Anal PhD mom that I am, I was recently making a list of all the signs and words Audrey now uses at 14 months (at least 6 signs and 8 words, in case you were wondering) and I started thinking about one of her favorite multi-meaning words, namely "Bei" (or maybe "bay"). This is a word Audrey uses, with slightly different inflections and associated hand signals, to mean "belly button", "baby", "bird", "cat" and "dog."
If it means belly button or baby, she points at the item in question (typically real babies but sometimes her baby doll). If it means bird, she makes a hand signal that looks a little like the sign for "bird." For cat, she uses a sign that looks a bit like "cat." For dog (which can be prompted by real dogs or our neighbor's dogs barking) she doesn't use the American Sign Language sign for dog, but instead a hand motion that looks a little like summoning a dog.
She is also experimenting with stringing words together. Her longest phrase so far has been 4 words ("No, mom, no, mine!" when I closed the refrigerator door before she was finished positioning her water bottle appropriately inside) and she's also signed a two-word phrase ("more signing" when I turned off the Signing Time DVD)
