Japanese is taking off...

Ever since Lydia started going to preschool, her Japanese vocabulary is increasing in leaps and bounds (and over-taking her German and English). She consistently asks me, "kore nani" (what's this?) and "papa wa, inu wa, sensei wa, panpan wa" (where's papa, where's the dog, where's teacher, where's the bread). She doesn't ask me, "what's this?" in English. I know it will come. I think she is mostly immitating the other kids in the class. I am glad she is trying to talk more and that she is able to make herself understood at school.

When we talk about things if she uses a word in Japanese or German with me I usually say, "yes, that's what _____ says. but mama says ____." Today she saw some flowers and she said, "mama, blume!" I said, "yes, the flowers. Aren't they pretty? Mama says flower. Papa says blume." She replies, "Lydia say?" Ha Ha. I didn't know what to tell her. So I said, "Lydia can say Blume and Flower and Hana. When Lydia talks to mama, she can say Flower. When Lydia talks to papa she can say Blume. When lydia talks to sensei she can say Hana."

We played with our German/Japanese friends this weekend. Their mom is German and Dad is Japanese. Maya is 1 year older than Lydia. Maya was chanting "Asobo! Asobo!" to Lydia (japanese - Let's play!). Lydia understood what she was saying but instead of replying in Japanese, she replied in German I guess because she knows that Maya's mama speaks German with Maya. So Lydia said "Ja!" meaning yes. But "Yaa!" in japanese means no! So Maya kept repeating "Asobo" because she wasn't happy with the answer. HA! For the most part, they were communicating in German and doing so rather successfully. Though kids don't really need to use words to play... they work with what they have.