Wednesday, December 14, 2011

No more milk at night

Last week, we had out first dental appointment. At first, we discussed, his meal habits: what he eats, how many sweets, if any, how do we brush his teeth, how many times at day, does he still drink milk from a bottle at night etc.
Bryce was still drinking milk from a bottle at night, approx twice every night. I knew this would be an issue and the dentist would tell us/ advise us to let it go. And she did.:)
The best way would be to just to cut it short and put water in the bottle but if the little one does not like such a dramatic change then it would be a graduate process where the the milk would be diluted with water 'til the quantity of water would replace the milk.
We knew eventually this milk situation needs to end, we were just not sure when to do it exactly. So, this dentist appointment gave us at least the impulse to try it. So, that night we started giving him a bottle full of flat water and guess what, to our surprise, he didn't complain at all and over the course of few nights he didn't bother to wake up just to drink a bottle of water.:)
So, it's been more than a week now and he doesn't seem to be bothered at all. I hope it's as easy as it's been so far and I don't write an update where he'd ask for the bottle back.:)
Sometimes, it takes just a little visit to the dentist office.:)

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Funny associations and more about bilingualism

It is so interesting to watch the way his vocabulary expands. Every day new words, new sentences, new associations.
There are some of the latter which I find very funny:

- Cai (he repeats this name every time he sees a dog in association with Cali, his grand parent's big, black dog)
-Myna ( he says every time he sees a big SUV just as the one his grand parents have or when he says somebody playing an instrument, just as Myrna's husband, Dan is doing)
- Mami (every time he sees a woman saying something on youtube or when he sees a PT cruise, the car his "mami" is driving
- same for "Tati" ;
- "two" for every number we're counting;
In terms of bilingualism, he still chooses to say the easiest words from each language: he will say "blue" but not "albastru". LOL, it's kind of hard.
I'm thinking going to pre-school 3 days a week/ 4 hours a day helps in acquiring more English language skills: all his sentences are so far in English and none in Romanian.
He says: "I want apa", I want eat", "I want house", "I built house", "I want hat", "I want mami", "I want car"(car) etc
Although, there's no palpable evidence of actually saying more Romanian words, I feel his Romanian vocabulary evolved as well, especially at an understanding level, as I talk to him in more elaborate sentences than before and he answers positively by letting me know he understands what I'm talking about.
My strategy is to obviously continue talking to him in Romanian and every time he asks something in English, I ALWAYS reply to him in Romanian.

Edit: this week our friend,Sho, came by for a playdate. He also comes from a bilingual family: his mother is Japanese and his father is Afro-American. I remember reading in the bilingual books I've mentioned earlier in my posts, that there is no evidence bilingual kids would start talking later than monolingual kids. I have to say I was skeptical about it, as all the bilingual I've met so far started talking way later than their monolingual peers. Well, Sho changed my opinion, as he's not even 2 yo and he already speaks a lot of words in both English and Japanese. He's not yet fluent in any of the languages, nor does he make any sentences but he says way more words than Bryce, my son, for example says at 27 months.
As I wrote before this is an on going process, so I'll keep updating as the days, weeks go by.

I work on movies-I love movies

  • 21 grams
  • 4,3,2 - Mungiu
  • Age of innocence
  • American Beauty
  • An Education
  • Apocalypse now
  • Atonement
  • Blind Side
  • Burn after reading
  • Casino
  • Gone with the wind
  • Good fellas
  • Good Will Hunting
  • Hereafter
  • Inception
  • Julie & Julia
  • Kill Bill - vol 1
  • Kill Bill - vol 2
  • La Vita e bella
  • Mar al dentro
  • Midnight in Paris
  • Million Dollar baby
  • Mystic River
  • Nine
  • Orient, Occident
  • Panth's Labyrinth
  • Slumdog millionaire
  • Some like it hot
  • Sophie's choice
  • The bridge of Madison County
  • The departed
  • The English Patient
  • The Godfather
  • The Hours
  • The Talented Mr. Ripley
  • Train de Vie
  • Vicky, Cristina, Barcelona