Talking with Thomas - 21 Months

Thomas is becoming quite the talker. This week he made his first two-word sentance, "Bye-bye, dada." Since he never seems to be willing to talk into a phone or other recording device, here's a snapshot of his current speech. It's divided into actual English words, protowords, and other sounds and listed in roughly their order of appearance.

English Words
Pronunciation	Word	Meaning
ma-ma	Mama	That'd be me
da-da	Dada	Curtis, though it's interesting that Thomas should pick Dada, since we refer to Curtis as Bauji, which is Hindi for father. Why? Because we're weird.
bye/bye-bye	bye-bye	"goodbye" (when leaving a place, also to people who are leaving him), "going out" (as in, "We're going bye-bye")
uh-yeah/ya	yes	His default response to anything said to him.
maaa	Max	Curtis's parents' dog, but not dogs in general
foy-yer	flower	also used for trees and colorful shapes like hot-air balloons
wah-yer	water	water, cups, fountains, sprinklers, bath, but oddly enough, not usually "I'm thirsty." That's just fussing.
hi	hi	greetings
ice	eyes	Accompanied by a poke in the eye, we're working on that
Protowords Words that have a consistent meaning, but do not closely resemble adult words (or at least not enough for strangers to understand)
Pronunciation	"Word"	Meaning
tzah	"cat"	all cats, including ours
ha	"hot"	things that are hot, steam, bright lights
ha	"hair"	usually accompanied by pointing, to distinguish from "hot"
ya-ya	"light"	light, lamps, light bulbs
baah!	"bath"	Thomas loves to bathe. The idea of a bath is always VERY exciting
ruh-rar	"truck"	just about anything with wheels
Other Interesting Sounds
oh		Was just a sound, but has started to refer to cereal O's.
wow		Doesn't seem to mean anything, but often inserted into babbling
uh-oh		One of his favorite sounds. Used for all occasions.
"panting"		The sound a dog makes, and dogs in general
buh, buh, buh	"beep, beep"	The sound a truck makes
"clicking" with tongue against roof of mouth		done to imitate Ruthann
mao	"meow"	What the cat says

Thomas's words reflect the things that are important to him. What I find interesting are the things that aren't on this list. There's no "me" or "mine" or any other self-referential word. He doesn't have any word for Ruthann. There are no words about eating. He uses words to call attention to things that he sees, but almost never to ask for things. The most surprising to me is that he doesn't say "no." It's usually one of children's first words because it's so powerful, but Thomas just shakes his head when he doesn't want something. And believe you me, it's not because he never hears the word from me. It wouldn't surprise me if he believed that "sister" was pronounced "No! No smack."