From being to representation

There was a significant lexical as well as conceptual moment this morning. J and were looking at this image at the New York Times:

I said: "Das sieht aus wie Ulli oder Sabine" (our mousie puppets). To which J replied: "Ja, ich glaube, das stellt Ulli dar." I've been working on darstellen for several months; this was the first time J has used it spontaneously-independently.