just have to blog this one before i get on with things today and completely forget she did it. Flower was sitting on my bed as i checked email this morning. she leaned back on the pillows and said "HAT". i turned around to see her smiling at me because a cushion fell on top of her head and stayed there.
i suppose this is more amusing for me, well, 1. because she's my daughter (everything your own little one does is more amusing to you than anyone else) and 2. because she has become completely obsessed with hats lately, though we didn't know that anything sitting on her head could work for her and 3. it indicates the development of her understanding of what makes a joke!
we always knew she was a little girl who's into accessories (shoes, hats, glasses, watches, etc...). she's a girl after her mummy's style conscious little heart (well, i can at least TRY to be a "yummy mummy"), and we anticipate that she will someday also grow to be after her daddy's credit card as well!
oh, another word for you: the word for "sunglasses" is "eyes". but "eyes" said with such a particular Flower expression in her voice and on her face that it takes on a whole new meaning!
so yes, as tj said below, "they grow up too fast. Write down Flower's funny sayings now before she grows out of them!"
so far, in losing "baby words" for more accurate ones:
-- "Gakka" (her cuddly toy Makka Pakka [ok, i admit the name itself is silly, but we like him!] who she is completely emotionally attached to and takes to bed. He's complete with battle scars and blood stains from when she fell down the stairs on Monday and saw her through 3 hours in the casualty department!! he needs a wash... anyway, i digress again...) has now become "Makka",
-- "gee-ku" has become a very grown up "thanks"
-- "ray-see" has become "raisins"
-- "see-caa" became "scat" and has now become "BIS-cat"
-- after seeming to not know the word for ages, she finally knows and says properly "pig" and "oink", though she's not as obsessed with cows as she used to be.
yes, i have been writing them down.
Heathcliff (our cat) is still "okra"! (we never did figure out the linguistic derivation of that one!)
ee declared to me the other day that "i miss 'gee-ku'. this language development thing is overrated!" it's funny how you get attached to the individual words/sounds themselves as standing for a particular time as she grows up. every parent feels like they have this amazing developmental time for such a short while that it's understandable why parents want to hold on to the "baby" words just a little bit longer. especially when you know that no matter what, yes, she's going to grow up and speak properly someday. we've only had her baby language for such a short time anyway. no one could blame us for wanting to enjoy this time just a little longer before it's gone.
because it will be gone.
though, after granny's concerted effort and brief success at trying to get Flower to take the "s" off the end of "sheep" that she puts there (even for the singular) we are happy to report that there are "sheeps" in this household once again!! ;-)
have had a load of b&w films that i shot and developed back in 2000-2003 in my bathroom darkroom and the uni darkroom, but never had the time/money/resourses/health to print the photos off. so finally i have bought myself flatbed film scanner so that i can get the shots onto my computer and printed off. the scans it's produced are pretty good, plus it was fairly cheap for what it is. for not being a professional level film scanner (oh so expensive!), i'm pretty happy with it.
So far i've been pretty happy with the results, proud of my original work (what i've gone through so far), and pleased to see the shots.
so here are some of the shots. any comments or critique happily accepted.
ok, ok. i know that i've completley neglected my responsibility to answer the question that i previously posed to you. in fact i get people asking me all the time for the answer. (and that's over cups of tea or bbq's not just internet bound. you know you've been neglecting your blog when people you see everyday in the place we satirically refer to as "RL".
["RL"="real life" for those who have never been addicted to internet role play or have never heard someone actually say "oh, i was talking to brad the other day and this GNOME walked by and gave me a love potion!! but then i went to the cafe and met up with steve {i mean in RL}." and yes, i used to know a girl many years ago who frequently said things like that {and NO, it WASN'T ME!!}. which was a bit destabilising, especially when you had no idea who brad or steve were! she didn't mention RL that much though... funny, that, hmm....] anyway, i digress...)
