Gunnar-isms

Through the years Gunnar has had many unique ways of saying things... like "upsidewards" for upside-down, or "pot hippo" for hippopotamus. As a Big Boy now, his vocabulary is pretty good, but he still has a way with words...

We were beginning to believe that Spring would never come - especially when it snowed, two days in a row, late in April. The following day we were all in the school room when the skies darkened. The boys looked up from their math and watched hail come down so heavily that the street and yard began to be white. Gunnar put his hands on his hips as he stared out the window, and said, "Mom, we gotta pray about this!"

Then, a couple evenings ago I cooked dinner in my crockpot. I love cooking in the crockpot because all the work is done early in the day! I had beef, potatoes and carrots roasting. Tate loves to be my "kitchen servant" (his term!) and all by himself (with me supervising but not helping) he made cornbread to go with dinner. Gunnar is still getting over his 'tummy trouble' and not eating a lot, so I gave him a very small helping. Even at that he was not too enthusiastic. Kerry kept suggesting things like, "Mmmm! Have a bit of potato with your meat - it's good that way!" etc. Gunnar finally gave him stink-eye and said, "Dad, I'm not a mixer. And I'm not a dipper either, so quit giving me recipes I won't like!"

Muffins or ?

Just in case you’ve been losing sleep, wondering how really cool families like ours come by their own unique family “vocabulary”, here’s how it happens:

I was in the kitchen one day, trying out a new recipe for something I thought my boys might like – Brown Sugar Muffins. You have to understand that there are kids out there who are just wonderful about eating all kinds of things. Then there are kids who are deeply suspicious of any unfamiliar food… those would be my kids.

So the boys were playing happily upstairs and the warm, sweet smell of something good baking in the oven filled the air. But this brief moment of domestic tranquility was interrupted. Tate stomped into the kitchen, obviously upset about something, took one quick look at the nice, little, round brown muffins I was taking out of the tins to cool, and said, “You aren’t makin’ me eat those Poo Poo Balls!” and stomped back out.



Well, ironically, turns out all the boys love the muffins… Tate, most of all. But now, whenever we’re going to bring them anywhere to share with friends, we have to go through this little vocabulary exercise:

“If anyone asks you, these are MUFFINS! BROWN SUGAR MUFFINS! I am not raising DUNG BEETLES!”

Because, of course, Tate’s name stuck.

Pockolate Chocolates

Actually, the picture below is from last week. The kids played until there were three inches of snow on the field, and still falling heavily. The games later in the day had to be canceled... The ball just doesn’t roll very well with wet snow sticking to it, and it gets a bit hard to see the sidelines.

Today was much better; still cold (38F when we drove out to our first game at 9AM) but, thankfully, dry. And Aunty Tami came to cheer too! I’m sure the boys are glad to see her because they love her so much, but – for all you other soccer fans – pockolate chocolates are a big hit too.

Dark Vader

So Tate's new HA is working just great. He loves it. So much so that he has convinced me I was wrong to encourage him to wear the old one to soccer. (He will consent to wear the old one to soccer if it's really raining.)

I was worried about the ball hitting him on the head and breaking the HA. Yeah, it can be fixed, but then he would be 'down-graded' to the old one for weeks, not just the duration of the game. (Oh, of course I care about his head! But it's a lot tougher than the HA!)

So he seems to be hearing much better. But over the years he has had his own unique vocabulary, related to his hearing loss. Some things he has self-corrected because now that he reads so well he knows what they are. He doesn't say "reNember" any more, or "hebby equibment". But he still has a few quirks we just let go.

Like "Dark Vader" (which seems reasonably appropriate), or "the Debt Star" (sounds like a place that most Americans should be banished!) Then there's his latest interest - "Gobzilla", and one of his enemies "The Smoog Monster".

Sometimes he's just so close, but not quite right. Like asking me to give him an "interview" of a story. Hmmmm, that would be an overview.

I love my Tater-bug.