Twin Speak

Hannah is very smart, at least too smart for me a lot of the time. She has developed a sort of twin speak, although she doesn't have a twin. Katie has no interest in Hannah's twin speak. Hannah just makes up words when she does not know the English word. She just assumes that I will know this word, since I know all the other words. At first this behavior was so irritating! Why couldn't she just talk like a normal 3 year old? After a lot of anger on my part, Jesse suggested that I just try to learn her language so that I could teach her English. He's so smart. In the past few month I've learned a lot of her language. Some words are simply different then the English ones. Others are for concepts that we just don't have a word for. When she comes up with words that we don't have an equivalent for I just think, I hope God knew what he was doing when he gave me this one!

1. Mommy cereal: shredded wheat
2. Daddy cereal: anything cereal with food coloring
3. our new back garden: the grassy area behind our apartment
4. circle fish sticks: salmon patties
5. Mommy apples: pears
6. bouching: to wear knit pants, particularly ones that look like pajamas (rhymes with couch).ex: I am booching in my new brown pants. I can't go outside! or Mommy, is that lady booching at the grocery store! We can only booch at home.
7. mockie: potato masher.ex: Can I play with this mockie? to which I brilliantly reply, "It's a potato masher. Go ahead."
8. boching: getting on her nerves (rhymes with coach).
9. gouchie: clothing that is too bulky or long to manage easily with the coordination of a 3 year old.ex: (crying and whinning) I can't buckle my carseat! My jacket is gouchie. to which I reply, "Bulky. You need help because your coat is big and bulky." or Help! My shoe is stuck in the gouchie. to which I reply, "Your shoe is caught on your long dress."
10. tookie: anything that is uncomfortable physically. this could be a rock in her shoe, her tee shirt on backwards, her hair in her face, sticky hands, shoes on the wrong feet, her pants twisted, etc, etc. this is an extremely useful word. I don't use the other words, but I use this one.ex: My pants are tookied. or My carseat is tooking me or I have a tookie in my mouth (it was actually a piece of bark. I guess that would cause discomfort).

I am thankful that I listened to Jesse when he told to learn her language. When she uses a new word, I respond, "I don't know that word. What does it mean?" She can usually show me well enough for me to get a working definition of the word in question. Oh well, she'll learn english soon enough. In the meantime, my gouchie is tookied and it's boching me so I'm going to bouch off to bed.