Family language >> a peek inside the fishbowl

19 Oct, 2009

Family language

Posted by andrea in: Misc. life

We were chatting about FAMILY WORDS recently. These are words or phrases we use for certain things which might sound foreign if not totally confusing to other people.

I wanted to remember them so I’m recording them here (including translations):

Stripey cheese = Tre-Stella brand cheese, which has stripes on the package
Sprinkle cheese = grated Parmesan cheese
Mouse pillows = interchangeable term for gnocchi and/or pierogi
Daddy bread = a brand of bread
Mummy cereal = a brand of granola
Bum Covers = underwear
Boobie Covers = (take a wild guess)
Sneakbelt = seatbelt (I used to tell the girls that sneakbelts were invented to keep little girls from sneaking out of the car.)
Huggle = a whole body hug. Combination of hug and cuddle.
Fleckles = freckles … something Sarah used to say when she was small.

I also often find myself giving a jokingly stern warning about giving someone a “smackeral on the backeral” and I have no idea where that one started.

What special made-up words and phrases do you have in your family?

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21 Responses to "Family language"

October 19th, 2009 at 9:39 am

I’m sure there are probably more, but the most used one is:

Cheesies = grated Parmesan cheese

October 19th, 2009 at 10:17 am

Cute, I think I will write own post because there are so many and it would be nice to remember them.

Here’s one,
schnooogie = well…boogie, booger, snot, I’m sure you catch my drift. Gross sorry!

3 | vanessa

October 19th, 2009 at 10:32 am

haha.. we have some similar language!

shakey cheese - parmesan
floppy cheese - cheese slices
(Boy.. we all seem to have some dairy issues, don’t we?)

love noodles - Kraft dinner - loooooong story!
eye booger - the crusties that gather in the corner of your eye

4 | andrea

October 19th, 2009 at 10:41 am

Vanessa, you reminded me… Sarah asked me for a “man made” cheese sandwich the other day. I thought that was hilarious. We don’t have processed cheese slices around here very often. :)

And I guess every family has a term for boogers. We call them crusties. (Ew!)

5 | Siobhan

October 19th, 2009 at 11:17 am

My dad’s friend often used the word “zilching” when my brothers were small - in reference to how little kids can get really hyper when they’re overtired. That’s a concept that definitely needs it’s own word!

The packaged cheese slices used to (may still) list “processed cheese food” as the main ingredient, and someone must have mentioned this to my little brother because he started calling it “food cheese.”

My uncle called those crazy-carpet-sled-things “dinglefarblers,” but he is a master at word-inventing and mere mortals can’t expect to reach that level without serious training. Or, better yet, very silly training.

(Now I’m craving a daddycake - a special oven-pancake that only my dad used to like. I love them now, and my dad won’t eat anything with that much butter in it, so I should call it a Siocake. But I don’t.)

6 | Aurelie

October 19th, 2009 at 11:58 am

Here are a few of ours - in French and English!

Bamboola — ‘Faire la bamboola’ is when kids get into this crazy party mood when they’re supposed to be in bed… sleeping.

Pitch Pitch (which we’ve shortened to ‘pitch’) — that’s what call the remote control

Bautomne — is our made up ‘French’ word for bum (funny how we have made up words in French and English!)

Prout — is our French word for fart, which in English we call flit. Ha ha.

7 | Karen

October 19th, 2009 at 12:16 pm

plastic cheese= cheese clice
eye boogers( yuck!)= sleep in the corner of your eye
sessup=ketchup( from when my daughter was learning to talk, and this was one of her first!)
la-bie= good-night, again first sound/word that stuck
marshallows=mushrooms…this one can get confusing!!
poo paper=t.p.
toot=fart

Funny- the more you think about it, the more words you discover….

