chatterbox

Elliot's 17-month "birthday" shall henceforth be known as The Milemarker at Which His Speech Exploded. I don't think I posted about this here (defensive much?) but at E's 12 month check-up, E's doctor suggested that he might be speech-delayed. I had asked her about the follow-up hearing test that was recommended on his Special Care discharge papers due to the ototoxic effects of the antibiotic they gave him via IV for the first week of his life. (Gah!!) The doctor agreed to order it, followed with the comment "It's probably a good idea anyway because of his speech delays." This was the first she'd said of it and I was so caught off guard, I didn't even question her about it. She'd asked a few questions earlier about what he was and wasn't saying but hadn't given any indication she didn't like my answers until then. Anyway, he had the hearing test about a month later and to the extent that they can test a 12-month old, he passed meaning he should not have any difficulty acquiring language.

So, we cruised along for a while, picking up a word here and a word there, and then during the last couple of weeks, E started not only repeating every single thing we say, but remembering the words and using them at other times. I realized last week that we are on the cusp of a phase where I won't even be able to keep track of all the words he uses. I was home with him most of last week so it gave me a good chance to keep track of everything he's saying, so here it is, the last word list I intend to make. :-)

Words Elliot uses correctly at 17 months:
balloon
flower
apple
water
juice
milk
bee
bird
dog
kitty
ball
banana
choo-choo
car
truck
bus
bunny
baby
mine (love this one)
hi
bye bye
star
sun
bubble
no
yellow
shoe
bottle
light
nose
frog
butterfly
chair
rock
beep beep
hooray
ta-da
whoa
He also does the animal sounds for cow, sheep, duck, horse, lion and dog (almost).

There are a handful (okay, a lot) of these you'd have no chance of identifying the first time you heard them (i.e. bunny = muh-nah, butterfly = buh-fye, flower = vow-ah). We recognize these words because we hear them consistently (usually in conjunction with him pointing at the object to name it), but he's not ready to use them on the debate team or anything. :-)

He's also been saying "la-loo" for the last few days but we haven't been able to figure out what word it is... until this morning when M correctly identified it as hello.

I know the light switch flips for kids at different times and 17 months seems to be ours. It's really exciting, especially after going through that speech-delay silliness a few months back.