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The Things They Say & Do – Week 6

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Some of Ellie’s new words & phrases this week: “Yippee!”, “Wow…”, “Oh dear dear”, “I love cake!”, “Tea Party!”, (in the bath, to Jake) “Can you swim?”

Both Jake & Ellie have a ‘thing’ about food being too hot, being a bit nervous of it sometimes even when it’s barely luke-warm. Breakfast, porridge, Jake decides Ellie’s is too hot & blows on it. Ellie says “Thank you”, then blows on Jake’s porridge. Jake: “Thank you”, Ellie: “You’re welcome”. We’re just watching them, delighted.

They’d managed to dismantle a toy garage & Jake was wearing a plastic support rod on his arm. I grabbed another one & wandered around pretending to be a robot, doing my best (meaning very, very bad) robot dance, with sound effects. This was the most hilarious thing EVER & they spent the next million hours trying to imitate me. Come to think of it, I may have videoed it…

I’m lying on my back on the bed during their bedtime routine. Jake is standing on my chest. Feeling tall, he says “Mummy, Daddy, I’m a man!”.

Later, more chest-standing. Me: “You’re Jakezilla, grrrr!!”. The Mummy: “I’m Mummyzilla!”, then Ellie: “Elliezilla!”.

Jake has done great things with some stacky cups, then says: “Daddy: I finished!”.

They both have a fascination with the moon. Spotting it while in the garden, Ellie looks up at it & says: “Amazing…”.

Jake is pretending to spoon me my coffee. With every ‘spoonful’ he says: “Nice?”.

Jake wants to wear the Mummy’s watch. She has a bit of trouble putting it on his wrist, but when she succeeds he says: “Well done!”.

We were drawing outside with chalk. They both decided that the chalk was better employed as pretend ‘phones. Jake is pretending to talk to Mummy Pig. Me: “Did you ‘phone Mummy Pig?”. Jake: “Yes”. “What did she say?”.  He snorts. I laughed. A lot.

We’ve had an eventful week! A lot of these words & phrases they’ve picked up from us, but I really don’t know where they get some of it from!

These may not seem be very exciting to some, especially non-parents, but to us these moments are golden.

This post is my entry for this week’s ‘Things They Say & Do’ blog linky over at Chris’ ‘Thinly Spread‘ blog. Have a look the other posts there: I guarantee a good read!

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The Children in the House Go Chatter, Chatter, Chatter

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This was to be a post  in my ‘3 Brilliant Things‘ blog, but there were so many great things yesterday, mainly to do with communication, that I thought it deserved a post here in my main Daddying blog.

I’ve been banging on for some time, mostly in that 3BT blog, about how surprised I am at their communication skills. I don’t really know but they seem pretty good considering that they’re only 23 months old.

Ellie’s pronunciation is really good, her vocabulary seems to grow every day & she seems to learn really quickly. She’s like a parrot; she often immediately repeats a word or phrase she hears us say. Jake’s pronunciation isn’t as clear, but his (it seems to me) social awareness compensates for that.

For instance: towards the end of the day we were watching TV & I put ‘Baby Jake‘ on. Ellie, word for word & in perfect timing, copied a part of the spoken introduction, “J is for Jake, our baby brother”. A 7-word sentence! Jake then said, really clearly: “No, not again!”. He then repeated it & I then asked him if he didn’t want to watch Baby Jake & he confirmed that he didn’t. To be fair, it was a repeat…

Earlier, in the garden, we were playing a game. 1 would pretend to be stuck on the ground (it started with Ellie actually stuck, sitting with a leg folded under herself), & then the other would pretend to help them up, along with ‘Daddy’ who did the actual lifting. Great fun. Ellie was consistently saying “Daddy, Jake: I stuck!”. An original 4-word sentence, used correctly in context, & using a personal pronoun (“I” rather than “Ellie”). I’m pretty sure children that age aren’t meant to do that.

During their bedtime routine Ellie was carrying a book. She said what I’m almost certain was “I can read the big book”, then sat down & did exactly that. An original  6-word sentence, again used correctly in context, & again using a personal pronoun.

I’ve mentioned before how Jake, when the Mummy told him that he was her little baby, said indignantly: “I not a baby, I’m Jake!”

I’m constantly amazed by all this. Our little babies – who not so long ago, it seems, were just little confused, immobile, inarticulate (& often smelly) bundles  - are talking, & talking to us! We’re actually having conversations with them, & they with each other!

But I’m also a little confused. Is this normal for children of this age? Are they ahead of the curve? Or am I just looking through the rose-tinted glasses of a doting Dad? I do actually need new glasses…

What are your experiences? Are /were your children little chatterboxes, or quiet as church-mice? I’d really appreciate some feedback here.

This post is my entry for this week’s Things They Say & Do’ blog linky over at Chris’ ‘Thinly Spread‘ blog. Have a look the other posts there: they’re really good!