Nate, my amazing, silly, funny and easy going third son is a quick learner. I’m sure it has something to do with wanting to keep up with his older brothers. It’s no wonder he’s been our earliest talker. As early as 18 months he started saying two-word phrases and just four months shy of his second birthday he’s already starting to string together short sentences and using proper grammar like saying Mine instead of Me. However, he still refers to himself as “baby”, so there’s that!
So while I’m impressed and delighted with his large vocabulary, there is one thing that frustrates me. Nathan refuses to call me MOM. He hasn’t uttered the word “IMA” (Mom in Hebrew) ONCE! I don’t normally take offence easily, but it’s annoying because I’m his caretaker. I’m the one that’s with him 24/7. I refer to myself as mom and he’s surrounded by siblings who call me the same. And the thing is, it’s not that he just won’t call me Mom, but he actually calls me DAD (more recently, he switched over to Daddy). UGH!
I guess I shouldn’t be completely surprised since he does follow his other brothers. Kyle called me Maya until he was two and Ryan called me Meme until he was almost two. Hopefully this means that I only have four more months to go until he finally decides to call me IMA (aka MOM).
So just to set the record straight, and so I can remember this to tease him a little when he’s older, here is a list of words that he DOES say (not included are some words describing body parts. I’ll leave it to your imagination)!
Dada / Daddy
Kitty
Turtle
Goal (which he says about anything that’s related to hockey)
Beach Ball
Hug(sie)
Done
More
Another
Hi Baby
Night Night Dada
Nana (his word for food)
Cham (Hot in Hebrew)
Mayim (Water in Hebrew)
There
That
Me
Mine
Me Baby
Baby
Bump… and Another Bump!
More Bump (he falls and gets hurt a lot)
uh-oh!
Door
Jump
Hi-ya!
Yay!
