Capturing His Baby Voice

From a very young age, Benjamin was extremely imitative with his voice.  He'd heard us say something, then repeat it back--in his unique baby version, of course--but the number of syllables and the inflection would be similar enough that it would catch our attention and make us smile.

At the time, it was suggested that he might be an early talker.

How silly.  Apparently, Fisher babies aren't early in anything.  ;-)

Here he is at nearly 17 months of age, and the only things he says are "Dada" (his most common word, by far), "uh-oh" (usually when he's dropped something), a version of "hi" (that he likes to say when the dryer door is open and he catches sight of me in the reflection of it), and "Mama" (although his occurrences of that are few and far between, and NEVER when I'm trying to coax him to say it).  ;-)  

So he's not much of an orator.  Yet.

But he does use his voice, and recently I've been trying to capture it.  This is made difficult by the fact that, when he sees me pull out my phone to record him, he sometimes clams up and doesn't deign to say a thing.  But while we waited for Josiah to finish his NCFCA club meeting last week, I managed to catch a little of Benjamin's noise...

...and two days after that, I caught this on tape.  Benjamin scooting around gleefully with a roll of toilet paper is pretty cute, but his vocalizations are significant, too.  :)

Speaking of speaking...  There are two interesting times when Benjamin periodically pipes up with a hearty "Dada."  One is when we're praying before we eat supper; he must have developed that habit because, in the morning as we begin our homeschool day, we pray together after each of us has had an opportunity to say at least one thing we're especially grateful for that day.  Some of the kids try to get Benjamin to say "Dada" during that time, as if Benjamin is stating that as his particular reason for thankfulness.  I think that must have bled over to our suppertime prayer; and now when Benjamin sees us bow our heads and start to pray, he decides it's time to add his voice.  :)

The other time is when David tries to get Benjamin to give him a high-five.  Somehow Benjamin got the signals mixed; and when David approaches him, holds up his hand, and says, "High-five!", Benjamin responds with "Dada!"  He's getting better about this one now and will sometimes raise his hand and hit David's; but for a while, "Dada" was his customary response.  :)

With five older siblings who have paved the way, it's not as if Benjamin is the first little baby we've marveled at as he's developed speech.  But goodness, what fun it is to observe the progression--to really stop and notice these moments as they speed by!