Making Progress

Isabelle's been making a lot of progress of late. I am really thankful to see her new milestones and enjoying watching her grow. People say the Terrible Two phase is a nightmare, and though I can feel it when those tantrums and meltdowns strike, honestly I'm loving this age much more than when she was a baby. Communicating & interacting with my little one is full of genuine joy & innocence, silly conversations and funny faces and laughter from the heart

Speech
- Isabelle's improved leaps and bounds in this area. From hardly uttering a single word in Oct last year, she is now stringing short sentences and is able to express herself rather well. I wished I could say it was just a matter of time that she would naturally speak, but we all know that it was attending childcare that has helped the most. For this, I am really thankful to our paed who not only cared for Isabelle's health, but highlighted this to our attention that she needed to be exposed to a wider circle of people (adults or children) in order to encourage her speech.

Language
- English hasn't been much of a problem since we speak that all the time at home. But I have been rather worried about Mandarin. So to my surprise, lao shi told me she was one of the top 3 in her play group in terms of articulating the hanyu pinyin sounds.... She can also understand what the teachers are speaking to her, while the other kids in her play group are sometimes clueless. I guess this is mainly due to the fact that Isabelle is one of the last to be picked up from childcare everyday. The school schedules the English teaches on the morning shift 7am and the Chinese teachers on the evening shift, up to 7pm. And so from 5pm, after dismissal, Mandarin would be the main language used to communicate with the children, and I guess that's how Isabelle picks up her Mandarin.

Health
- Still not very good, but to be fair, it has improved a lot more this year since Isabelle started on Sambucol in late Dec. At least when she is ill, she recovers much faster and the flu bug is also less severe. Unfortunately though, the paed has prescribed a more proactive treatment for Isabelle which involves steroids. I was very upset upon hearing it at first, but upon more research from the internet, agreed to give this a try to see if it really stabilises her airways. And so Isabelle is now on Nasonex, a steroid nasal spray to reduce the sensitivity of her nose as it seems like she has sinusitis, which triggers off a bad running nose and then a cough. She is also on Flixotide inhaler, which is a common asthma treatment to reduce the hyperactivity of her airways. I hate to admit it, but it seems to be working as we're into the 3rd week without seeing the doctor (the longest ever!). And we even managed to squeeze in some swimming & water play for her during the weekends (previously any of such activity would trigger off a cold or fever within a few days).

Weight
- Still at 20 percentile or less. Isabelle's only 10.3kg, but 86cm in height. Honestly, we think she eats quite a fair bit. The main problem is she doesn't like eating rice very much. Give her noodles anytime, and she's a happy kid. But rice or porridge is like a "pain" for her. Thank goodness she's loving potatoes for the moment, so I'm trying to cook stir fries or stews with potato to add on to her carb intake. And then between meat and vegetables, she will choose the latter anytime. She can almost be a vegetarian :(

Cognitive Skills
- Isabelle's attention span is definitely longer than before. She enjoys doing puzzles / jigsaws involving alphabets, numbers and shapes at the moment. Recently I showed her a memory game on the iPad, which basically involves uncovering 2 matching items. The first 2 days she was clueless on the objective and was just tapping away aimlessly and even got frustrated when i tried guiding her. Then early this week, I left her on her own and to my surprise, she figured out the game. At first I thought it may have been pretty random, and observing her more closely tonight, i noticed that she does register the position of the objects she has uncovered and makes a conscious effort to match them. I'm really impressed!

And so I'm really thankful for all of Isabelle's recent developments. There was a time when I worried she would not speak, that she would be a very ill child and that we would have to deprive her of all the outdoor activities which she loves so much. But with God's blessings, much has turned around since. Though I am still very tired managing things on my own, fortunately the routine has set in such that I am able to manage my time better and with Isabelle growing more & more independent each day, it is relieving me a bit more, even if in terms of only 5-10 mins break.