signs abound

Oh, hello -- June? Is that you? I didn't even recognize you! Did you change your hair? No? Hmmm. Maybe it's the brisk 60 degree weather? Come on June, no need to pretend you're April. You're waaay warmer than her.

Okay. What I really wanted to tell you, aside from the fact that I've been too cold to blog all month, is that Auden is becoming a signing genius.

We've been watching baby signing dvd's every day for two months, and the only progress I noticed was my own increasing annoyance at the host's maniacal smiling. Oh, but she's effective. If I sing the theme song -- join in if you know it: baby, baby, baby signing time! -- he'll run to the TV, going "BEH-beeee, BEH-beeee," and insist on watching it. The other day I absent-mindedly sang the song about moms and dads, and I'll be darned if he didn't stick his little chubby thumb to his forehead and sign "dad."

His first and most vigorous sign was "dog" (an easy pat on the leg), which he does ALL THE TIME. He did "cat" for the first time on Monday while looking at a picture book, and then beamed at me, cleary pleased with himself. "Bird" is a favorite, too, I guess since we see a lot of them. He does the sign backwards, but we know what he means:



He does it when we go outside, he does it when he sees the fake seagulls hanging from the ceiling at Trader Joe's. The other morning, he did it at breakfast, totally confusing us, until we realized he was looking at this:

Genius!

Every day he pulls out a new one: Tuesday it was "shoes", Wednesday it was "truck". Or maybe it was "bus". We'll say any big vehicle that makes a loud noise.

It's so awesome to watch him put it all together and get excited to tell us about what he sees.

And here's this, only because it's totally cute: