James was taking Tristan to bed and I said, “Good night!”  Tristan said, without any sort of prompting, “Good night… mommy!” The ellipsis represents the marked pause he currently has between his (gasp) independent strings of words.

Tristan isn’t just echoing back two word combinations or getting them by chance.  He actually remembers how to do it.  And he’s been calling me “mommy” and James “daddy” a lot lately, even to the point of calling it out if one of us goes to leave.

I never was as overwhelmingly disappointed at not being called “mommy” as other folks have been, but it’s SO nice to hear Tristan using words to refer to me and to his dad.  This represents maturity, intelligence, and independence.  He’s not using only babylike screaming to get our attention.  He remembers who we are and that we have ‘names.’  He’s catching on that words can get him what he wants and all fast ninja-speed like.

Oh, dear god.  He has learned to ask for milk.  While we’re at home, he still seems to have no drink preferences.  However, Tristan knows that both cars contain a case of portable milk cartons.  And since Tristan has learned that saying the word “milk” will earn him milk or at least dialogue on why he must wait for his milk (none in the case, about to hit a restaurant, etc.) he has been requesting milk Every. Single. Time. He. Is. In. A. Car.

We went to Bounce-a-Rama tonight.  All of the milk seems to have caught up to Tristan.  He managed to poop so copiously that it exploded out a side of a size 6 diaper.  That’s the largest diaper sold in the babies’ section – if he needs a larger one, we’ll probably have to shop the incontinence supplies.

I’ll pack extra diapers to win more battles in the war of language acquisition!  Extra wipes, too, I suppose..