SHQUAW-K!

Cole has made humongous progress with his speech and language, but we still have the occasional "What did you say?" moment.  Like the moment last week, when I FINALLY figured out he was saying "CRANE!" when we passed a mill plant - yup, mom of the year award here, we've only been working on that one since September.  

And then there was today.  We were driving to pick up Chris, chattering away together, when Cole says something.   And of course it's a single word - when he puts a few words together into a sentence, the context usually has enough clues for me to figure it out. 

"SHQUAW-K! MAMA, SHQUAW-K!"

"What was that, honey?

"SHQUAW-K!"

"Hmm... didn't quite get that.  Try it one more time."

"SHQUAW-K! MAMA, SHQUAW-K!" 

"Ohh, uh-huh.  Yup, wow, that sounds interesting."  (an attempt to pretend that I've understand and try to quick change the subject...however, this method rarely works.  My child is stubborn with a memory like an elephant... he never lets me off the hook this easily.)

 "SHQUAW-K! MAMA, SHQUAW-K!" (accompanied by a slight glare at me in the rearview mirror.  Like he's saying, I know what you were trying to do, you sneaky mom.  I'm not moving on until you repeat what I'm saying so I know you understand!)

"Can you show me what you are saying?" (all the while feeling like a terrible person because my child is trying to tell me something and I can't figure out what the heck he is saying!)

"MAMA, SHQUAW-K!  SHQUAW -K!" (enunciating the nonsense word quite clearly - he is obviously thinking I'm a total dunce for not understanding what he is very clearly saying)

::blank face::

"SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K!" (because apparently saying the same nonsense word five hundred times in a row is what will help me understand.)

In desperation, I say, "Can you use it in a sentence?"  (Oh yes...I've relegated to spelling bee hints to understand.)

"MAMA! SHQUAW-K! SHQUAW-K!"

"Oh! Short!  SHORT!  Yes, I got it!" (feeling incredibly proud of myself and also extremely happy that I no longer have to listen to increasingly louder and more frequent "SHQUAW-K"s in the car)

"YEAH, MAMA! SHQUAW-K!" (I know he's really saying "DUH!! I was saying it fine the whole time! Mama needs her ears checked!")

I know, right?  How COME I didn't know that SHQUAW-K meant short?  

You probably knew it all along, didn't you?