Tuesdays in Translation

Today I was reading my book on language development (yes, I'm a nerd), and it suggested I keep a diary of Lily's language as she's now beginning to enter a really interesting period of language acquisition. And what better place to do that than here with the four of you?

So with that, I bring you Tuesdays in Translation, where I will try to tell you what the heck Lily is talking about these days. While I think that Khan and I have the best insight, we are largely clueless, too.

First words are tricky. Sure, she says "mamamama" and "dadadadada." But does she mean it? I don't think so. Honestly, I think "mamamama" means "snack" and "dadadadada" means she's yelling at us. It's actually pretty funny. Here's how it goes. Lily decides she wants milk and lets us know that. If we are not responding quickly enough to her request, she starts with the "dadadada! dadadadada! dadadadada!" If I had to translate, I think she's saying "Now! Now! Now!"

However, she does say "uh-oh" and "Bubba." "Uh-oh" started when she dropped things on the ground. She started repeating "uh-oh" along with putting her hands up like we did. Not much after that, she started doing this in context, on her own (i.e., not repeating), and then she started to do it when she dropped other things and in other contexts, and that's when I knew she had real meaning attached to it. So, officially, I would say her first word is "Uh-oh."

"Bubba" is her new word. This started last weekend when we were dog-sitting Jeanette's dogs, Gizmo and Bubba. We were introducing Lily to them, and she started repeating "Bubba" after we said it, like you can see in the video. But after a couple of days, she started saying "Bubba" more and more. But...she says it for Kitty, and pointing to a picture of a dog in a book. So, I think she's overgeneralized "Bubba" to mean 4-legged furry creature. She also saw how Mama patted the ground when she called Bubba or Gizmo, and she started doing that, too. Today, she was patting the sofa calling for Bubba. Too freaking cute.

I'm pretty sure English isn't the only language she's using, too, which is pretty cool. First, she does know a few signs. Not many but we're trying for a few. She's extremely consistent with "more" and "milk," and she sometimes does "eat." At first, I was pretty sure she used them all interchangeably to mean "give me food now," but at this point she definitely uses the right one at the right time.

Then, probably the coolest thing she's said so far. Yesterday she did the sign for "milk" and said "nom" (sounds like "gnome"). I had to call Khan to confirm, but I was pretty sure that's the Lao word that he uses for "milk."

Pretty cool, huh?

(PS, sorry for the crappy video. I suck at video.)