Aiden's first baby sign

Aiden is not much of a talker. He babbles a bit, and likes to blow rasberries, but so far it has been just nonsense. Occassionally he'll stick with "ma ma ma ma," or "da da da da" for a while, but we've never gotten the impression that "ma ma" means mommy or "da da" means daddy. In the last two days, however, he has given us indisputable proof that he knows that baby sign for "light."

For whatever reason, Aiden finds lights fascinating (lights and wheels, actually; a future firefighter). He stares at lights and squeals with delight if I hold him close enough that he can touch the lampshade. Because of this intense interest, Danielle started showing him the baby sign for "light": hold you arm up high, open your hand and fingers wide, then close your first and open your hand two times quickly to simulate a light blinking on. Aiden watched closely for about two weeks and now he does it almost every time he see a light, whether it's a headlight, a lamp or the sun.

Tonight's demonstration, which prompted this post, happened when I was bringing Aiden in from the car and pointed out a plane that had just taken off. It was a jumbo jet with the landing lights on (headlights for planes), and lights were illuminating the clouds and mist in front of the plane. Aiden saw it an immediately made the sign for light. Then when we got inside he looked at the lamp, which was on, and made the sign again.

With this little bit of encouragement, we'll be trying to teach Aiden some more useful signs, like "hungry," "bottle" and "more." I suspect those three words will be some of his favorites.