Words, words, words

Just 2 months ago A had maybe half a dozen words: Kitty ("diddy"), Mama, Dada (now sometimes "Da-dee"), bubble, balloon and bye-bye (which started as "bah-bah" and then she polished it to "bah-ee, bah-ee").

Now she's also added cracker ("cah-cuh"), cheese (which she pronounces with an 's' rather than 'z' sound), ball, baby ("bee-bee!" always with excitement), truck ("chuck"), car ("cah" like any good Bostonian), dog ("gog"), eye drops ("eye ja!" ...yes, we did just have a bout with conjunctivitis...), Bravo! ("babo!" while clapping hands-- the excitement of getting to do "Bravo!" afterwards is what made the eye drops acceptable), No (both in the context of "nononono" tattling on the cats doing something they shouldn't, and "No!" in response to questions like "A, are you going to eat more broccoli?"), helicopter ("ha-kuh-tuh"), water/agua ("wawa") and her absolute favorite, umbrella (??-go figure). That one started as "unlela" then "Brella!" always said enthusiastically with volume. Now it's sometimes "Abrella!". This kid is in love with umbrellas, the days it rains she is in heaven. We have to say goodnight to the household umbrellas at bedtime, I'm not kidding.

These are all spontaneous words she says when she sees/hears the object in question. She also tries with varying degrees of success to repeat all sorts of things we say. She waves goodbye but rarely hello. When she wants to give a kiss she flattens her lips and says "Mmmmmm!"; for hugs she just tries to grab you in a headlock.