Talking Maniac

Claire has been elevating her talking to the next level lately. She used to say mostly single words about things and people, like "blanket" or "Gracie". Now she is sometimes speaking in actual sentences. If she spills her drink, she'll say "I spilled it." Dropping something, she'll say, "I dropped it." If she wants a book that is out of reach, she says "I have it." That last one sounds kind of rude in a way, but I think she picked it up from me asking her to give us something she has, like a flashlight. I normally say, "Can I have it?" as I hold out my hands. She even told Kit, "I love you" the other night out of the blue.

I guess this means that one day I will have a conversation with Claire over breakfast beyond the current standard, "Pancake. Table. Reesie. Goergie." But what else could there possibly be to talk about?

She is also "messing up" fewer words, which she does so cutely. Sadly, flamingos are no longer "'mingos". I think she was onto something with her "mingos". We call aligators "gators", right? And "ome-ne-ne" has largely been replaced by the technically more correct, "Open it". She is even sort of counting now. Somehow a game evolved where we spread the phonebooks out on the kitchen floor in a crooked line, and Claire steps from one to another. As she steps, Kit and I count, "Oooone. Twooooo. Threeeeee..." Claire has picked this up and will usually repeat the number, and sometimes even say the next number before we do: "Fooooooour" That just kills Kit and me.

But happily, she does not say everything perfectly yet. Here are some things that she still says funny. I wanted to get these down before she fixes these too.

• Oatmeal is "elmote". It sounds like "Elmo", with a distinct "T" on the end.
• She also adds a sharp "T" to the end of "arbor", which is Spanish for tree, making it "arbort". Sometimes this devolves into "Eye-bort".
  
• "Close the door" is just "Clodoor!", usually said with gusto as a single word.
• Elephants are "ephelants"
• A lion is a "liney"
• A spider is a "pider", and Spiderman (Reese's favorite) is "Piderman"
  
• She loves saying Cock-a-doodle-doo, but leaves out the "doodle", making it the more concise "Cockadoo!"
• A strawberry is a "strawburrrdy", usually said with gusto.
  
• Pasta is "patsa"
• Blueblerries are "blue-blerrrries"
  
• A quesadilla is a "kadeeya!"
• A heart is a "lart"
  
• Corn is "corner". This especially applies to the Mr. Potato head character Pop Corn.
• Some phrases are a mystery, like "Apple duty!", which she repeats often.
• When we say "Gimme five", she'll slap our hand and say, "Go five!"