It's crazy to think just how far we've come! We may not be able to understand them right away, but I believe babies come out speaking their own language. Small little oooohs and aaahhs quickly turn into cute jibber-jabber and I LOVE Keira's jibberish. Even though we didn't and still don't understand all the words coming out of her mouth, she has always been very expressive and communicative. At 7 months she definitely knew how to express unhappiness, but even better, she knew how to convey joy and lots of it, as expressed in this bath time video!
At the time, I remember wishing that I knew exactly what she was saying, but I got the message!
While she was relatively easy to read, we longed to really communicate with her. So, a little after this video we started to teach her how to sign. She took to a few words well. She signed: more, food, please, all done, milk and sleep. You know, the basic essentials! I remember feeling elated when she picked these up. Just being able to communicate these six words connected us even more to our little girl and helped us out tremendously with everyday tasks like feeding and sleeping.
As she got older her signing got better and her jibberish started to become more structured. I could listen to her gab for hours. It was hard to capture on camera, mostly because she'd stop as soon as I picked it up, but there have been many times Keira would have full conversations with herself (especially in the back seat of the car) or with us. In this video, I happened to capture her talking to Ryan about playing knock-knock on the bed.
Not to long after this, Keira uttered her first intentional word. It was clear as day and took us by surprise. What do you know? Out of her mouth came the word, no. I guess we used it a lot! Insert guilty look here.
Her little voice was so sweet and incredibly cute & tiny. The joy I felt when she signed was multiplied by a thousand with this development! This single word from her lips caused us to go into fits of laughter for quite some time! Her voice sounded exactly as I had imagined it would but oddly, she had, what sounded like, a mid-northern accent that reminded us of Bobby's mom from the 90's cartoon, Bobby's World. Remember that gem? It sounded like, nu-nu-nu, nu-nu. She grew out of it eventually, but I will never forget it.
No was the only word she could speak for weeks, so no matter what you asked she responded accordingly. Yes was a little too demanding, so in its place was a high pitched hmmm! Ryan and I milked it for all it was worth and had a lot of fun with it, especially at bath time!
To my delight, her next word was mama! One day when I came home from work, Ryan told me that as soon as Keira heard the garage door open, she got all excited and started saying, mama! Do you know how incredible that makes a working mom feel? I struggle and continue to struggle with believing that Keira may not love me as much as Ryan or even her nannies because I am away so many hours in the day, but in this case, she cared enough to notice that when the garage door opens it means that I'm home. It melts my heart when I think about it and I secretly liked and also needed the assurance. Whenever doubts arise about her love, I replay this moment in my head. I count it as Keira's gift to me!
Unfortunately, for Ryan, she also referred to him as mama for what seemed like forever. He'd say, "No, I'm daddy," and she would laugh and say, mama as if to correct him. I think she knew what she was doing! Still, we'd try to teach her that I was mama, Ryan was dada and she was Keira - mama (pause) dada (pause) Keira... mama, dada, Keira, over and over again. When she responded she got the tone right, but the words always came out - mama, mama, mama! Again, throwing us into laughing fits!
After mama, came bye and we all know the story about owl. Then came, nigh-nigh, elmo and baby then finally came daddy! Ryan was so happy that he texted me the news! It was his turn to be reassured. Now that she has it down pat, she can't stop saying it all, Daddy-Mama-Daddy-Mama! Still, no Keira but I'm sure it's coming soon.
I really could go on and on and on about other words she's picked up, but then this post would also go on and on! So this is the last one that I'll take the time to document, only because it's so darn cute. This weekend she learned to say her puppy's name, Dutchie!
In this in-between stage, it's as if she's bilingual. You see, she speaks both baby jibber-jabber but fully understands everything we say. If I tell her to it's time to eat, she goes towards the kitchen. If I tell her it's time for a bath, she follows. If I tell her we have to go somewhere, she gets her shoes... she's FULLY aware. Clearly, she's been talking to us for a longtime but we are only now beginning to understand her. Since the time she first said no, the words have come like an avalanche, slow at first but increasingly quicker. Everyday she's learning something new and all of sudden the jibberish baby talk we've become accustomed to getting from her is quickly being translated into words and those words are now turning into phrases! It's so funny to hear her saying all sorts of unrecognizable stuff and right in the middle of it, you'll hear daddy, mama, dutchie, owl!
Unfortunately, the jibber-jabber of her baby speak will eventually disappear. It's a dying language, after all. As the words and phrases increase, the former will naturally decrease. Sure, I'll miss it, but if there's one thing I love more than the jibberish, it's the clarity of her words! Nothing is as sweet as hearing, nigh-nigh daddy and bye-bye-mama!
It won't be long before we can have full fledged conversations and right now, I can't get enough. When Keira speaks, my heart skips a beat! I want to hear her talk all the time. It's music to my ears and I hope I never tire of it, although, I know eventually I will. I will forget the newness of it all and take it for granted. So just do me this one favor... please remind me of this post when one day way into a future, I write about my dealings and struggles with a very mouthy teenager!
For now, I'll just take it all in one sweet word at a time and let Keira say bye-bye until we meet again!
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