Monday, March 30, 2009

word to your mutha

as is to be expected at this time in her little baby life, summer is slowly building her language repertoire. it is particularly fascinating for us as parents to see which words she picks up on and which fall perilously by the wayside.

here, in no particular order, is a list of words she can say and also with which she consistently associates the correct meaning:

1. help
2. toots
3. baby
4. dada
5. shoes
6. jacket
7. eye
8. banana
9. cheese
10. more
11. belly
12. kisses
13. no
14. hi
15. bye
16. uh-oh
17. up

notice anything strange about that list (besides the fact that "toots" is on it)? any word ominously missing from her vocabulary?

that's right, "mama."

can she say "mama?" absolutely. does she know what it means? not a clue. currently, she thinks it means "skin."

when summer would pat my arm or leg or belly, i would say "mama," in an effort to teach her that i (the person she's touching) am the mama. unfortunately, our signals got crossed and instead she correlated the skin (the object she's touching) with the mama.

oh well. better luck next time.

1 comment:

Holly said...

Aubrey learned how to say both "dada" and "Richard" well before "mama." I consoled myself by thinking that perhaps she didn't need to know how to call my name since I was ever-present and constant. ;)