8 | Debbie

October 19th, 2009 at 1:06 pm

Toot/puff = fart

red raisins = dried cranberries

flicka flacka shoes = my 4-year-old daughter’s favorite sandals

sprinkle cheese = shredded cheese

cheese toast = 1 piece of bread with a spread of hummus and cheese on top

nigh nigh (rhymes with “sigh”)(which is actually Cantonese) = milk

“You’re leaking!” = crying

There are many more but I won’t bore you all…

9 | Hellcat13

October 19th, 2009 at 1:32 pm

I distinctly remember “whisker rubs” from my dad - when we were kids and he had 5 o’clock shadow, he’d give us “whisker rubs” all over our bellies. We’d scream with joy at the tickles. The funny thing is that now I’m SUPER ticklish and sensitive to my husband’s 5 o’clock shadow and I complain when it rasps against my skin :)

10 | Kelly

October 19th, 2009 at 2:24 pm

We have…

stinky cheese = parmesan cheese (not sure why, it really doesn’t smell)

rubber cheese = processed cheese

and boogers = fluffs

October 19th, 2009 at 3:13 pm

Hey! We have mommy cereal in our family, too, only it’s a mix of Raisin Crisp, Just Right and PC Heritage Grains cereal.

I’ve been meaning to do a post about our Family Words for a while…I should finish compiling them and write them up.

12 | andrea

October 19th, 2009 at 3:22 pm

I think it’s worth keeping track of this kind of family lore, whether it’s in a blog or a scrapbook. It’d be a shame to lose it!

October 19th, 2009 at 6:36 pm

Stinky Cheese for Parmasen
Flat Cheese for Processed cheese…Why does lend itself to nick names?
Pandie Cakes for Pan cakes
I can’t think of anymore but I’m sure there is.

14 | Nadine C.

October 20th, 2009 at 8:43 am

I was reading some of these and they are hilarious , We also use some of the french ones mentioned above but for us as well the “cheese” names are many :

Mouse cheese (the swiss one , of course)
Stinky cheese (i.e. OKA, my daughter’s favorite)
plastic cheese cheese (she refuses to even touch that one)
Bumpy cheese (yep, cottage)

And for the non-dairy products :

funny bones (the gooey part of chicken or steaks)
trees (stems of apples)
Lenashnesh (to nibble or to snack in hebrew)
leshafshef (when we make crumpling paper sounds)
tooske (bum , behind, bottom,…)
mamours (cuddles).

15 | Tanis Gilbert

October 20th, 2009 at 9:18 am

Mr Cheeseheads = mini babybel cheeses
Pink meat = salmon
Dora Fish = tilapia
sprinkle cheese = dried parmesan
squeaky chicken - chicken dredged in “sprinkle cheese” and bread crumbs

16 | Sheila D

October 20th, 2009 at 2:13 pm

Cow jellyrolls = those big rolls of hay
Cow marshmallows = hay rolls wrapped in white plastic

17 | Caroline

October 20th, 2009 at 2:57 pm

Roast meat - meatloaf

October 21st, 2009 at 8:09 pm

For some reason dh and I use a lot of slang/family words. here are a few:

Toe-Toes: feet
Tubby: bath
doe-doe: bed time/sleep
chooch milk: chocolate milk

oh, so many others…

19 | Sarah

October 22nd, 2009 at 2:12 pm

Here’s our list….

stones-lint between your toes

juicy-an orange

boobie case-bra

fleece- hair on your arms or legs

and many, many more…

20 | Amy @ Muddy Boots

October 23rd, 2009 at 8:20 pm

underwear is “bundy undies” in our house (since our last name is Bundy)

bedtime is “nonie nonie time”

21 | mchen

October 24th, 2009 at 5:05 pm

Aw man, these are hilarious, very sweet.

Most of the pet words I have with my family are based on food. I don’t even know the English terms for some of them — just the Taiwanese words and then the nicknames we made up for them as kids. Here are a couple of them:

- Doggy doggy (I’m pretty sure this is a tofu product)
- Wiggle wiggle (no idea, but it’s translucent and VERY wiggly)
- Taiwanakopita — my Dad’s original recipe of springrolls that are baked instead of fried, and in the shape of triangles (borrowed from spanakopita design); he even got interviewed on the cbc about these!

Side bar: One time, I was over at a friend’s, and her 2-yr-old son wanted chocolate milk. He couldn’t remember what it was called, so he asked for… “Cake juice”.

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