The King of Spanglish

Our youngest son, Caedmon, has been afforded the benefit of more than 5 hours a day of Spanish-only day care during our 11 months here in Costa Rica. While our other two children have been in regular American-style classes with only an hour each day of Spanish instruction; Cade's teachers are all Ticas, and have cared for and taught him every day while we have been in language school.

As a result he has learned much from his "maestras" and fellow Ticos. He seems to easily understand cartoons in Spanish and when asked a question in Spanish he usually responds appropriately. However, at age 3, assimilating what he has learned into everyday conversation has been quite entertaining. He has a propensity for throwing Spanish words into his mostly English lexicon.
There is the usual mix of the Spanish in his sentences like, "I want más leche, Mamá." (more milk) and "Look, una mariposa!" (a butterfly). The other day he was counting and said, "Uno, dos, tres, four, five, six..." Just this evening he got liquid soap on his toothbrush and reacted with "That's just huacala!" (gross). Last night I cut my hair very short leaving the normal 1/16" guard off of my trimmers. He rubbed my head and told me my head looked like a "bola" (bola = ball).
We had been told that children are like sponges when it comes to learning a new language, and it seems that little Cade has developed his own little special combination of the two. I guess it's his destiny to be the King of Spanglish.