Apropos of ASL, our three-year-old is interested in the notion of different languages and is aware of two -- Spanish and sign language, which she calls English. Any spoken language that isn't what we speak around the house she considers Spanish. We have a few bilingual and foreign-language children's books around the house. I don't speak Spanish, but I pronounce it well, and it's fun to read a Dr. Suess book as if I'm the announcer on Univision. Katherine does not appreciate it when I read in another language and she scolds me.

But sometimes she likes to show off the bit of Spanish she knows, like she did on Mother's Day, for the Peruvian lady who joined us for lunch at my Mom's house, telling her the Spanish names for the colors of her crayons.

And sometimes she will tell us what some word is in Spanish -- which is often a random selection of sounds, including a flipped 'r' and ending in a vowel -- followed by the word in "English" -- which is some sort of hand signal, sometimes accompanied by a cluster of foreign-sounding syllables.