Veronika is definitely trying to tell us (and her toys!) something these days; that girl can babble! And she keeps up a steady stream of chatter when she plays or looks at us these days, as if to say, “Can’t you understand me?”.

In the past, I’ve advocated turning your baby’s syllables into words. “Ga” can become garage or goose, for example. But today, I flipped that around. If she “hmmmed,” I “hmmmed” back at her. If she said “ga ga ga” (a favorite these days), I replied “ga ga ga” or “la la la”, trying to pick up on her rhythm.

Wouldn’t you know, she loved it. It was as if I had learned her language, and she was praising me!

One way to get her going is to read the newspaper by her side. I read my news and she “reads” her Hello magazine. Pretty soon she was babbling up a storm. I responded back with my own sounds – all the news that’s fit to babble!

We kept it up all day, and big brother Travis loved it. “Everyone talk like Veronika!” he said on our walk. You can see her delight when he copied her.

This was a great way to get an older sibling more focused on your baby’s sounds, especially if they are frustrated that baby isn’t “talking” yet.