I, proud father of Kimi

[springrite]

Kimi at home

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

She really IS a beauty, Paul!

[springrite]

Translation of the caption in Chinese for the first photo:

Wow! This world out there is full of fascination!   -- Kimi

[karlhenning]

 

[springrite]

My fingers still taste better than that awful Gerber stuff!

[springrite]

Let go! I can walk, I tell ya!

[springrite]

OK, left, right...

[Harry]

As always a delight to see pictures of our adopted child.
Just keep them coming, its nice to see her grow up.

[springrite]

Kimi always liked to listen to music. But just now, I was playing for her a DVD of piano playing (van Cliburn competition). She was mesmerized by it and watched attentively while moving her fingers as if she was playing. The scene was so wonderful, so moving that I had tears in my eyes. This went on for about half an hour. She had her attention on the screen and the piano playing at all times, moving her fingers to the music. When it's time for her bath, she was very reluctant to leave the video.


Now time to check the budget...

[springrite]

... After the bath, Kimi was brought back to the DVD. She watched for a minute and then started crying, very very unhappy. Then she stopped. Then, she started again.

  Soon I understood. Everytime the piano playing stopped and people started talking -- jury, van Cliburn himself, announcement of the semi-finalists, etc., she got upset and started to cry. As soon as piano playing re-start, she's happy again.

I will play a piano recital DVD tomorrow, probably Libetta.

[Herman]

Our daughter (22 months) has a rapidly expanding vocabulary and one of her words is "sick!" meaning "music, please!" (In Dutch the word music had the emphasis on the 2nd syllable, that's why.)

She is also quite a little DIY-er, being aware what the button on the right of the living room cd-player is for. She's on her toes and points her little index finger and pushes PLAY, and if it so happens there's a cd in the Naim she's done enough to start the music. (We don't approve of this, but that's another matter.)

These are grey and dreary winter days, and she's fairly bored sometimes at being unable to take walks outside.

Nice pictures, Paul!

[karlhenning]

I love this thread 

[jchen]

she's so cute just like when my little brother was a baby. and boy, the first words he said weren't Chinese, unfortunately. well, its was mama I guess but it was such a long time ago. He's 8 now and growing up fast!!

[jchen]

oh, by the way, congrats and I hope you the best with Kimi and your family.   
I nearly died when I was a baby 

[Herman]

When A. was just a little tot her main music resource was our singing. I remember singing Tchaikovksy waltzes to her as I held her in the morning dark. Not all that easy really. We never did "Mozart for Einstein" or something. If we played cds at all it usually was calm, friendly Haydn, rather than wild Mozart.

However what I thought was intruiging was how soon she was clued in where the music came from. As soon I picked up the remote control, she looked at the cdplayer and speakers, waiting for the music to start. This cause-effect insight was all the more remarkable because devices like remote controls are the source of another fascination to her, just like pocket calculators and all things with rows of buttons.

They're make-believe telephones. She has her own little play calculator, which she uses exclusively as a telephone. I say "ting! ting!" and if she's in the mood she picks up the 'phone, wedges it under her chin and starts having a make-believe conversation with a friend usually called Muck (very close to her old word for milk), complete with silences allowing Muck her story and a polite "dag!" ("bye") at the end.

[springrite]

Kimi can't really talk much yet. But she does call out Mama and Daddy, although her version of Daddy can be anything from Daddy to Dada to Dida to Daidaidaidai. In any event I knew that was me! The few words she speaks are in English and Chinese, since I speak only English to her. Once in a while she'd say a word that surprises you. Two days ago, she said "come back!" Yesterday, as Vanessa was reading her a nursery rythm I had written "Little bear, baby bear", as soon as Kimi heard "Little Bear" she said "Toe Bear", taking the second half of the word "little" as the first part of "bear", thus "tlebear". She said it twice and it took Vanessa a few seconds to realise why she had said that. That was funny.

[jchen]

Kimi can't really talk much yet. But she does call out Mama and Daddy, although her version of Daddy can be anything from Daddy to Dada to Dida to Daidaidaidai. In any event I knew that was me! The few words she speaks are in English and Chinese, since I speak only English to her. Once in a while she'd say a word that surprises you. Two days ago, she said "come back!" Yesterday, as Vanessa was reading her a nursery rythm I had written "Little bear, baby bear", as soon as Kimi heard "Little Bear" she said "Toe Bear", taking the second half of the word "little" as the first part of "bear", thus "tlebear". She said it twice and it took Vanessa a few seconds to realise why she had said that. That was funny.

oh wow that is so cute!!!!!!! I just want to hug her  How old is she? 

[springrite]

oh wow that is so cute!!!!!!! I just want to hug her  How old is she? 

She was born May 8, 2008, 7 weeks premature. So she is 8 months old now, 6 months from her supposed expectant date.

[karlhenning]

Kimi can't really talk much yet. But she does call out Mama and Daddy, although her version of Daddy can be anything from Daddy to Dada to Dida to Daidaidaidai.

A born variationist!

[jchen]

She was born May 8, 2008, 7 weeks premature. So she is 8 months old now, 6 months from her supposed expectant date.

ok. I was born early too. I was supposed to be born in Sept. Mom said she had the hardest time giving birth to me