No, this isn’t about a cliche pop song. Just documenting the latest news in babyland. Last week, Lennie started saying “bah bah” when looking at pictures of babies (including herself) and at herself in the mirror. She’s definitely attaching the word to babies. Her system’s not foolproof, however. As with Duh-dn-duh (kitty cat), she for a while attached the word to other things as well because she was being validated for saying it. That seems to have leveled off now, and she’s pretty consistent with the usage.
Sunday night, we stopped at Hardee’s while we were out, and she did something close to the “more” sign as we were feeding her little bits of food. To do the sign, you clump the fingers of each hand together and have the fingertips of each hand kiss the fingertips of the other. Her rendition of it is more like pointing into one cupped fist with the other hand, but it’s close enough. At first, she wasn’t very consistent about doing it, but she’s done it more and more since then, and she did it reliably enough tonight at dinner that I’m convinced she knows what she’s doing. She’ll stick a pea in her mouth and do the sign. We’ll put another pea on her tray, she’ll stick it in her mouth, and she’ll do the sign again.
Also, she’s got a soft (as in foam and cloth) block with a duck on one side that quacks when you squeeze it. When she was very young, I’d pretty frequently imitate the tone and rhythm of the sort of nasal, grating quack sound. I’m pretty good at it. I still do it from time to time when we go to look at the ducky shower curtain rings in the guest bathroom, and it often gets a laugh out of her. So today, I squeezed the duck block, and when it was done quacking, she did a pretty darned decent immitation of it, matching the number of quacks (eight) and possibly even trying to match the rhythm and intonation a little (though that could have been coincidence or wishful thinking on my part). At any rate, it’s a pretty cool accomplishment as far as I’m concerned.
Not to be limited to the performing arts, Lennie also tried her hand at the visual arts today. Mleeka gave her a crayon, sat down on the floor with her and showed her what to do with the crayon, and she went to town, trying very deliberately to apply the crayon to the paper. Of course, she would have done the same with a block or a stuffed animal or her own finger if prompted, but it’s fun to think there’s something more to it.
My little brother is 2 and he barely talks and my step-mom and dad are really cancearned about it
what can we do? signed Bryanna Helms
Ohhhh, she sounds so grown-up and people-like! It’s always shocking how surprising it is to watch babies becoming little people. I can’t wait to see Lennie again. I’m hoping June.
Kate has gotten to the grabby phase. She grabs my glasses, my shirt (she adores stuffing cloth in her mouth), the remote control, her spoon when I’m feeding her (especially fun with colorful food when I feed her in the living room), the cat’s tail, everything. I’m trying to do a couple of signs with her, milk and mama and daddy. No talking, no signs. She’s showing evidence of learning the mechanics of crawling, though I think it’ll be months yet before she does.
It’s weird to think that she’s now as old as Lennie was the last time we saw Lennie. She seems so much littler (not physically, I mean younger and less-accomplished) than Lennie was then.
Liam’s playing soccer and doing quite well, likes it too. I was resistant to “Pele Paul” living out his soccer dreams through Liam, but it seems to be working out OK. Ronan’s reading is coming along, but even better, her writing is coming along, and apparently her teacher shows her stories that she writes at school to all the other teachers. : )