Just wanted to say thank you.

[timmette]

to all the lovely mumsnetters who gave advice sometime ago about my ds learning Dutch you were right he is now a complete chatterbox in Dutch and it's now the English that needs a bit of work.

That's nice to hear. I'm not sure I helped but also have a Dutch/English bilingual child. How old is he now?

He is 3yrs 3 months and I was a bit worried that his speech was delayed and he didn't seem to notice that his school spoke Dutch and I English - but now he gets it all - it just clicked.

. That's lovely. My dds also chat fine in flemish, but their english needs improving!

We live in the uk and DD is around the same age. She's nowhere near fluent in Dutch yet though. She has realised that she can translate a few phrases, and that there are two languages. I think fluency in both will take some time yet. Her father speaks Dutch to her, and she has no other exposure, other than tv and grandparents when she sees them (rarely).
Must be great to hear him chattering away!

DD's favourite phrase at the mo = 'Ik hou from you mummy!'

my girls also mix the two languages, especially dd2 who still doesn't really get that she is learning two languages.

@belgo It may seem that she doesn't realise that she is learning two languages, but children are able to keep their languages separate - research shows that even babies who aren't producing words yet babble in different languages. Children tend to mix languages when they are talking to other bilinguals - who can understand, so it doesn't matter, or if they don't know a word in one language they might try a word from the other language to see if it is understood.