Today is Independence Day, which made it a fitting occasion for L to spend breakfast flexing her rapidly developing free will.

First, she demanded to share my bran muffin (the muffin, this nugget of goodness from our local bakery technically is dubbed “Berry Beneficial,” and has blueberries and blackberries inside). Then, after I complimented her for the way she finished all of her yogurt, she repeated my kudos perfectly, pointing to herself as she said, “Good girl,” again and again.

Talk about instilling self-confidence; following this initial mimicry, the baby must have deemed herself a good girl 40 times in all. Then, after her meal, she just crawled around the living room chanting it like a mantra.

I’m not sure I’ve laughed as hard in weeks.

Powergirl and I welcome this kind of parroting; most of our friends (and Web sites like this one) say it starts around 13 months, so we’ve been waiting for it for a while.

The only major downside? Now we really have to watch our mouths; as two California transplants from New York (I’m from Long Island; she’s from Queens), that may be more challenging than it seems.