At two Junior is genuinely chatty. His whole day is narrated, at great length and with frequent repetition: "Mummy, water in there! Water in there Mummy! In there! Water! Mummy! Water in there!" I long ago stopped counting his words but he is able to say most things he wants, and has some interesting nuances: "actually" is a new favourite. We are quite good on subject/verb/object, occasionally with an adverb or adjective thrown in although not necessarily in the right order. He is also very clear on what he wants and needs, and is unsurprisingly intolerant of that not happening instantly.
"Mummy, bird fly gone fast"
"Where bird gone?"
"Find bird now"
"Find bird now"
"Find bird NOW Mummy!"
He has just started to know colours (with no effort from us to teach them - classic second child neglect). Blue is usually correct. Red sometimes. Orange often. The rest a bit random.
He counts, in the fashion of one, two, five, seven, although he can recognise many of the numbers correctly (the 'hippos go beserk' book is a good one for this). He can say "I'm two" and does a lovely rendition of "Happy Birthday":
"Happy birthday mummy daddy, birthday birthday, mummy daddy [Pob] [Junior], happy birthday"
He knows an extraordinary number of animals, including 'pider, chicken, duck (loves ducks), magpie, cat, doggie, giraffe, tiger, bunny, flamingo, caterpillar, ant, bee, ladybird, armadillo, jaguar and ephelunt.
He has a great ear and repeats most things accurately the first time he hears them: "ballerina," "bolognese" "Beethoven" were all pronounced correctly this evening.
Nonetheless, he has the usual complement of adorable mis-sayings, even though some of the best are now gone (cockee has become coffee, nummy has gone to dummy). Our favourites are:
- 'poon
- ephelunt
- tupper (supper)
- paghetti
- lellow
- Teebee (tv)
- piggle piggle (iggle piggle)
My mother was busy correcting his pronounciation of 'poon this evening and I had to stop her - I want to hold on to his baby hood a little longer.
I think my favorite thing about the kid's speech is their mis-saying. Timmy still says "breftas (breakfast) and vitamitin", Ant is holding on to "aminal" and "betatch (attach)". I was really sad when Ant stopped calling his Donald Duck "Dogald". Sounds like Junior is doing really well in the language dept!
Posted by: Nico | Monday, 11 July 2011 at 18:33
Haha, Linnea has been giving us a running commentary since she was a tiny tot too.
Sometimes we can't keep up giving her the response she wants.
They do grow up so fast.
Posted by: Lut C. | Monday, 11 July 2011 at 20:09
Awww! So cute. I remember when Phoebe was 3yo helping her say yellow properly. She used to say "lellow" I missed it the instant I did it.
Posted by: Heather | Tuesday, 12 July 2011 at 11:57
I love the language stuff best. Everyone comments on PB's language - maybe there's a causal link between those two statements! Also, I really hate the screeching/crying, so definitely a causal link I'd say.
When they get it a bit wrong it's even better. Recent example from us: I asked PB to tell Dad where we went that day. He said, "To the lavatory!" He meant the observatory...
Bea
Posted by: Bea | Tuesday, 26 July 2011 at 12:35