I am a sucker for the quirky things people say. As a kid, I often heard my mom's favorite expression: "flour'em." I have no idea how to spell it, but it means something like, "that's pretty hard to believe." I also learned "tick-a-lock" from her, the only version of "shut up" we were allowed to say at home. My Grandpa Brown, born in the state of "Misery," (his words!) sometimes said, "I swan," which meant, "I never."
We have Larson family sayings, too. Whenever anyone's hungry, we say we're "feeling elevenish," inspired by Winnie the Pooh. And when Quinn was little, and she wanted a snack, she'd ask for an "over-tider," which came from my asking her if she wanted something to tide her over till dinner. And anyone who wasn't being sweet and cheery earned the label, "Crankleberry Johnson."
What are some of your favorite expressions? They can be from your favorite literature or real life. Share!
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Wow, I love your family sayings. They are so whimsical and such wonderful family heirlooms.
ReplyDeleteWe say "nubbins" to all dear ones because my nephew pronounced "I love you" as "I nub you".
Whenever any of my kids sneeze, we say, "God bless you my little fur child, every time you sneeze" because we like that part in "The Little Fur Family" by Margaret Wise Brown.
I love these terms. My son Holden was talking about the trees in winter, and he said they were "deciduating." I asked him if that was a real word, and he said he made it up. Holden argued that deciduous trees need a verb for losing leaves in the fall. I later found out the word comes from the root "de"(down) and "cadere"(fall).
ReplyDeleteI think his argument was pretty logical. :)
This is a fun idea! My husband's family says "Poky Gamma" when ever they see any slow car. I finally found out it a distortion of "Poky Grandma" because that how Grandma drove. In our family we say "broke a muscle" for any muscle strain or cramp.
ReplyDeleteThe weirdest one is "that's definitely a Bub Wooey" for anything that is not in the right place. It originated because my 4 year old son once 'helped' a hermit crab out of his shell with disastrous results (for the crab). "Bub Wooey" is a childish pronunciation of "Crab Louie" the hermit crab's name. My son is 26 now and prefers his shell fish in the shell.
I had an uncle who used to love to take the Lord's name in vain but it upset my mother, so around us he used to say "Jeepers Christmas." I say it quite often these days, though my mother still likes "Oh for Pete's sake."
ReplyDeleteMy mother still spouts a lot of gems from her childhood. Her two favorites are:
"Why don't you freeze your teeth and give your tongue a sleigh ride?" (A phrase she used often in the presence of my son who never stops talking.)
"If wishes were horses then beggars would ride. If horse turds were biscuits we'd eat 'til we died." (I heard this all the time as a girl when I wished aloud for something I couldn't have.)
Fun! I can't wait to read what others share.
I'm not sure where this originated, but, my Grandma Aggie loved to play cards, especially one called Spite and Malice. Whenever she'd get a card she really didn't like she's say, "What a revoltin' development that was." I am laughing just thinking about it! AND it makes me miss her.
ReplyDeleteI was just discussing this with my family last night. We say "gighandi" (gi-ghandi) to refer to something really big (instead of, I suppose, ginormous) and "yogrit" instead of "yogurt."
ReplyDeleteOh, Molly --your grandma's saying has to work its way into a book somewhere!
ReplyDeleteTricia -- I've heard that longer version of the "beggars would ride" before but we would've gotten our mouths washed out with soap if we'd said it at our house! ;-)
Oh, this is interesting. Southerners always say "I swanee" - so I loved hearing your "I swan". We also used to say "pure T" to mean "very" or "a lot" - as in "He is one pure T dumb dude"
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