The Beginning of Speech?

Lately Ethan has taken a liking to blubbering, i.e. puckering his lips, making the “brrrrrruuuuu…” sound (aka blowing raspberries), and using his index finger to flick his lips up and down. Then of course he will indulge in the baby blabbering. Occasionally we do catch a few words like deh-deh (Daddy maybe?) ….., mum-mum…, beh-beh (waving buh-bye) and just a couple of days ago, something which sounded remotely like “Mummeee….”. (yay!)However, it is unfortunately an unwritten rule that girls mature faster than boys, and also that the fairer sex is more adept at picking up languages. Just a few days ago, I met up with a fellow breastfeeding mommy friend of mine for lunch, and she told me that her daughter (now 15 months’ old) can already count from 1 to 10! Amazing!

Well, we don’t know when our boy will start having conversations with us, but we certainly can’t wait… for now, we are constantly speaking to him like we would to another adult, and he would listen attentively, even laughing on cue sometimes. It’s true that babies can understand and mimic what adults say fairly easily, especially at this age, when their brain is like a sponge. Therefore, we need to remind ourselves (and also those around us) to be careful NOT to use words which we do not want him to pick up at this tender age. You’d be surprise what babies these days can absorb…

Now until that precious first word is spoken, we’ll have to content ourselves with:

Me: What did you do today, Ethan?
Ethan: Wa wa wa…bababa…..brrruu, bruuuu……!!!
Me: Wah….really? What else?
Ethan: Mamamummmm…..vavava…..bruuu, bruuuu…..!!!
Me: Have you learned to say “Mommy” today?
Ethan: Brruuuuu…bruuuuuu….!!!! (showing a toothy grin)