I'm sorry, I don't speak 'Ewok'.

What is more frustrating than trying to communicate with a 2 year old?.....Trying to communicate with a 2 year old that doesn't communicate. That's right. You heard me. My *almost* 2 year old, darling, angelic daughter...does not talk. At least, coherently. There's a lot of babble, and I'm quite certain she knows exactly what she is saying in her own head. For instance, she's throwing around a new word these days "BOP!", which I have deciphered to mean "'BLEEP' you!" She says it with such fierceness and tenacity in her voice, I'm almost afraid for when she does start enunciating actual words.

She looks incredibly innocent and sweet, batting her big baby blues and long eyelashes at people. But those of us who live with her, know the truth. My 5 year old son and I have deemed her language that of the "Ewoks", since that's exactly what she sounds like. It's fun to laugh at her cuteness and all, but ULTRA-frazzling to spend a 12 hour day with her trying to deduce what it is she saying, wanting, needing. I have attempted to teach her baby sign language in hopes of reducing frustration on both our parts. Sometimes this is effective, others, not so much. Her patience level goes from 0 to 60 in less than 2.5 seconds, and the sign language technique does NOT work when she is tired, teething, sick, frustrated, etc.

I've only just begun to hear the words 'mommy' and 'daddy', and even these are not gender specific for her. I am sometimes 'daddy', my husband is sometimes 'mommy', and any woman she sees in person, or in print, is 'mommy'. Glad to know I am appreciated and recognizable.

So, what is the remedy, you ask? Well, we have speech therapy once a week (which she only occasionally chooses to cooperate with). Mommy keeps the wine and bubble bath industry in business. The appearance of "BOP!" in her vocabulary started just recently, so I'm quite certain it's her way of telling me off. She seems very content with keeping us all frustrated. I may have the only child who goes off to school speaking Ewok.