Haha, me too! DD still uses the sign for CHANGE and occasionally MILK. Although now she mostly just asks for Mama.

She first signed somewhere at 5/5.5 months? At 6 months she said "up" and now at 7 months she's got a vocabulary of maybe 7 words that I think she actually knows and understands the meaning. She's repeated a few others but I think that was more of her just imitating me. She's been cruising for awhile now and I suspect that she'll be walking soon on her own.

DS 9mo:
said "hands" at 5 months, I'd tell him the names of some of his body parts when i'd talk to him and change him in the morning, and some day's he'd say "hands" back to me.
- would say Duck at 6 mo, when he'd play in the bath with his duck, also Dad
(i know there's more but it can't remember)
Anyway about the day he turned 9 mo, he started calling his brother Jacob's name and still does it usually whenever I ask him to say Jacob he'll say "Gacob".
also says "Car" at 9 mo.

DS 3:
-Knew letters by 2, numbers to 10
-reads 3 letter words and simple books with 3, 3 letter word sentances.
-Very good and advancedsence of humor.

DS5:
-first word at 9 mo "Jesus"
-Didn't walk til 13-14 mo
-coupld tell me any and all letters by 19 mo,
-all letter sounds by 20mo
-increadible vocabulary after 1 year and on.
-doing 25 peice puzzles alone at 2 years
-counted to 20 before 2 1/2
-could understand how to sound out words by 2, but not interested
-read spontaniously 2 weeks after turning 3, went through 4 levels of "bob books", the decided he didn't need to read "until I'm 6" he'd say.
-he didn't read again for 7 or mo months after
-then started slowly reading again.co
-Recently tunred 5 and is now at at least 2nd grade reading level.
-counts to 100 or higher, counts by hundereds, 10'2, 5's...
-huge understanding of science at 5 ( cells, DNA, Planets...)
- loves languages and countries (can count to ten in spanish and swahili, can find many countries on the globe... can tell you so many facts about Japanese culture...(and I don't know any of them) (huge memory)

I had to look because I thought you had dug up an old post of mine! I had the exact same experience. Now I can't remember when, but maybe around 8-9 months DS's first word besides mom and dad was "book."

He tried walking the day before his 1st birthday. Took several steps, fell, and did not try again until 14 months, when he walked like he'd been doing it forever.

It's fun to read about all the little kiddos!

DD3.5 -
walked at 12.5 months, and was actually behind for quite some time before that in the gross motor skill area. If you saw her running today, you'd understand why our family is not very athletic!
Did not speak many words until 17-18 months. In fact, 18 months was when she really took off on everything. She's very perfectionistic so I think she held off until she was sure she could do it just right. Now she reads, writes, does math, independent on the computer, etc.

DD15mo.
Speaks more than her older sister did at this age, but nothing outrageous -- then again, I'm not sure if I know what's normal anymore. Said her first words around 9 months (her sister's name).
Took her first steps on the first birthday, then seemed to give up walking for a while. Then learned to walk in one day around 13 months and it did not take her long to get her steadiness. She has to be a big girl like her sister, which includes sitting by herself in a chair at the doctor's office, a picnic table at the park, on the couch, etc. Has the same gleam in her eye that her big sister has, like she knows much more than she can say.
Since around 13 months, when she sees letters in the bathtub, she gets all excited and says, "Eee!! ee!!" - I'm thinking because a lot of the letters have the "ee" sound at the end, like "B, C, D, G," etc. Not sure if that's unusual or not.

My kids did not reach the typical milestones early.

DS12 was always very alert, even at birth, and just seemed "different" from the other kids.

I didn't know that DS9 was gifted until he was 4 and started doing his brother's math homework (three years ahead).

I realize that Ruf's levels work for some kids, but I do somewhat resent the use of the word "always" to describe some of the skills, especially the reading skills. Many kids (including 2E) will not "always" reach the skills at the levels she indicated, even with very high IQ's. My kids do not fit the mold.

I found her book to be too reliant on anecdotes to be really useful.

I was also annoyed by the huge amount of crossover in IQs and accomplishments among kids at different LOGs (eg, Level 3 and Level 5). I don't remember seeing much in the way of explanation about this problem, which made me more dubious about the book's value.

(Someone please correct me if she wrote up a discussion about how two people with the same IQ end up in very different LOG groups).

Val

My Sons (now 7) walked and talked right at the end of the 'okay' range, correcting their age by 2 months for prematurity. If we didn't correct their age they were late with those milestones. First 4 or 5 words were typical "tree" "ball" "owl" "mama" and the next 26 words were letters of the alphabet. More speach was there, but not intelligible.

Walking was a bit different. They didn't walk on their feet until 16 months, when they started within 30 minutes of each other. The big "however" is that they had been walking on their knees since around 11.5 or 12 months. One of them only crawled for a short time before then, and the other crawled on a more normal curve.

Weak pronunciation and gross motor skills as well as extremely cautious personalities have remained constant. Walking and talking are certainly the most obvious things to see in babies and toddlers, and it certainly had most of us fooled into thinking there was a possibility they were, in fact, developmentally delayed. Our views changed very rapidly when their speach (rather suddenly) became intelligible. Other skills were emerging at the same time.

My DD (14 months) has had advanced gross motor skills, and I am more aware of her ability to identify shapes and colours than I was with her brothers, but she doesn't say much. Her gross motor is really good, but not 'out there'. Good neck strength from the start, first assisted steps at 6 months, first unassisted steps at 9, but wasn't really good at walking until she turned 11 months. At 13 months she could climb ladders and started consistently finding things to help her climb, such as her toy basket > piano bench > keyboard in order to try to get at the items on top.

Both my kids walked around 12 months and said first words around 9 months.

DD has always been more physically coordinated, though.

My DS 6 was a bit different on somethings.
He pulled himself up on the side of the tub they put newborns in the day he was born, its true, we have it on video.
Never crawled or cruised,
He walked at 10 months

Didn't utter a single word, No da da, no ma ma, just pointed, I don't know how many times I asked the DR. if there was something wrong, until 3 days before his 2nd birthday. My DS and my dad were playing that game where you have a little fishing pole and you try and get the fish as they go around, well my dad had already been scolded, by me, for says some words not for little ears. Well my DS missed a fish and said "G*d D*mn Stupid fishy" You could have blown me over with a feather. I think I started crying his voice was so sweet, even if what he said wasn't. Hasn't stopped talking since then. What kills me is I had to put that phrase in his baby book in the first word section.

Mostly I remember DS seemed to have been born a little kid already, never liked baby stuff, rattles stuff like that. Watched full length kid movies before 1 and so on.

OMG! That IS SOOOO FUNNY! We have had a few slips of that nature, but really really funny to be his first words worth uttering! Oh dear. Grandma must have loved that!!!