More

I have been doing a few words of sign language for a while with Anjali, such as the sign for "peepee" and "toilet", the sign for "food", and the sign for "more", and a sign for nursing. My sign for nursing is to make a pinching motion near my chest. When I have been away for a little while and she has spent a few hours with Papi, Anjali has made the pinching motion with her hands indicating she was ready for Mommy and booby to be back home. She has mimicked the "food" sign, which looks as if she is putting a little morsel up to her mouth. But she has really taken the "more" sign into her vocabulary. For "more", you tap the tips of your two hands' fingers together in a way that looks kind of like a bridge. When Anjali makes this motion, she always hums a certain way. And we have figured out that when she uses this sign, it is a blanket term meaning that she wants to ingest something in the first place, or she wants "more" of what she has already eaten or drunk. If she is using a cup, she holds the cup with one hand and taps it with the other hand in the "more" fashion while she hums the "more" hum. It's fun!

When she first started using the "more" sign, I was so excited ~ that night I looked up all the other signs I could possibly think of that were relevant to our life ~ cheese, yogurt, water, mother, father, "all done", hungry, thirsty, full, apple, dog, cat... and attempted to use them. But the first few days when I tried to use them all at once I think it confused Anjali. As she was attempting to communicate what she wanted, she swirled her hands in the air and swished them together maybe hoping they might mean something. Ha! So I have backed off a bit on the signs and use them in a more limited fashion.