All about imitating

Leah is quite good at imitating. She is very perceptive. Things that we say and that she hears, although she may not indicate that she's learned it, sometimes re-surface in her memory much later.

For example, she really likes Finding Nemo. She knows the chanting from the fish-tank initiation scene. Little did we know that she has the entire scene committed to memory. One day I did the chant and she responded with "Sharkbate, Ha Ha!" which is the next line! We never taught her that! She also likes to speak "whale" and gets a good laugh when we speak whale back. It took us a few times to figure out what she was saying, but then it was like a light-bulb turning on, and she was thrilled! She is always anxious to watch her favorite movies and excitedly waits to sing and dance along.

She can count to 10 but usually skips 5 and can do the alphabet in pieces with 9 coming after H. She's learning the song and I think that has helped. Somehow she picked up "No Way!" and says it all the time. She also "prays" while we are blessing the food, and we hear her saying all sorts of words that are just identifying the things around us, "Mommy, Daddy, water, Ophie, Dinosaur" etc. She encourages herself while she works a wooden puzzle by saying "turn it, turn it, good girl" and says "careful" as she goes down the stairs by herself.

Yesterday, Leah was "coloring" while I was reading and after a while I looked up to see what she was doing. She had torn a page out of her coloring book and was ripping it to shreds while saying "Sing songs, ...treats". After a puzzled moment, we realized she was recreating a scene from Mary Poppins where Mr. Banks tears up a peice of paper in the fireplace while grumbling about what the children wanted in their nanny. See for yourself:

What a copycat! (We may need to get some more coloring books)