A Little Life Form Learning....

    My baby won't talk.  (Well, not a BABY, really.  She's 15 months old....) She understands English well enough, she just won't use it.  Grunts, groans, jabbed-a-pig-with-a-hot-poker squeals, she's got those, she's just not big in the word department.  It may be that she's just making us work for it, or it may be that Sass won't let her get a word in edge-wise.  My vote is the latter.  That boy has been talking since conception... may be even earlier.  His 3rd or 4th day home from the hospital we started calling him "Tweeter" due to the fact that we had to wheel his little bassinet out into the hallway outside of our bedroom to get even a moments rest because he was constantly "tweeting".  I'm talking non-stop, 24/7 chirps and squeaks, even in his sleep.  It was cute for all of 8 hours.  He did that for 2 months straight and then moved on to coos and squeals... and then there was the "singing"/shrieking phase... *shudder*.

Fast forward to about 30 seconds in...

All.  Day.  Long.

And yes... his eyes always looked like that.

At eight months the little booger said "ball" and knew what he was talking about.  It was all downhill from there...
   
     Sprinkles has been a foal of a different color... naturally, I suppose.  She will say a few words when prompted, like "Daddy" or "Owl", but nothing really consistent.  Oh, and she will call everyone "Mama" but me.  Like, she will look at one of my friends and call her "Mama" and then turn to me and smile sweetly with a touch of evil.... I know, we are in trouble.  She understands what we are saying to such a degree that I worry that we may have underestimated her level of understanding one to many times, and I really shouldn't have mentioned my bank pin number out loud... in front of her....  She got that gleam in her eye after I said it, too...
     We aren't worried about her.  You can tell her that "Your milk is in the refrigerator   Would you like a drink?" and she waddles on over to the kitchen and starts hauling on the fridge doors.  She gets it... she just doesn't speak.  Fine.  She will when she's ready.
     With Sass, the allholyfirst, we researched and Googled and Baby Einstein-ed and, as a by-product, picked up some simple sign language along the way.  You know, 'cause with the first-time-freak-out we wanted to "enrich" his little mind as much as possible. (Because gawd forbid he get even a little frustrated with verbal communication and isn't it responsible of us to give him this wonderful opportunity to talk with his hands and aren't we great and flying unicorns on rainbows...)  Or as he saw it, bore him to tears....  Needless to say, sign language wasn't his thing.
   
But....

A week ago, while sitting at the dinner table, Sprinkles signed "more" when she had finished her milk...

"Was that...?"  I asked.
"I... I think it was."  Said Hubbs.

*shocked silence*

     They must have worked with her on this at school because, as with many second children, we hadn't the time, neurosis, or neurons to work with her on it.  Holy sh*t.  And she loves it.  Time to dust off the first-time-freak-out box and get this girls fingers wiggling!

And go you, little girl.  Way to show us....  :)