Our Sign Language Testimonial

Ken and I have been using signs with Ava since she was about 6 months. She didn't really start signing back until about 8 months and her signs have been relatively limited. Her first sign was "more" and that was followed with signs for "all done", "milk", and "eat". She is up to about 8 signs and this weekend she actually used two signs in succession without being prompted. We were eating lunch and she signed "more please". It was pretty exciting to see a child at an age where they can't speak to actually communicate a sentence. (Or at least that's what we like to believe it was.)

Tonight at 5:30 as we were eating dinner she was very fidgety. She didn't really seem interested in eating and was making the sign for "milk" over and over. I was reading her daily activity sheet from school and noticed that she only napped for an hour today so I asked her "Ava you sleepy?" She instantly started making the sign for "sleep". So, I thought "maybe she's confused and that's not really the sign she means to make." (It was an hour and a half before her normal bedtime; she couldn't ACTUALLY want to go to bed.) I took her out of her chair and she immediately made a beeline for the stairs making the sign for "sleep" the entire way. I took her up, changed her into her pj's and put her in bed...where she is still happily sleeping. The moral to this story: a child who can communicate is generally not the one who is confused...it's the crazy parents.