko

Immi was sitting next to her dad this morning. She looked up at him and said:

“You are my dad!”

…well yes he is! Immi saying this phrase is more intriguing to me than when she said “Hmmm. It’s so yummy” since I might have said something like that many times (either because I was eating something tasty or trying to make immi want to eat something) but when do we ever say “You are my dad.” ?

immi says…

September 5th, 2008 | By Kyoko

I was brushing up stuff (mostly immi crunchies that she dropped, some dust bunnies, few tufts of kitty fur) off the floor into the dustpan when I saw,  in the corner of my eyes, Immi grab a cookie off the table. It crossed my mind to stop her from eating it, as it was before her breakfast, but I decided that it’s my fault for having left it there so I let her enjoy it. Besides, I had donut for breakfast, who am I to judge?

And then I heard Immi say:

“Hmmmm! It’s so yummy.”

I was so shocked. And it was really creepy (as creepy as Red Room speak in the Black Lodge of Twin Peaks!) since it didn’t sound at all like an immi babble that I have gotten so used to.

So here is the word count in chronological order

1) “meow”

2) “hi”

3) “yay!” (does this count as a word?)

4) “wroof”

5) “bye”

6) “Hmmm! It’s so yummy.”

Immi also says “mama” and “dada” but those aren’t really real words are they?

home

August 30th, 2008 | By Kyoko

We got back home this afternoon. Immi seems happy to be home. She is out on the patio with her dad watering and misting plants. Immi is picking off catnip and feeding her kitties.

Immi says a new word: “wroof”. She says it when she hears dogs barking.

bye!

August 29th, 2008 | By Kyoko

Today was the last day at the beach — the week went by so fast! Immi’s grandparents, immi and I spent a lot of time by the ocean today. Immi is no longer scared of the waves. She had so much fun walking into the water and then running away from the incoming waves (I don’t have any photo/video of this because my hand was wet all the time!). We even had lunch on the beach (sandwich and chips!). Immi did get a little tan despite the waterproof sunblock.

Here’s immi taking a nap after her bath.

Immi’s grandparents’ friends (the ones who kindly took us boating earlier this week) came over for dinner and when they were getting ready to leave, Immi waved, said “bye!” and showed them where the door was. IMMI SAID “BYE!” — it took me a while to realize that it was a new word since she has been waving ‘bye-bye’ for a while now, but hasn’t actually said the word.

We are packing our bags tonight since we are leaving early tomorrow morning. Immi is packed and ready to go!

night time

August 26th, 2008 | By Kyoko

It’s getting late but Immi is still up for more fun. She is doing stickers and crayons at the moment.

Immi is doing very well away from home even though she seems to miss her kitties a lot. She says “meow? meow??” and looks around everywhere for them several times a day.

Immi’s linguistic comprehension level seems to be taking off these days. She can follow many simple orders (“Put the keys back on the hook”, “Go get your shoes”, “Please move your Mr. Moose out of the way.” “Put your crayons away” etc.) and she seems to have stocked up on quite a bit of vocabulary. It’s still amusing to me when I see evidences of her linguistic understanding because Immi has yet to say much more than ‘meow’, ‘mama’, ‘dada’, and ‘hi!’.

sunday

August 10th, 2008 | By Kyoko

When Immi wants to go outside, she brings me my shoes for me to wear, then her own shoes for herself. Today, Immi brought her dad his shoes! So here we are outside in the parking lot with rc car.

Immi is walking with the car. Todd encouraged her to help the car move by pushing it forward a bit. Immi liked this game a lot and she kept pushing the car every time it stopped (in reality it’s controlled by the controller…). When it moved again, she laughed and clapped!

Sometimes these days, Immi has been having meals in her chair at the table with us instead of in her high chair. She seems to enjoy this arrangement and behaves really well. For some reason we end up with much less mess then if she ate at her high chair.

Immi now says “tata” for “thank you”. I think that it’s a very nice word to know: )

saturday

August 9th, 2008 | By Kyoko

Immi is doodling in her little travel notebook with her daddy at Starbucks.

Immi still doesn’t say many words but she seems to understand a whole lot of what we are saying. I know for sure that there are many words she understands because when I say “Where is your chair/notebook/book/kitty…” She can find the correct object and bring it to me.

Immi and I went to a Story Time at a bookstore today while Todd was having eye examined. I had felt badly about not taking Immi more to these things but I feel better about it now because neither of us liked it at all.