A special first year

Leah is one year old. It's quite incredible how time flies and how one only notices it when one has small children! Work has progressed of course, but nothing changes more than the first year of life. As with Hannah, Leah is practically walking, is eating more than the average teenager, is constantly grinning with her four teeth, and always looking adorable with her wonderful and bountiful hair. An incredible first year.

Despite being somewhat lazy, she is becoming more demanding and impatient: working out how to shout when she wants more food for example; and there is a lot of intelligence in there too: she seems to already be understanding a fair amount and pointing to what she wants. Last night at dinner she decided she did not want her food anymore, but wanted my food instead – she made that very clear through rejecting her own food and pointing at my food!

She's quite a drinker, quashing a few bottles of water per day, and is now enjoying the taste of soy milk and fresh milk, as well as everything else under the sun. She's more willing to eat spicy food than even Hannah is now. Unfortunately, as befalls most second-children I am told, Leah suffers from a lack of friends. She has one very good one, her sister, who plays with her continually, and she plays back. They sit together putting things in trucks and then emptying the truck; playing with play dough, balls and other things. But most of the friends we hang out with are of Hannah's age: from her kindergarten, neighbors and so on. Leah does not yet need friends, but we'll have to find some for her next year. Unfortunately most of the people we know in Shenzhen only have one kid, including the foreigners.

The last week or so was a national holiday in China. And a typhoon decided to hit South-East China meaning torrential rainfall almost non-stop. Just before the worst of it hit we managed to spend some time playing in the fountains at OCT Bay and a day in Hong Kong cycling along a bike bath on the Eastern coast, and after the rain hit we spend time in indoor playgrounds, a trampoline park, toys r us, and even some time at home! It is probably a good thing we did not travel around the region, though we should have got our act together and flown overseas somewhere for the holiday.

Hannah is still enjoying her kindergarten and having more interesting conversations that involve joining-the-dots as well as connecting disparate events. When I talk about flying she asks about me going to a different office, or sleeping on the plane; when she sees the Chinese flag she talks about the one she made in kindergarten; she remembers things from her visit back to Europe in January; compares a video of someone in a wedding dress to the dress worn at her Aunt's wedding in August and so on. She's enjoying her dance class and taekwondo class more: a good way for her to get some exercise and some discipline following teachers. She loves using her imagination to play games, but she is still failing to hide in any interesting places for hide-and-seek.