first word

Remember the blog entry from February 22, 2006? Well, after all these months, "hi" has been officially declared as Elijah's first word. I am a little disappointed that his first word wasn't Russian, but I can't blame him for choosing a simple mono-syllabic word with only to letters. After all, many Russian words have 4 or more syllables and difficult consonant clusters. The formal "hello," for example, is zdravstvuyte. I can see how a simple "hi" would be more appealing.

At first it sounded like many other random sounds he made, but over time the timing and context became more and more fitting, and are now near perfect. I say "near" because sometimes he just can't wait and says "hi" when he hears the front door opening, before the person actually comes into the house. Or, when we pick Daddy up after work, he says "hi" as soon as he sees Ryan coming to the car, but before he actually opens the door and can hear and appreciate the greeting. But most of the time he says just at the right moment.