Just like that, Richie's new favorite thing is standing. He's pulling himself up from sitting and loves to stand at his activity table and play with all bits and bobs (aka buttons). The table is another great toy library find, but the only problem is that it "speaks" British. As in when you press on those dough-colored discs in the lower left it says "mmm, biscuits" rather than "mmm, cookies." And when you spin the alphabet soup bowl in the center it sings the ABC song, ending in "X, Y and Zed" rather than Zee.
This brought up the tricky linguistic issue of what language is going to be Richie's native tongue? Will it be Kiwi or American English? After much debate, we've decided that while we're living in NZ and everyone else is speaking Kiwi around him, we'll speak American at home. Then he can decide what to use when he gets older. So for now I'm strictly "Mom" not "Mum" and on Wednesdays we wear our swimming suits not our "togs" to go to swim class, and we use a shopping cart at the grocery store, not a "trolley." Although I did have to do an online search for "trolley seat cover" rather than shopping cart cover to get him one to ride around in now that he's outgrowing the capsule. So that will go back to the place I rented not "hired" it from soon. This is going to be tricky to keep up as Paul and I have already gone soft and catch ourselves using more and more Kiwi-isms.
1 comment:
And does it say "yellow ba-nah-na"? :o) Mookie has the same one! But in American, not British. :o)
We only lived in England for 3 years, but we do still have some Brit-isms that escape every now and then, and we've been back 18 months. It's okay to be bilingual. :o)
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