A multilingual friend of mine whom I interviewed for this blog a while ago read my recent post asking Why not English? Here’s her reaction: Forget English, German is the tongue that we all wish to know, to emigrate to the country of jobs and money!!! (that’s what they say everyday on Spanish TV). But […]

You might have noticed we like cows. The other day, near my aunt’s, we drove past the local elementary school. Next to it was a farm, and two young cows were curiously looking through the fence. (Maybe they were hoping, like Pippi Longstocking, that some wisdom would come out the window and stick with them.) […]

A couple of weeks ago, we were staying with friends in Germany whose son is the same age as our daughter. I’d hoped this would get her to activate her passive German vocabulary, and it did. Here’s one very cute example:

Over the long weekend, we went to see friends in Germany whose son is the same age as our little girl. The two hit it off right away, but for the first day and a half our girl used the method of “if he doesn’t understand me, I must repeat and speak more loudly”. “Viens, […]

This weekend, we had a German friend staying with us who doesn’t speak French. Yesterday evening, our little girl wanted to play with her and asked: “Jouer ballon.” (play ball) She repeated her request several times, even though our friend told her (in German) she didn’t understand and I suggested she ask in German. In […]

Last night, Daddy read our little girl a bedtime story. Unlike with my stories in German, when she listens to one in French, she will repeat the sentences or their final words. Settle down for Carolus et Rolf le Terribleand listen to the “echo”! Story from: Les plus belles histoires du soir – éditions Fleurus […]

Today Daddy remarked to me, “She’s talking really well,” after another full sentence from our girl. I couldn’t help but sigh “If only she did it in German.” Whereupon Daddy turned to her and said, “Tu parles en allemand à maman ?” (You speak German with Mommy?) Her answer: “Non.” Daddy: “Pourquoi pas ?” (Why […]

I thought that maybe it was time to give a little overview (from memory) of some notable grammar aspects of my little girl’s speech at this point. So here we go: She uses “moi” instead of “je”: “Moi veux” (I want) or “Moi vois pas” (I don’t see). She mostly uses the infinitive form of […]

Our little girl recognises her first letters on her way to learning to write her name. These are the ones she picks out : P for papa, M for mama, and her own initial. For some reason, the P has taken centre stage. When she looks at some writing and finds any of those three […]

Our little girl is a water lover. As such, it is very hard to get her away from any kind of water game, such as this: So for getting her out of her bath, we have to use our imagination to avoid having the evening end in tears. Last night, it was almost too easy, […]