Sunday, October 24, 2010

Our Mute Boy


Henry uttered his first word- Caesar- seemingly forever ago. His vocabulary has been very slow to grow. He will say momma and dadda when prompted, but he doesn't initiate it. There is a particular grunt that I usually recognize as he wants whatever it is that I have. He yells "Dee!" whenever he does something like a body-slam or tackle. Everything else he needs or wants is covered with a generic grunt that's like saying "uh" over and over again. He's not exactly the most verbal child ever.

So Nick was surprised last week when Henry saw a picture of a flower and said "flower" clearly enough that it could be understood as an English word by a casual listener. Nick wondered why would that be the new word he would add to his vocabulary when he still doesn't say things that he wants all the time like milk or ball or car. I had a simple explanation. All summer I've tried to keep Henry from picking the flowers in the yard, or more accurately, pulling the petals off the flowers. Thousands of times this summer he has heard "Be nice to the flowers," or "Don't touch the flowers," or "Stop killing the flowers please." We've gone over what to do and not to do to the flowers a lot.

He may have learned to identify them, but he still hasn't learned not to touch them. We were outside today, and it was if he made a bee-line to pull the petals off the one flowering plant we have left. I guess we'll try again this spring.
Posted by Picasa

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

he is so darling. i would have let him pull the pedals off the flowers.

Jo Ellen/Toots said...

Maybe he just wants to utter grammatically correct sentences and is saving up until he can get everything right--and then will just blurt out something like "Mother, would you please make a reservation on Southwest for me to fly to see grandma?" Love, Toots

Iuliana@Hip2Thrift said...

Maybe he'll become a botanist, especially since you love the Botanic Gardens so much:)

Holly said...

Ben was that way, not much of a talker I mean. Then one day it was full sentences. We also have issues with the flowers. Every single beautiful blooming tulip in our yard was gone within a couple of days.