The Twins Learn Sign Language ... And Try To Teach Mommy & Daddy

Learning to communicate

While the twins jabber quite a bit between themselves, we don’t always understand what they’re saying. Once they started solids, we knew we needed a way to communicate with them. Along with the ability to eat solid foods comes the opportunity to have choices ... and while “unna, unna” made perfect sense to them, we couldn’t tell whether it meant “milk,” “carrot,” or “I’m full.”

My mom was an interpreter for the deaf, so we grew up with some sign language in the house. She taught us our first words in sign and then later, we had family code words in sign. Of course, every family probably has some unspoken way of communicating, “you’re in big trouble when we get home.” But we also knew at a glance if we needed to excuse ourselves and go home, how to tell Dad we were okay from across the room, and how to finger spell someone’s name that another person had forgotten.

I was given a baby sign language book (and of course there are a LOT of resources on the Internet) so we started teaching the girls a few phrases. It was a slow start, but the girls having been picking up signs faster.

The twins’ dictionary

Here are the words they know currently.

Please

This was the first word they learned. We repeated it with them over and over. And now they’re pros ... they’ve realized it tends to get them whatever they’re asking for 😉

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Cracker, More or Cheese

It took a long time to get “please” down. But once foods became involved, their learning speed was much faster. “Cracker” is usually done by tapping your non-dominate elbow with the palm of your dominant hand, but so far, this is the closest they can get.

“More” was something our friends tried to teach them. It’s a little vague, so we don’t use it a lot. Plus it’s similar to the twins’ version of cracker.

We’ve also learned “cheese” recently, but it is a little confusing because it involves pressing your two palms together ... which looks a lot like “cracker” when they do it. But we’re working on being more precise. I don’t think it’ll be too difficult since that is high on their list of preferred foods.

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Pancake

They loved learning this sign. Pancakes are one of their favorites. It’s also fairly easy - position your hand flat, palm up and then flip it over ... like flipping a pancake.

Unfortunately for the girls, I like trying new pancake recipes, so they don’t always get the pancakes they were hoping for. Their favorite is made with applesauce (no eggs and no milk, so it’s a good recipe to have for friends with allergies and also easy to make!)

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All done

Teaching them this sign has made my life so much easier! Instead of throwing their food on the floor, they can tell me “all done” and get cleaned up. I can also let them know when something they like is gone (otherwise, they look at me like I’m holding out on them ...) and when I’ve finished changing their diaper so they can sit up.

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Words of their own

As we’ve been teaching them sign language, the girls will come up with words of their own. It took me awhile to realize what Squirt meant when she did this.

I noticed her doing this - covering her ear when she would get in trouble. I wasn’t sure what she was doing. Then one day, she did it when I asked, “Can you blow kisses?” That’s when I realized I tend to cover her ear with my hand when I kiss her on her head! 😊

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Now maybe your thinking, so Squish does the same thing, that’s cute ... but actually this is how she plays Peekaboo! 😂 it’s not hard to see why. Of course, if you give her a blanket, she’ll cover herself completely until you ask, “Where’s Squish?” I guess hands are harder...

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This is one of those “twinnisms” (I just made that up here ... My spellchecker is telling me it’s definitely not a word). Sometimes the girls do exactly the same thing at exactly the same moment. They don’t even look at each other. They just do it. And when they do this, they’re trying to tell me how cute they are. All I have to say in response is, “Awww, I love you guys” and then they grin and laugh.

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In the works

We’re still adding signs to the twins’ vocabulary. And trying to take pictures of the words they know (like milk). Right now, they’re still practicing: peanut butter, french toast, carrot, berry, water, and a few more I can’t remember 😅

In the meantime, we also use the good ole, “this or this” method of showing them two items and letting them pick. 😂

Words, Words, Words

Twins are known to be slower at communicating verbally ... probably because they understand each other so well. Of course, @ironmanmatt has his name in neon lights around here ... everything is “da” or “dada”. Sigh. Maybe they’ll learn to sign “Mom” first...

And then there is the universal sign...

Bye! Until next time...

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