Or What About "You'd Better Recognize..."

When our first child was born, we worried about normalcy.  We compared against everything: percentiles, checklists that our doctor gave us, kids of friends now, memories of kids of friends in the past, what our moms told us that we used to do, etc., etc.  (I was apparently a very early bloomer, by the way.)

With the second kid, not so much.  We've learned that everything comes eventually, every kid is different, and that there's enough to get grey hair over without seeking it out.  (If tapping dinky cars on LCD screens is a milestone, our kid's got it covered.)

But if we're comparing, with language the little one is definitely behind where the big one was at his age.  He's really only clung to and used about five words for the past six months.  Everything else is communicated with a violent head and body wagging which means "no".  I'm guessing that since 93% of what he wants to say is "no" this has been particularly effective for him.

But in the last week, it's been an explosion.   He's been repeating everything.  And those words that don't sound like they're supposed to are used consistently enough in context to determine what they are.  Case in point:

Carol:  I love the fact that Sammy says "thank you" every time you give him something.

Me:  But he doesn't.  He says "gai".

Carol:  Yeah, but he'll say "peeez" and you give him what he wants, then he says "gai".  It means thanks.

Me:  You can't be sure of that.  It could mean "go to hell"  or "haha, I got you again, bitch".

Carol:  You're a jerk.

Me: Gai.