It’s a new year, and at 20 months, Lo is changing so fast I am afraid I’ll forget. My aspiration for this blog was to record Lo’s day-to-day so that she could have a record. In exchange, she has to put up with my lapses in documentation and my forays into non-Lo subject matter. As an overall and overdue update, I can say that pretty much everything Lo does right now is funny. Sometimes she is funny on purpose but mostly not. We are laughing at her, not with her.
I have always loved the acquisition of language and regret that I have but a few scattered memories of funny things my own two said, although at least one made it into our family dialect. Snissue – a better word for tissue. Lo’s vocabulary is not yet that sophisticated, but the way she says duck “dukkaaah” is worth repeating, if you can achieve the proper guttural effect. I once laughed/cried during an episode of Curious George, when the monkey spent considerable time chasing dukkaaahs. Bring on the snissues.
As for most babies, Dada was Lo’s first word which of course was endearing to my son. Until he noticed that she called every dark-haired man Dada. A plumber working across the street. The TV weatherman. The cartoon man on a bag of Pirate’s Booty. An illustration of a 70’s era Sesame Street actor. My son reports that he now recognizes that Dada is generic label. In Lo’s defense, don’t you agree that the following Dadas share a resemblance?
She has a personal version of the sign language for “more.” And if she doesn’t get more, gestures faster and harder. We have speculated the her sign really means “give it to me now, and fast” or “I am enjoying this, so make sure it doesn’t stop.”
Lest I underestimate Lo’s burgeoning intellect, you should know that she is a precocious alphabet enthusiast. Most of the “words” she knows are actually letters. She points them out everywhere. I was impressed when I saw her pointing at the TV shouting O O at a car ad for $0% down, 0% interest. We train her, of course, by pointing to the letters and having her name them. When in doubt, she proudly claims the letter is B.
She gains new words everyday. Toddler language acquisition is a strange process, ranging from the useful “uh oh” or “stuck” to the rather irrelevant “door” to the obscure “owl.”
Her limited vocabulary, however, belies her very complete understanding of what’s going on. She can follow all instructions. Examples: go get a diaper. Put this in the recycling. (She also likes to empty the recycling.) She will dance on command. And to anything. Christmas music especially Mariah Carey’s All I want for Christmas is You. The annoying tinny music from toys. Television commercials. And, she really boogies – gets low and stomps. And might even lift her shirt in a final flourish. Ah, to be so free of inhibition.
placeholder://Close behind language acquisition and dancing, is Lo’s investment in her hobby. Her passion appears to be moving items from one place to another. The more mundane the household object, the better. She takes the plastic container covers from the drawer, throws them throughout the kitchen and puts them back. She likes to remove all the cooking utensils, one by one, from their vessel and them put them back. And do it again. She can spend a happy 15 minutes moving raisins from one bowl to another.
So, Logan, if you are reading this one day: this is you at the start of 2018. You are a hilarious little wonder. Happy New Year!
Lo&Behold 