upps, wove, sokay, tayawoth

Being my first, everything TJOML (aka "Ana") does amazes me these days.

Her vocabulary is growing quite fast... of course, as far as I have read, till they are four or so, the words they form and mouth out don't always match the way we adults say it - "Mazhalai" as it is called in my mother tongue - incredibly sweet sounding.

Anyway, already, "ba-yaa" has become "bunny", "dhow" has become "cow", "bith" has become "pig", and so on, she is gradually starting to say the words clearer...

Just so I can read back here and remember, I need to record her latest:

This morning, I served her some toast and eggs; i cut up the toast into little tiny triangles and served it to her with some ketchup we all have come to love. She picked up a piece of the toast, dipped it in the ketchup and held it up for us to see and said, "tayawoth", which is her word for triangle!

We have been teaching her basic shapes and she clearly recognizes patterns in these four shapes: square, triangle, circle, star. So far, if we held the book open and asked her "where is the circle?" she would point to the shape correctly. But nowadays, she tells us the name of the shape herself. Pattern recognition is quite a skill for toddlers to master.

When she is running around the house and unintentionally drops something or trips on her own, it is quite interesting to watch her talk to herself:
"Ana upps, uh-oh, Ana upps"."Ana sokay, Amma. Ana sokay".

(upps = oops, ana sokay = Ana is okay).

When she tries to get into places she shouldn't or climbing up some place and is losing balance, she says, "Ana wove. Ana wove". (wove=wow, as in steady, don't fall down).

Of course, she learnt all this watching the adults around her, and maybe her class-mates at daycare... but, it is amazing to watch her make the connection, use the words in correct context and communicate as best as she can at her tender 21-months.