My baby (17 months) is starting to really talk. She’s stringing words together and her first sentence was a question: “Where’s Papa?” She asked this every morning while we were in Florida two weeks ago and her Papa was still sleeping.
Now, she uses the same phrase for her sister, brother, Daddy and me. She’s also started saying the word “go” with a question emphasis. If she drops something, she holds her hands out and says “Go?” She also says:
- “side” when she wants to go outside
- “Duicy” when she wants juice
- “Paba” for peanut butter (a favorite food)
- Cheese
- “Mo” for Elmo
- “Bop” for Baby Bop
- “Dude” to greet her brother in the morning
- No
- “Shym” for Gym
- Mine
- Toes
- Eye
- Nose
- “Beddie” for belly
One of the many joys of having this baby is getting to relive and reminisce these fun times with my older children. Hearing her say “mine” reminds me of my son’s first use of the word. He was completely MY baby until he was about 3-years-old and he was very possessive of his Mommy. My DH used to tease him by putting his arms around me and saying, “My wife.” So, my son responded by hugging my legs and saying “Mine ife.”
Similarly, the baby’s desire to go outside constantly reminds me of my teen’s toddler days. She often used what my husband refers to as “Jedi mind tricks.” She’d repeatedly ask us questions that she wanted us to ask her. “Want to go to the park? Want to go to the park? Want to go to the park?” Finally, we’d say, “Do you want to go to the park?” And she’d say, “Okay,” as if it was our idea and we were twisting her arm.
Just before falling asleep last night, my husband and I were talking about what an adorable child this baby is, which led us to discussing favorite memories about the other two kids. I remembered bringing my oldest to our bed in the early morning hours to nurse, and then waking up several hours later with her sound asleep between us, her blond curls sticking to her head and her fat little fists tucked up under her chin. I remembered my husband carefully, excruciatingly slowly lifting my sleeping son from our bed and trying to transfer him to his own crib. The instant he felt the emptiness of his crib, he’d begin wailing and I’d eventually give in and bring him back to the curve of my body.
I’ve said it before and I’ll write it again — it’s all going way too fast. It went too fast the first two times, and even though we’re more careful to live in and relish the moments this time around, those moments seem to move at warp speed.
