Rilla Signs

Whoops, it’s all pixelly. No time to fix it now—back later!

UPDATED: Well, I tried and tried. I don’t know what’s wrong with the upload. Tried saving the movie file in various formats, but it comes out pixellated every time. Ah, well. She’s cute even in tiny dots.
Don’t ask me why I picked that particular moment to capture her litany of signs on film—a moment when one hand was clutching the treasured Pink Plastic Phone. She was there, the camera was there, and I’ve been meaning to record her baby signs for weeks. She is exploding with new ones every day, courtesy of her big brother and Signing Time. When Wonderboy and Rilla start signing to each other, I swear my heart turns to jelly. It’s sweeter than I could ever have imagined, back when she was in utero, kicking him through my belly as he signed himself to sleep.

18 thoughts on “Rilla Signs”

  1. I know you know how awesome that is but do you know how awesome that is???? LOL
    I’ve tried to teach mine sign for as long as I can remember. They were both speech and language delayed(youngest still has articulation issues) it would have been so nice if they had signed! Awesome!

  2. Rilla is so precious!! I have just begun teaching my littles with Signing Time, and in just a few days my 17 month old keeps signing “eat”, again and again, then she goes to the cupboard,signs “eat” and then yells % er!”

  3. Simply adorable! I love it when little ones sign… they are capable of so much more than we tend to give them credit for. 🙂

  4. I love seeing what rilla is up to, as my little abram is exactly the same age (born april 20). that smile of utter delight when they do something is better than chocolate. i havent taught our kids sign,just kind of used it for that transition stage before they are talking. I was wondering what the research says about how hearing kids learning sign affects (if it does at all) their verbal speech acquisition. I assume it is like my 4yo learning romanian and english. his english is miles ahead of romanian, but learning romanian hasnt affected his english at all. just wondering if you had read anything about this.

  5. Wonderful… and not pixellated at all! Good job Rilla, and what a precious gift for Wonderboy to have a sibling to sign with 🙂

  6. I too have always believed in signing as a path to spoken language–it was practically “bible” when I taught special needs preschoolers (in my past life!) My now 4 year old amazed me at how he picked up signs from videos, immediately putting chosen ones (like “ouch,” interestingly) into his gestural vocabulary.
    But despite his obvious proclivity for signs, I couldn’t understand a thing he said (spoken-wise), and I wondered why the signing didn’t lead to more speaking.
    As it turned out, he had a pretty serious speech delay, which a speech therapist miraculously (and I don’t use that word lightly) helped him overcome in less than a year.
    If he didn’t have those signs, he would not have been able to communicate effectively with us at all…at a time when he clearly had so much to say!
    (You are just amazing, by the way. Your posts have a way of giving me the chills every time I read them. I’m going to have to learn to keep the kleenex nearby when I visit your site!!!)
    Warmly,
    Eileen

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