Lucisms

Lucy appears to have a gift for neologisms that far surpasses her dad's when he was a kid. She makes up words and phrases with creativity, perceptiveness, and most importantly, supreme confidence. It's the confidence that makes a new word go over really smooth, and may even give it sticking power. And this girl . . . has GOT it.

A partial list (and remember to insert a hard lisp on anything approaching an 's'):

Santa's little helper is an "elb." "Mom, look, there's Santa, and there are his elbs. I lub elbs."

Lucy loves to watch Leinsteins. That means she loves to watch a show called "Little Einsteins." She's just smart enough to know that some of those syllables in the title are superfluous.

Tonight Lucy asked if we wanted to play Vaminos. She was pointing to a box of dominoes, but also alluding implicitly to a favorite phrase of Dora the Explorer's- "vamo-nos." So in our house, we play Vaminos now. Pretty much the same as dominoes, but with a bit of Spanish flair. Much more fun.

Lucy is also very supportive of our new year's resolution to read the Book of Morning nightly as a family. It's odd that we do it at night, but being a part of this family conditions one early to live with contradiction.

She also has a designated hidingsinkout. A hidingsinkout is the hideout one uses while playing hidingsink. And hers is a good one. It's behind a floor lamp. A very good hidingsinkout.

And my personal favorite. When a sporting event of some sort is on the TV, Lucy usually doesn't pay attention (it's a boy show!). But there's one thing that can make her perk up and follow closely: "Cherlers! Dad, did you see the cherlers! I lub cherlers!" Given that her mom was a cherler in high school, I suppose it's a natural affinity.

Lucy heard me laughing when Macy told me another of her Lucisms the other day. She stood up on the couch and grabbed my face with her two hands and smiled and said "Dad, do you laugh about me?" And it's true- we're not laughing at her, we're laughing about her!