Tyler sorted all the shapes by himself tonight!
For sure, he's not very verbal... in fact, I think he's the least verbal of all my kids at this age, which is saying something (I'm looking at you Hailee!)... but he continually surprises me with what he knows and how quickly he learns things. One morning, he wanted milk- a surprise because he hadn't been a milk drinker since I weaned him. In fact, every time I offered him cows milk, whether in a bottle, sippy cup, big boy cup with or without a straw, he'd take a drink and then let it just dribble out of his mouth... nice buddy. But enough times of seeing his siblings drinking milk and eating it with their cereal, and eventually of course he wanted it also. So I showed him the sign for milk and he signed it right back to me. A few hours later, I asked him to say milk and he signed it to me. He did the same thing with 'toothbrush' - I had to make up a sign because I didn't know it (why not??), and he pretty much instantly signed it back to me and remembered it the next time. Sometimes he gets confused in his urgency of 'needing'... he'll anticipate what I'm going to ask him to sign, so he'll sign 'more' instead of 'please' or 'eat' instead of 'drink'... but he corrects himself if I ask him to sign the correct word.
Verbally, I think he's just kind of 'shy', for lack of a better word. Months ago, I was trying to teach him the word 'car'. I repeated the 'cuh' sound over and over, "cuh, cuh, CAR"... after a bit, he quietly, almost under his breath, repeated, "cuh" and then acted like he was embarrassed! I praised him, but he wasn't willing to repeat the sound for weeks, and then suddenly, he started saying it whenever he saw a car! Prior to that, 'car' was "mmmm-mmmmm-mmmmm" like the sound an engine makes when revving up *wink*.
Every time I'm changing his diaper, he points up to where his pacifiers are kept- most of the time, he'd just grunt as he pointed, so I started saying, "PAA-SEE, puh, puh, PAA-SEE"... Same thing happened as with 'car'... he picked up on the 'ssss' sound and one day repeated it and then clammed up until he was ready to say it, and now, boy does he repeat it! He drags anyone willing into his room, points up at where his paci's are and fervently says, "SS! SS! SS!"
At this point, he says: Mama, Dadda, I (Eli... in fact, he makes a sound for all of his siblings, but 'Eli' is the most distinguishable, which thrills Eli!), bah (ball), SS (paci), cuh (car), hot, nigh-nigh (goodnight), buh-buh (bye-bye), buh-buh (bubble- it's pretty much the same as bye-bye).
He makes animal sounds for a dog, chicken, elephant (it's so cute!), cow, horse, lion, bear, duck and alligator (a chomping sound).
He signs: eat, drink, more, please, thank you, all done, milk, brush teeth/toothbrush and help.
He understands SO much- he cleans up when asked (and even sometimes without being asked!), he points to the correct pictures in his 'first words' books (100+ words), gets his shoes, folds his arms for prayers (if he's feeling it...) and so much more... somehow, he still doesn't understand "get off the counter" though *wink*, but that's not surprising because I'm still trying to teach Jace that one!!
So even though he's not overly verbal for an almost 2 year old, he understands so much and communicates enough that I'm not too concerned... at least at this point!
