A Little Knowledge

It has been said that a little knowledge is a bad thing. This is certainly the case with Megan.

Megan entered into the world of language with flawless use of the word "kitty." But as time progressed Megan morphed the word and used it for anything that was particularly exciting, most specifically, all of her stuffed animals became "kitty" (none of them are actually cats) and pictures of babies (including herself) became "kitty." They were all things that were cute and cuddly, so we could kind of justify the useage. But now Megan is trying desperately to learn new words - "duckie" and "daddy" occasionally escape from her lips, particularly if we bait her with repetition: "look, Megan, it's a duckie...DUCK-IE," to which she will reply in jarbled tones,"dck-EE." These new words have only brought confusion, not clarity, to Megan's naming system. We catch her calling the cats "duckie;" Her ducks are frequently "kitty;" and often her jumbled thoughts come out in a run-on list of syllables: "da-da-da-kit-TEE-dck-EE."

We've had some laughs at Megan's expense. Playing flashcards goes something like this:
P: [cat] Megan, what's this?
M: Kitt-ee
P:[horse] Megan, what's this?
M: Kitt-ee
P: [dog] Megan, what's this?
M: Kitt-ee
P: [cow] Megan, what's this?
M: Kitt-ee

And so on and so on.

Megan also now knows that big spoons are for big people food and big people food is better than baby food, so she refuses her little spoon. We have to feed her baby food with the big spoons.

And Megan is now great at climbing the stairs. Her spatial awareness is even worse than her dad's, so we frequently have to catch her when she turns to sit or tries to come down.

So the one thing that Megan seems to have no idea about is "mommy." One day we were in the bath. When I asked Megan about the duckie, she grabbed the rubber duckie, when I asked Megan about the cat she looked to Zeus who sits next to the tub while we bathe, and when I asked about Mommy, Megan looked expectantly toward the door to see if there was a Mommy walking in.

A second time I was trying to get Megan to repeat after me.
P: [cough, cough, cough]
M: [cough, cough, cough] (Meg loves to imitate coughing)
P: Megan, it's Daddy
M: Dad-dy
P: Look, Megan, the kitty.
M: Kitt-ee
P: Look, Megan, it's Mommy.
M: Dad-dy

aaargh!