ok, so "tid-da-low". none of the guesses were even close. but then, that's not surprising, considering that it was an "armadillo"! no really, it was. she had a book (sadly, sadly lost now.) that was a story of a zoo keeper saying goodnight to all his animals who then let themselves out of the zoo and follow him home to go to sleep in his bedroom. it was a lovely story. so i had heard her saying tiddaolow tiddalow tiddalow for a few days and couldn't work it out, until i told her the story again and pointed to the different animals and said 'can you say giraffe?' and she'd answer 'jaf.' 'can you say lion?' 'lion' 'can you say armadillo? (i only asked for a laugh to see what she'd do, not thinking she'd really respond) 'tiddalow.' so i tried again 'armadillo, Flower, what's an armadillo? 'tiddalow!'
it seems so long ago now. her language has moved on SO much that we'll probably not hear that word again, now that she could probably say 'armadillo' itself!
well, and as we can't find the book anymore, and we generally don't have much call to talk about armadillos in everyday conversation, really.
there are now photos in the wibsite flickr group pool from the november Swansea/Oz wibmeet. when you click on the link and get to the slideshow, hover over the middle of the first pic and click once on the "i" that appears and it will give you the captions throughout the show. some tell you who's in them, some just say things like 'wibmeet 037". sorry, i ran out of captions.
incidentally, it will take you through the evening from the end to the beginning. it's just how they posted.
hope you enjoy. (oh yeah, and once you get to the make poverty history pics, that's the end of the wibmeet.)
by the way, i'll give you one more shot at "ti-dah-low" hint: it's an animal found in this book, and no, it's not a gorilla.
i never realised how much fun language acquisition, translation and the whole guessing game that is communication with a 21 month old would be. she tends to have a favourite word of the day. it's great listening to her obsess about 'cow, cow, cow, cow. . . cow. cooooowwwwww. COW!" or sometimes " cat, cat, cat etc..." These types of exchanges usually happen while having a quiet moment looking out of her window together.
Flower Child: "cat, cat, cat, cat, cat, cat, cat." me: "do you see a cat, Flower? I don't see a cat. But do you see one>" Flower Child: "no cat. bur -tee!" me: "do you see a birdie, Flower?" Flower Child: "no bur-tee."
and so on.
but i particularly love when i work out what a random syllable means. particularly when said random syllable has been confusing us to it's meaning and frustrating Flower at our incomprehension. Words that have happened in this charades like way have included "shh!" (for "fish"), "raysee" (sometimes with a trilled 'r'...means raisins), "scat" (for buscuit/cookie), and the imfamous "DO NOT DO NOT DO NOT" or sometimes said as "TO NO NOT TO NO NOT TO NO NO NOT" or even sometimes "TO YO YOT" (this obviously was never an emphatic instruction not to do something, but it took us awhile to figure out it was her way of saying "i want". "To yo yot" was actually the syllable combination that helped the most, because it was close to what we would say to her when asking "do you want (fill in the blank, whatever)?"
Yesterday's word was "skwee". Can you guess what it means? You'll never guess. Wait for it. . .
. . . hold on, don't rush me
. . . it's too good
. . . really, it is
play dough! skwee is play dough!
i think it comes from when i introduced her to play dough a couple of weeks ago, i handed her a blob and told her to "squeeze it". so after buying some new colours yesterday (yes, yes, i know one can save money by being a super mum and making it, but believe me, the energy and time and frustration it would save me in buying it, is worth the 3 pounds! i'd love to be a super mum, but i simply haven't got my cape yet.) we spent the afternoon squeezing the skwee. Today's word of the day has been "skwee, skwee, skwee, skwee, skwee."
also included in our linguistic adventures are words that mean something they don't really. Early on in our time with Flower she'd say "chaairr" and obviously want something that wasn't a chair. Worked out that it meant she was hungry (because of her booster seat at the table). Although this translation is a fluid one, as she's almost as obsessed with chairs and different chairs and seating furniture as she is almost with cows. so sometimes "chaairr" really does mean, well, chair.
ok, here's one for you to guess. what is (and no spilling the beans if i've told you this already!):
been meaning to post some wiblogger pics on the flickr group. please respond in the following thread if you do or do not want me to include pictures of you. (this will pertain to anyone who has been at a wiblogger meet up with me... because if i was there, then my camera will have been there to.)
this is my last call before posting. you have been warned. ;-)
the last burnt sienna crayon 
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