more ethan-ese

Ethan is now naming three shapes (triangle [twyy'-yuh-yuh], square [quee'yuh], and circle [syuh-cuh]) on his own, no prompting. He held up his slice of quesadilla the other day and said "triangle" clear as day! He recognizes stylized shapes, also, not only simplified ones. For instance, he pointed to a line drawing of a Starburst candy that was drawn in perspective, sort of looking at it from the side, and the literal 'shape' of it was a diamond with some odd flanges. He labeled it correctly as a square. He recognizes several capital letters and knows their names. And my newest favorite? "No Thank You!" This is also accompanied by the emphatic finger thrust. My best friend Julia is always trying to get him to be more polite, and whenever he does a wicked thing, she says softly but firmly, "No thank you, Ethan." So the other day when I took a large rock from him that he was about to hurl into harm's way, he looked up at me and pointed, and said petulantly, "No duck-dya!!" I about died.

The excited incomprehensible babbling has increased exponentially as he is trying new ways to communicate verbally every day. He's not great at it, but he's finally decided that it's important to him to learn our language. What more could a mommy ask? *joy*

We have a new little ritual where he barges into the bathroom when I'm in there in the morning, and wields a magazine at me (usually a Martha Stewart Living, but Wired and Linux Journal are also popular lately). I am required to pore over the pages with him looking for interesting images or letters or numbers, and name them. If it is an animal of any kind, the name is unimportant and the sound it makes is required instead. If I can name a thing, he is game and will do his best to say it. However, this rule only extends so far as this magical time lasts each morning. The rest of the day he acts shy if I introduce a new word to him and ask him to repeat it. But during this moment we share over a glossy periodical, he feels free to venture out and sample the feeling of as many new words as I want to throw at him on his tiny tongue. One thing's for certain- he's bound to have a phenomenal sense for graphic design, cutting his teeth like this on some of the best print advertising in the mainstream industry... *grin* He already is more interested in imagery than the actual language. The season for language-based graphic design is drawing to a close (does anybody read the fine print anymore? I mean, any consumers?), and people who can communicate viscerally with image, sound, and color are the immediate future of the media industries. Ethan's not weird. He's just well-adjusted to his environment. What's another word for that? Evolved. *laugh*