ZY and his cute kiddy voice

I still remember how I jotted down the early words of ZK and made video and voice recordings frequently. But poor ZY, being the second kid of a busy mama, there has been few such records! And his voice is soooo cute - need to make more effort..

Last night, or rather, very early this morning when he woke for milk, he said a lot in his sleepy state. It was a reminder for me to do this - today, I shall just pour out all I remember about ZY's speech.

While we weren't too sure when ZK meant what he said when he went "papa" and "mama", we were very sure when ZY meant them when he uttered those words. And he called ZK "didi" for the longest time - this boy wanted to be the big brother! Sorry, dear boy, you're two years too late! He eventually learned that ZK is "gege".

Speech seemed to come earlier and more easily to ZY though he used less hand signs. Very soon, he was saying all kinds of things. Found him singing baa baa black sheep and row row row a boat this week, way clearer than back in December!

Saying cheese for the check in/out photos

"妈妈，出来" as he holds the door open for me in the morning.

"Cannot open" as he tried to open a small tub of play dough, with a grimace on his face.

"Don't want!" - self-explanatory.

"So angry, go away!" when he doesn't like what someone is doing - just where did he get that from?!

"I don't like it!" when he doesn't like his food or when he is just following what ZK says.

Just the other day at dinner, I was telling ZK to eat so that he could be big and strong, and this exchange happened:

ZK: I'm big!
ZY: Yangyang bigger!
ZK: I'm bigger!
ZY: Yangyang so big!
Sito: I'm biggest!!

They kept repeating it so I captured bits of it:

A couple of days later, I was telling ZY that he was so big and strong, and he said "Gege big and strong!" So sweet :)

So this morning, I was up at 3 am. At about 4 am, I heard them come out of the room and the light was switched on. I walked out to see this little boy with his eyes 90% closed, lugging his two bolsters with him.

mf: Yangyang... 没有睡觉？要奶奶啊？
ZY: Go away, Mama.. Kakak make..
mf: Ok ok, Mama will sleep, ok?
ZY: *nod nod*
mf: Kiss kiss?
*muack*
mf: Hug hug?
*hugs*
ZY: 晚安, Mama.. Go in the room!

So I followed the direction of his finger back to my room. As I closed the door, he said 晚安 again :)

Oh, and he is, at this moment, more bilingual than ZK. Yesterday, when I went to pick up the kids after telecommuting, ZY had some toys in his hands and I asked him to 收玩具 so he repeated that as he dismantled the blocks and dropped them back in the box. He will also volunteer 谢谢 and 再见 without us prompting him to use Mandarin.

But I must be true to my heart - I can see that he is slowly saying more and more English... Gosh, please don't also let this boy tell me that he is an English boy, not Chinese boy! (Yup, his brother said that already, more than once!)