As usual this morning when we woke up Kate immediately asked me for a "diamond", but for the first time EVER she corrected herself after she said it by clearly asking again but saying the word "vitamin" very clearly. When I was dressing her, she wanted to wear her "sprinkley" shoes (glitter) to church. After we got there and she was playing with her friends, she asked me where her friend Dylan was because she wanted to "wiggle" (tickle) him in the bounce house. And when we were sitting at the table eating lunch after church, Cody handed me an envelope and Kate was very excited about seeing a "little clipper" (paper clip) attached to it.
There's no doubt Kate always knows exactly what she's saying, but sometimes I have to be her interpreter in public. The problem isn't her enunciation, her communication problem with other people is her odd choice of words - even when I know she knows exactly what the right word to use! I can usually make sense of it eventually, but sometimes she even throws me for a loop.
One of her funniest word substitutions that I'm hearing daily is for a Christmas song. I know this is going to sound pathetic, but I confess: I have a CD from the 2003 Singing Christmas Tree show our church back in Lubbock performed and there are a few songs on that CD I still love listening to during the Christmas season. My favorite song on the CD is "The End of the Beginning" sang by Mickey Henderson (the minister of music at the church in 2003) - and Kate has learned to love it as much or more than I do.
Here comes the particularly pathetic part of my story: we listen to it at least twice every time we're in the car during the holidays. We've made up hand motions to some of the words and belt it out horridly off-key at the top of our lungs as we cruise down the road in the Civic. We also have several other fun Christmas CDs - and this year I even bought Kate the Cedermont Kids Christmas CD set so she'll have kid Christmas music to enjoy - but that old recording of the Singing Christmas Tree track 9 is still Kate's favorite song. Last year I broke down and let her listen to it a few times in January, but by February whenever I finally decided we had to let the Christmas music go Kate literally cried and cried when I told her we couldn't listen to it until next Christmas.
When Cody and I listen to the song those first few times each season, we frequently talk about what a great singer Mickey is - we've never heard anyone else able to sing that song like he can. Kate must have overheard us talking because last year because she started requesting the song by begging for "The Mickey Mouse Song" (the only Mickey in her two year old world!). That title was cute last year and made us smile every time she said it, but this year since she's older I decided to teach her how to ask for her beloved song correctly. I told her over and over the actual title of the song and tried my best to get her to call it "The End of the Beginning" - words that she sings in the song and definitely can understand as well as say. But she kept calling it "The Mickey Mouse Song" by default. My last effort to amend the title in her mind was to tell her Mickey Mouse did NOT sing the song. With a very concerned and confused look on her face, she immediately wanted to know was who sang the song. So I told her Mickey HENDERSON sang "The End of the Beginning". She repeated "Mickey Henderson" methodically to be sure she was saying each syllable correctly. I saw the light breaking through in her mind and got so excited for fleeting moment until she so sweetly said: "Okay, Momma - can we listen to the Mickey Hen-der-son song?"
So this year, without any more attention paid to the fact that she definitely knows the correct name of the song she loves to sing, the moment we get in the car she starts begging to hear "The Mickey HENDERSON Song". I've finally relented to that being the song's title to Kate from now on - but I'll keep working on the sprinkles, wiggles, little clippers, and all the other word switching as she gets older. They're definitely a precious part of being two - and it always keeps us laughing hearing which words she'll switch - but I don't want her to be 42 and still talking about swallowing diamonds every morning!!
And Mickey, if by any chance you're out there in cyberspace reading this, I want you to know my little girl's favorite Christmas song for two of her three Christmases is sung by you - and if there are any 2003 Singing Christmas Tree of FBC Lubbock choir members out there reading this, thanks for all your hard work on that CD! Who knew that 5 years later a tiny two year old little girl would be requesting that song over and over and over again?!?
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2 comments:
As your SLP friend, I get to remind you of the fact that kids are only expected to be 50% intelligible by 2 and 75% by 3, so no worries about being an "interpreter." I love that you ? maybe) appreciate my SLP facts as you helped me learn so many of them during school!
As another SLP friend and a member of that 2003 choir, I loved this post! We, too, are big fans of that particular CD and still listen to it in our car! And you're right, no one else could sing it like Mickey! That was a fun Christmas in the choir!
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