Play-Learn-Grow-Repeat

From Friday Mom – Erin
Rory repeats everything.  Literally, everything.  Words.  Cadence.  Phrases.  You name it, he mimics it.  And I find it hilarious to hear these things blurted from this quiet, soft spoken two-and-a-half year-old.

For example, last week there was a large dump truck parallel parked in a no-parking zone at the main entrance to our neighborhood, dangerously close to the stop sign, and making it extremely difficult for me to make my right-hand turn onto the main avenue on our way to daycare.  Rory– ever the inquisitive one– asked what the dump truck was doing.  I muttered a few choice words (to the truck, not him) and barked back firmly that I had no earthly idea what it was doing there other than blocking the way.

The next day, we pulled up alongside another dump truck, parked in the same exact spot.  Rory, without missing a beat, chimed in– “That’s a dump truck!  I don’t know WHAT it is doing there.  It’s in the way.”

(Mental note– mommy must watch her language henceforth when driving. . . )

Similarly, we have always made a habit of asking “Rory– is that food?!” when he puts toys or other things that he shouldn’t into his mouth.  It is not surprising, then, that he will scold poor Charlotte when she is teething on her toys, firmly explaining: “No Charlotte, that’s not food!”  We’ve tried very hard to explain that babies explore with their mouths.  To no avail.

As much as I know that he has a very strong grasp of language, I am still consistently caught off guard by his conversational faculties and his ability to converse so matter-of-factly on a range of topics.  I can’t wait to see what he says next.

From Friday Mom – Erin:
Rory’s verbal development has been expanding by leaps and bounds over the last few weeks. As soon as he wakes up each morning, he begins an endless stream of babbles and chatter that continues the whole way to daycare. He seems to be speaking in complete sentences, though most of them make no sense at all. It is both comical and fascinating all at the same time.

Most of the words he has gotten a grasp of are fairly simple: dog, ball, duck, car, truck, up, out, no, hi, bye-bye, uh-oh, etc. He’s also repeated a handful of more complicated ones like yogurt, for example. It’s fun to help him sound out the words and see if he’s willing to echo them back. More often than not, he will lose interest and go back to playing with his toys. Occasionally, however, he will focus in and work on the new words, and excitedly shout it out.

His favorite new game, by far, is making animal noises. He’s just getting the hang of them, but he can moo like a cow, blow like an elephant, and roar like a ferocious lion. With a name like Rory, we’ve given him a handful of lion outfits and a few stuffed animals. Earlier this week, while wiggling away from his daddy’s efforts to put on his pajamas, he looked at a small plush lion and let out a giant “RAWR.”

His daddy and I both doubled over in laughter.

Rory proceeded to pick up the little lion and toddle about the upstairs roaring ferociously, laughing, hugging the lion, and roaring again. Pretty soon, he’ll be able to make the noises of a full menagerie!

From Friday Mom – Erin:
Rory calls me Daddy. And it kind of hurts my feelings.

Da-da and Daddy were some of Rory’s first baby babbles. According to our pediatrician, it’s actually easier for toddlers to move their mouths to say daddy than it is to say mommy. So for a long time, I reassured myself that Rory’s grasp of the word “daddy” was simply reflex, and not some choice or deliberate favoritism on his part.

Now, however, I am starting to question that assessment. Rory has started to respond to questions. When we ask him to show us his belly button, nose, ears, or head, etc., he happily obliges. So, when we asked him the other day who each of us were, we expected the same dutiful response.

You see where this is going, right?

When I asked Rory who I was, he gleefully responded, “Dadeee.” We both chuckled and explained that, no Rory, I am mommy. Ma-ma. Ma-ma. Ma-ma. Eventually I elicited a brief “ma-ma” in response. I responded with the appropriate degree of excitement and enthusiasm. And he responded with a giggling rant of “daddy, daddy, daddy.” Hoping it was a one-time deal, I asked him the same question again the following morning. His response: “dadeee.”

Sigh.

I’m happy to keep politely correcting him and am hopeful that he learns in fairly short order that mommy smiles a whole lot more when he calls her mommy (instead of daddy). But, I can’t help but take it a little personally (even though I know I shouldn’t). And I also wonder if I failed to talk in third person enough around him, or if I just didn’t talk enough around him, or what, if anything, I did that led him to not know who I am, or at least not be able to say it. I guess I can take solace in the fact that he doesn’t call me “ball” or “duck” or one of his other favorite words. . . at least not yet.