Do You Understand the Words Coming From My Mouth?

People frequently ask if Tyson can speak yet. At almost 19 months corrected, the little guy's ability to communicate both verbally and through gestures has taken off. He still tends to be quiet until he warms up... and although he loves playing with telephones and cell phones, he doesn't often speak on request when someone is actually on the phone (i.e. if you talk with him on the phone and ask him to say "hi" he will more likely wave than say the word). You know he considers you a friend when he starts endlessly telling you the names of his favourite Sesame Street characters :)

Some of the words that he can say:

• Mama
• Dada
• Nie-nie (milk)
• Bauble (bubble)
  
• Boh-boh (ball)
  
• Wo-wo (puppy)
  
• Puppy (puppy :P)
  
• Car
  
• Elmo
  
• Ernie
  
• Bert
  
• Pooh
  
• Blue
  
• Geen (green)
  
• Pur-pul (purple)
  
• Hi
  
• Bye
  
• More
  
• Book
  
• Byeble (bible)
  
• Mut (sock)
  
• Sit/s*it (umm... sometimes his "sit" doesn't come out quite right)
  
• Share (he uses this word gently when he is electing to share an item with you... however, he will also shout this word adamantly when he wants you to handover an item)
  
• Ghun-Ghun/Poh-Poh (Gong-Gong/Poh-Poh = maternal grandparents)
  
• Yeh-Yeh/Mama (Yeh-Yeh/Mah-Mah = paternal grandparents)
  
• Xie-xie ("thank you" in Mandarin)
  
• Bak-bak ("bahk fahn" = rice in Cantonese)
  
• Up
  
• Down
  
• Poe ("carry me" in Cantonese)
  
• Chaht ("chaht nga-nga" = "brush teeth" in Cantonese)

He can also say and identify certain letters of the alphabet such as A, M, and O.

Some of the words he can sign:

• Thank you
• Sorry
• Please
• More
• Water
  
• Toilet
  
• Wash/bath
  
• Hurt/pain
  
• I love you
  
• All done

Tyson signing "more":

"Squash"