I forget exactly what age it was, around 14 months maybe when DS had only a few words, that I spent a few hours and made a pictoral list of the songs on DSs favorite CDs and posted it on the wall near the CD player. He was always requesting particular songs, and would lose it because we couldn't understand which one he wanted to hear. That whole facet of life, which was a big part of our time then, got miraculously simple overnight with the hundred little pictures chart.
Around that time we also had a photo book of foods to point at, although it wasn't much used because he generally wanted only about 3 items and had signs for those and more and all done.
Polly
PS. I don't think DS would have talked sooner had we not used a lot of pictures and signs. He seemed to have genuine trouble articulating what he wanted to say before the thought was over and the next one started, or before he became too frustrated with himself to continue. I noticed when he was loopy and sleepy he would talk a lot better than during the majority of the day when he was awake and self-aware, the self-awareness seemed to make it all much harder. He still sometimes has trouble but can always at least get his point across, so no more tears from communication issues.
