Twenty months

At 20 months, Nora's spoken vocabulary has nearly doubled! She's voicing a lot of the words she also signs now too. A lot of kids tend to stop signing at this point, since they can communicate much more reliably with their voices than before, but of course we're going to continue signing with Nora. Many (but not all) of her spoken words still need translation. Good thing I speak Nora! ;)


Signs: more, all done, please, dog, hat, milk, food/eat, music, bed/nap, play, brush teeth, push (swing), hi/bye, airplane, Daddy, me, baby, napkin/wash face, hairbrush, banana, telephone, thank you, fly (the bug), Mama, apple, up, you're welcome, book, help, tissue, wind, wash hands, camera, water, shaker (maraca), rain, glasses, I love you (the handshape), Josie, bang, hurt, cheese, wash, waffle, hot, cold, nursies, bath, snow, bird, orange, cracker, toast, full, cry, ice cream, sticker, hold, fish.

Spoken words: yes, no, Mama, Daddy/Dada, switch, fish, shoes, sock, dog, duck, now, tea, dump, chair, bang, up, Nora, Nana, belly button, baby, cat, bear, beep, yum, sister, Josie, clock, diaper, uh-oh, Auntie Emily, knee, Taylor, Sam, Papoose, whee, coaster, apple, ball, spoon, Mica, happy, banana, Abby, nursies, ring, silly, Snappi, Santa, swing, soon, sure, shower, oops, wow, yuck, yay, spin, night-night, more, bowl, help, zipper, Zoe, cheers (complete with clinking glasses!), oh man, no way, snap, help, cracker, sorry, so big, fruit, tunnel, back, lucky, whole, home, velcro, water, bib, hold, hippo, earring, balloon, wrap, ice (cream), cry, mine, markers, color, step, shelf, sticker, raisin.

Sounds: a cow-mmmmooo, a dog-woo woo, and a truck-rrrrrrrrrrarrrrrr, occasionally a motorboat-phhbbt, a bee-bzzzzzzz, a train-chooo, a cat-meeemow, a chicken-cock cock cock, a rooster-cock cock ooooooo, Santa-ho ho ho, bird-caw caw, cat-mememeoww.

She's been singing The Wheels on the Bus a LOT lately, and she even knows the tune - she'll sing each of the motions ("round and round," "beep beep beep," etc.) with just the right timing and melody! It's very cute.

Nora's starting to show some definite two-year-old behaviors. Lately a lot of things are MINE MINE MINE, and she's also started running into her room and slamming the door! Mostly she just does that when she's trying to escape a diaper change or wants to play peek a boo through the window between her room and the study.

Another milestone: she just had a real conversation on the phone! It's snowing here today, and Daddy's been out plowing since 4:15 this morning, so he wasn't home when Nora woke up. She was looking for him, and I said we could call to say hi. Usually she just listens to whoever is talking on the phone to her, and nods or smiles in response. This time, she held the phone herself, and this is the conversation:

Daddy - Hi Nora!
Nora - Hi Daddy!
Daddy - Did you have breakfast?
Nora - Yeah.
Daddy - What did you have?
Nora - (signed) Waffle. (I voiced it for her.)
Daddy - Sounds good!
Nora - Yeah.
Daddy - Ok, I have to go work.
Nora - Bye!
Daddy - Bye Nora!
Nora - Bye Daddy!

I was impressed!



Here are a couple of pictures from the other morning. You can tell Nora's concentrating on something when she sticks her tongue out a little bit!