I've been thinking about writing a blog post about Bjorn starting to talk for several months now. I've kept procrastinating in hopes of getting a video clip of him actually *saying* some of these words, but since it seems that his intense interest in the video camera (which causes him to rush up to me and attempt to snatch it out of my hands approximately five seconds after I begin shooting) isn't going to end anytime soon, I thought I should just go ahead with the post already!
If I'm remembering correctly, when we took Bjorn in for his 15 month doctor's appointment, the item on the language development checklist for his age read something like "uses words to name at least five objects." He was right around that level of language development at the time -- just beginning to name a few things other than Mommy and Daddy. By the time his 18 month appointment rolled around, I had a vague sense that he was saying more than five words, but I wasn't sure how many -- maybe a dozen? Two dozen?
To get a more concrete picture of where his language development was at, I started a list of all the words he was trying to say. By 19 months, he had easily blown past the 100 mark. It looks like Bjorn is learning from his chatty older brother that talking is a pretty fun pastime! Granted, many of Bjorn's words are probably only intelligible to me and Aaron, and only within an immediate physical context that makes it possible for us to guess what he is most likely attempting to say. Still, when you've had no means to communicate other than crying and gesturing for the first year and a half or so of your life, even a 100-word vocabulary with questionable articulation seems like a pretty amazing development.
A few of Bjorn's favorite words these days:
FOOD/DRINK - pickle, olive, popsicle, apple, applesauce, banana, meatball, berries, yogurt, pizza, pasta, waffle, pear, cracker, water, milk, juice, cookie, coffee (no, we do not give him coffee! but he is fascinated by my coffee pot and all its weird noises)
HOUSEHOLD OBJECTS & LOCATIONS - bowl, fork, chair, DVD, computer, light, camera, clip, cord, keys, garbage, floor, wall, kitchen, bed, paci, potty
BODY PARTS - belly, eyes, arm, hand, mouth, ears
ADJECTIVES - hot, cold, hungry, messy, heavy, stuck
VERBS - try, trade, eat, carry, back (meaning "put it back on" or "give it back"), shut, push, help, hug, go, park, pour, see, jump, dancing, hiding
CLOTHING - socks, shoes, boots, shirt, pants, hood, glasses, hat
VEHICLES - airplane, bus, car, truck, van, train, ambulance, bulldozer
ANIMALS - doggie/puppy, panda, cow, piggies (may refer to either pigs or toes), bear, duck, cat, squirrel, horse
MISC. - alley, home, pictures, baby, snow, shovel, all gone, please, knock-knock, other, else (meaning "something else" or "someone else"), up/down, out/in, off/on, yeah/no
Interestingly, Bjorn does NOT say "more," but rather persists in saying "neh neh neh" while doing the baby sign for "more." This reminds me of when Leif was a toddler and for quite some time referred to blueberries as "za za," who knows why!
At 19 months, Bjorn is also starting to put together a few simple two-word phrases, such as "Where Dad?", "Grandma sleep," and "Go, Leif!" However, much of the time he has a knack for communicating a whole sentence worth of information through a single word. If you are standing with him at the bottom of the stairs and he looks up at you and says something that sounds like "key," he's actually trying to say "carry," as in, "Carry me upstairs!" Or if Leif eats a quarter of his dinner and declares himself done, while Bjorn has rapidly cleaned his plate, Bjorn will point to Leif's nearly full plate and declare, "Trade!", meaning "I want to trade my plate for Leif's!" And we are starting to get that classic toddler proclamation, "Self!", meaning "Hands off, Mom/Dad! I want to do that ALL BY MYSELF -- or suffer my wrath!!!" I'm sure we will be hearing plenty more of that in the year(s) to come :-) .
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