Eli's Name; Shaking the Head

Here in the last week before Eli's 2nd birthday, I have a couple of quick anecdotes to share:

- Eli has started referring to himself by name. He has understood his own name for a while now when Missy or I have called him, of course, but just recently he can do things like point to Missy and say "mama", point to me and say "dada", and then (and this is the new part) point to himself and say "Eli!"

He is still may be working on the concept that that "Eli" is his own unique name though: The other night, as I was putting Eli to bed, we were reading a "counting book" (with pictures of different numbers of things to count on the various pages). One page pictured a large duck along with 5 little ducklings. Eli pointed to the big duck and said, "mama duck!" and I told him that was right! But then, Eli pointed to the little ducklings and said "Eli ducks!"

I haven't heard him say anything else like that (for example, calling kids other than himself "Eli"), but it was pretty cute, as well as being an interesting insight into how his mind is developing!

- Eli has learned to shake his head to mean "no". He uses this effectively at meal time if he doesn't feel like eating; at such times, for a while now, he has just sat and sucked his thumb. (Logical thinking, Eli: Mommy or Daddy can't get food in there when the thumb is in!)

When Eli is doing this, in the past, when if Missy or I had held up some food and asked him, "would you like some of this?", Eli would pretty much just sit and look at us. (Can't say "no" without taking the thumb out!) Now, though, he'll shake his head -- effectively communicating with us without having to pop out that thumb!

The next step will be for Eli to learn to nod his head for "yes." Right now, his only available nonverbal answer is "no," so that tends to be the answer to every question when the thumb is in! (If the only tool you've got is a hammer, then every problem -- or every question in this case -- tends to look like a nail!)