Shhh, she's listening (and watching!)

Good day to you. Or good evening. Whichever it may be for you, I hope you are enjoying your time. And I want to thank you for coming by to share in our stories. It is very much appreciated.

It has become abundantly clear in recent days how much Del is able to understand when we talk and sign to her. There are simple "commands" that we have practiced with her that she deciphers without any problem, such as knowing the difference between "give a hug," "give a kiss," and "give high five!" (although the last one is usually said with such exuberance and gusto that it likely isn't just the words that Del attends to but also the energy of the request). She is very tuned in to us when we are communicating with her, and is making constant attempts to let us know her needs with her voice and hands (even though most of the time we're still pretty clueless about what she's trying to say).

I have to preface this next little story with a piece of information. Del loves books. Love love loves them. She sits for entire (short) stories two or three times in a row, turning pages and clapping when she sees familiar drawings or characters she likes. Her absolute favorite book is Dinosaur Roar by Henrietta Stickland. I read the book to her with silly voices that match the dinosaurs in the book, roaring and squeaking in turn with the opening line, "Dinosaur ROOAAARRRR, dinosaur squeak." Lately, whenever I read it to her, she says "eek" along with me when I do the squeaky dinosaur voice.

So now the story: Two days ago I was doing the dishes and Del was playing at the base of her bookshelf, surrounded (as usual) by the mountain of books she had pulled down from the shelves. I was looking away from her when she made what could only be described as a "ROOAAARRRR" sound. I turned around and sure enough, she was holding Dinosaur Roar in her hand. I recited the first line for her and she squealed when I said "squeak!" and dropped the book on a pile of others to crawl over to me. I gave her a high five, and then told her to go get "ROAR!" I repeated the request again then pointed at her pile of books. She crawled over there and sat down, looking up at me. I asked her, "where is ROAR?" and she smiled, grabbed the book, and held it out for me so I could read it to her. (again).

Del's verbal play is filled with a lot of phonemic variety, volume control exercises, and pitch exploration. No first words just yet, and she is not yet consistently using canonical syllables, or syllables that both start and end with a consonant (marked as CVC, these are starting to pop up more frequently in her babbling). Her new favorite non-linguistic sound is to pucker her lips in a tight little "o" and blow air or hoot. This was very adorable and endearing until Del decided that it would be fun to try this trick with applesauce in her mouth. Oh, the joys of parenthood are never ending! So all in all, Del has keen interest in her voice and all that it can do for her, and is slowly and steadily progressing through the steps of early sound development.

ASL is where Del has made (relatively) large leaps lately. She has started to produce signs in locations other than neutral signing space such as on her face and chest. She uses so many different handshapes, various kinds of finger play (proto-fingerspelling?), and sign movements when she hand-babbles these days that we can't keep up with everything new she produces; it's a barrage of manual linguistic play every time she lifts her arms to share a thought with us. See the video below for a brief example of what this looks like (my apologies for the poor quality; I have to capture these moments incognito).

The fluid nature of both spoken and signed languages make it difficult at times to pick out discrete units such as individual phonemes or signs. Here Del transitions rapidly through several different signs, experimenting with the dexterity and linguistic creativity she is tapping into more and more each day.

Thanks for stopping by, and please share your thoughts, questions, comments. . .I know there are some of you reading out there who know so much about these topics and I am eager for your perspective and input. I'm also curious to know what piques your interests, and the kinds of things you wonder when you watch or listen as people communicate with one-another. Share, share, share! (pretty please)

High Five!

Del is addicted to high-fiving. She does it all day long, and shrieks with glee each and every time. She is, in fact, shrieking as I type this, playing in the other room with Daddy F. I don't remember how the high-five fanaticism started; I'm thinking it was Daddy F's doing as I tend towards the fist-bump in matters of casual hand-to-hand greetings. She's also doing this funky little belly crawl as she crawl-runs around the apartment, flopping flat onto her stomach from hands and knees with a "thwump" and a giggle. She likes to hug and loves to wrestle, and has serious height advantage when it comes to new-shelf exploration and the getting-into of things not intended for her to get into.

Receptively, Del's language has taken a bit of a jump. The other day Daddy F and Del were playing a game of passing a teether back and forth. He gave it to her and pointed to me and signed, "Give it to Mommy." I didn't call to her or reach out my hands; I just waited to see what she would do. She looked at him with a blank face and Daddy F pointed to me again and signed "Mommy, go give this to mommy. Give. Mommy." Del's eyes all of a sudden lit up as she understood the message and she shrieked as she sped over to me and shoved the toy at me, elated. (Insert typical background noise of "yay!" and clap-clap-clap!) Since then I've been giving Del little directives, to see how much she is able to understand and follow. Startling, really, to think of how brilliant babies are. So much learning, so quickly, and not only is it effortless, but they truly delight in each and every new discovery along the way.

Del's hand babbling has increased recently, and has taken on more "intonation," or different level of intensity. When she wakes in the morning, she tends to wave her hands about with loose wrists, talking at the same time as though sharing with us the stories of her dreams. When we read books to her before naps or at bedtime, she will sometimes turn the pages herself, and babble manually and vocally at the same time, as though telling us the story. She has a lot more intonation in her voice these days, with long, ear-shattering minutes dedicated to the exploration of: HOW HIGH and HOW LOUD can this voice of mine go?

Del seems to already have a fundamental grasp of Daddy F's deafness. Our schedule during the week is such that both Daddy F and I are home alone with Del different days. When I put Del down for a nap and she wakes up, she will typically start yelling or talking loudly to herself when she gets up to alert me to come get her. The other day I came home early and Daddy F had just put Del down for a nap. I took care of some bills and read for a while in our back den. At one point I went to go get a drink of water and passed our bedroom. There Del was, sitting up wide awake and staring straight at the door, just waiting for someone to appear. She was silent as can be, and looked confused, then surprised, then happy to see me as we caught each-others' eyes. Daddy F claims that she is typically sitting up and staring at the doorway like this when he goes in to check if she's awake. I can honestly say that I have never experienced Del waking up silently when I am home alone with her. She's put two and two together and learned that Daddy doesn't come when yelled at, but mommy does. It will be interesting to see how she uses this information to her advantage (and my disadvantage?) as she continues to grow and learn.