Feb 17: Mad Gab

If you’ve ever played the game Mad Gab you understand what it’s like learning a new language. You know what you want to say, and you have to be very creative to get it out using the limited words you know. Often we resort to making up (i.e. guessing) the spanish word, which seems to work roughly 15% of the time. There are some common patterns between some English and Spanish words which helps. At other times we simply insert the English word and hope the person can make sense of it. I’d say this works another 15% of the time. All in all, if we know most of the words we need (not very often) the other person probably understands us 30% of the time. Yes, we still have a long long way to go.

But our kids are getting smarter. Last night Ciara was asking for water at bedtime, not an atypical delaying tactic. Remembering that we do let her have water if she gets up in the night she innocently asked if she could have some if she had to go to the bathroom. Fortunately my parents sensors triggered here and I was smart enough to respond in the negative since her next sentence was “I have to go to the bathroom.” Hmm, coincidence or opportunistic?

Ariana Quote of the Day: [ As excited as you can imagine her] We have _two_ bedrooms!!!!