Cheese!

If you listen and pay attention these days, you will notice that Anjali is working at saying words. I think our household would all agree that Anjali's first official word (other than "hi", which she's had for months) is "cheese". She says it with a smile, and pronounces, "tseezz!" We have a ritual of tapping our forks together and saying, "Cheers!" before a meal as a way to center our focus. We include Anjali, and tap her hand (or fork if she is using one) too. For this she also says something close to her cheese word. Dates are another favorite snack for us right now (there are some really soft, gooey and even sweeter ones in season right now from Southern California! yum!), and oftentimes after I say the word, she mimics it, saying something like, "det", with a very pronounced "t". She says, "Choo," for shoes, and points to the shoes we're wearing. And she has recently changed the sound she makes in reference to booby ~ from the "Nye nye nye," noise she has made for a long time, to "Bbbbb."

Yesterday she made a motion that reminded me of hopping and so I said, "Hop hop hop!" And she said, "Hop," very clearly. Today we were sitting on the couch and she pointed down to something on the floor. There were three things I saw there, so I said, "The hat, the (toy) apple, or the block?" Anjali paused to think, and then said, "Bloh."

Her imitation of our movements and sounds is so keen and enthusiastic, it really reminds us to be good examples! But it's a lot of fun to hear and see her renditions of us! Ha ha! One day Uncle Austin jokingly displayed very animated disgust at something, saying, "Blaaah!" and sticking his tongue out. From across the room, Anjali yelled, "BLAAAHHH!!" and stuck her tongue out with such gaiety. We all roared laughing, including Anjali.