My youngest daughter didn't start talking until she was three. Prior to that she could make the sound of nearly every animal I could think of (and knew the sound to teach her, lol.) but she wasn't much into human sounds, I guess. When she finally started talking at three, she took off like wildfire. She went through quite a while (as does any child learning to talk) where I, Mama, was about the only one who could figure out what she was saying.
However, there was one day that she was perfectly understood by ALL. And I will never forget it.
We lived in a condo at the time and the condo association had hired a painter to paint the exterior of all the buildings. One morning he was painting the portion of wall between our ground floor and the floor above us and was within 6 feet of our door. All you could see of the man from our doorway was his legs...and a bit of his khaki shorts...which blended in with his tan at first glance.
Well, we were headed out and the girls headed out the door just a few seconds before me. I had turned back to grab my purse and just as I stepped out the door, Alli calls out in perfectly clear speech (very loudly because she thinks I'm still inside), "MOM! THERE'S A MAN PAINTING YOUR HOUSE! HE'S NAKED!!"
The painter bent down to peer under the edge of the wall he was painting, grinned at me, and went right back to his work.
Think he heard her??