Obeservations on communications at one year.

I am reading a book called "How Babies Talk." It's about how babies learn to communicate and learn and what a huge and involved process that is. It's actually fairly amazing that such tiny creatures can grab words from a sea of babble and learn, remember and finally repeat them in context. The analogy that the book gave was if you went to a foreign country where you knew nothing about the language - how hard would it be to pick that language up. I suppose for some people that may be easy, but for most of us (like me, who after 2 years of high school French class, I still don't think I could do much more than ask where the post office is) it would be a difficult tasks indeed. And quite frustrating.

Anyhow, the book suggests that monitoring your baby's communication abilities will be fun and interesting -- to see just how far they progress in 3, 6 or 12 months. So to memorialize where Isabelle currently is on the ole communication index, here is what she knows, as of today:

Words Isabelle can Recognize (i.e. if you ask her where one of these items is she will look for it):
Brush (as in hair brush)
Mini
Meeko
Hat
Teeth
Nose
Eyes
Ear (this one is a little hit or miss still)
Hair
Teeth
The Baby
Daddy
Mama
Sheepy
Ball
Bath
Bye-bye
Hi
Kazoo
Flute
Belly
Cow
Lion (as in her stuffed lion chair)
Leo (her stiffed fluffy lion)
Toothbrush
Tower (i.e., the tower I build out of her blocks that she loves to whack down)

I am sure there are more, I just can't seem to think of them right now. I will update this post if I think of more.

She also has learned a few more signs, although, much to my irritations, she continues to use the sign for "more" for "help" as well. Sigh.... Here are the signs she can do and/or recognize:
More
Bath
All done
Water
Bye-bye

Lastly, she has learned how to make some animal sounds when you ask her what X animal says. Here are the animal sounds she has mastered thus far:
Cow = moo
Chicken = bock bock
Snake = ssssssss
Owl = who who
Lion = ROAR (this one is the cutest by far, to see such a tiny cheerful baby making a guttural little roar)

In other news, she still refuses to walk more that 3-5 steps. She is crawling like a mad woman and is really starting to climb on things. She continues to use her head as a bettering ram on various objects throughout the house.

All is all she is doing great. And I adore her more and more each day.