Claire’s 2^nd Birthday:

We celebrated Claire’s second birthday with a medium-sized bash at our place. The theme of the party? Kai-Lan, of course! And since I don’t have the time to do DIY projects these days, I enlisted the help of the lovely Miriam of LimoncelloSTYLE to create this fantastic banner:

More pictures of the party to come in a future post…stay tuned!

Claire’s favorite birthday present has to be her new toy kitchen, courtesy of her halbeh. She cooks us breakfast every morning and even feeds Aerin pretend food.

 

Learning/Milestones:

Claire has begun speaking in semi-complex sentences, adding adjectives and even adverbs to her speech. I remember how I was so proud of her when she began speaking Korean in 3-word sentences, and when I told J about it, he replied, “So? She’s been speaking Chinese in 5-word sentences for weeks.”  👿  FINE THEN!

Our smarty-pants also now knows:

• The English alphabet (when we point to a letter and ask her what it is, she answers correctly)
• A few characters of the Korean alphabet
• The numbers 1-10 in Korean, Chinese, and English.

As for our younger daughter, Aerin transitioned from crawling to cruising a couple of weeks ago and is now wandering everywhere! Claire was (and still is) such a cautious baby that we didn’t have to worry much about her safety — we didn’t even babyproof much — but Aerin is quite the little daredevil that we constantly have to keep an eye on her.

Miss Aerin test-driving a car at the toy store

As stated in a previous post, we believe that Aerin is a bit slower than Claire when it comes to fine motor skills. Although she can wave and uses pincer grasps, she has yet to clap her hands or flip through the pages of a book one by one, both of which Claire was able to do at her age.

However, one thing she does do is twisting her hands in the air (like a sparkly star) when we sing the song “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”  😀

 

New Stroller:

Since Aerin was starting to get too long for our UppaBaby Vista (we had been using the optional RumbleSeat with the seats facing each other) and began to kick Claire in the face, and because our girls hate sitting tandem which is the other option we had with the RumbleSeat, we decided to get a side-by-side double stroller.

I took a trip to BuyBuyBaby with my mother, tested several strollers out with her and the girls, and we both agreed that the Combi Twin Sport was the smoothest, easiest to maneuver, and the best deal for the price. (The runner-up was the Maclaren Twin Triumph.)

We were also able to get a 20% discount because I brought a Bed, Bath, & Beyond coupon. 

On one of their weekend strolls with their baba

We still have our UppaBaby and use it when we’re only taking one kid out. I won’t lie — the UppaBaby is a vastly superior stroller and I miss it when I am pushing the Combi on uneven sidewalks, or even when I go to the grocery store (because the UppaBaby has such a large basket). However, we weren’t willing to spend $500+ for a second stroller and so stuck with a strict budget of $200.

 

Miscellaneous Stuff:

We began bathing the girls together. The job is much easier with two adults (because sometimes, Claire will make a sudden movement that knocks Aerin down into the water, or they will start fighting over toys and need to be separated), but it certainly is doable by myself  — I just tell Claire to keep playing with her toys, or even ask her to place all the toys back into the basket, while I quickly dry off Aerin and dress her first.

Claire showing Aerin how to play with the rubber ducky

We have also started to toilet-train Claire. Our tools of choice: the BabyBjörn Toilet Trainer and the KidKraft Two-Step Stool. (Claire can also use the stool to reach the sink.) We’re taking it easy and not pressuring her at all — we trust that she’s smart enough to figure it out soon!

 

Aerin’s Dol:

Aerin’s dol, or Korean first birthday party, is slated for the end of this month. Because I was so uncomfortably pregnant at the time of Claire’s dol and thus couldn’t throw a large celebration, we decided to go all out with Aerin’s and celebrate both girls’ birthdays (since they’re so close together anyway) at a small banquet hall.

Trying on the headpiece for her dol

I never thought I would spend this much money on a kid’s birthday party, but I know that it’ll be worth it — especially since the first birthday is one of the most important ones in Korean culture. I even rented a hanbok for myself for the occasion! (The girls both have lovely hanboks gifted to them by their generous aunt.)

 

And that’s what’s been happening with me on the home front. What about you guys? Got any special plans for Halloween?