When my kids were young, they’d mispronounce a few words. Sometimes, we’d continue to say words the way they did. Eventually those “words” were adopted into our family’s lexicon.

Take the color “lallow.” That’s how my daughter said yellow.

I pushed my son in his stroller downtown Laguna Beach before little sister was born. He said “high gone” or “Hai Gòn.” I was confused at what he was saying. We stopped in our favorite bakery/deli and I bought him a chicken drumstick. He raised it high in the air and said “high gone!” To him, it looked like a helicopter. Chicken drumsticks became “high gones” in our family.

My daughter kept asking me for chicken when she was a toddler. I’d cook baked chicken, chicken and dumplings and every type of chicken I knew how to cook. She was always upset because it was the wrong chicken.

One day I made pan fried sole. My daughter said, “That is the chicken I like.” So we called sole “that chicken.” We still do.

What words did you or your children use that were unusual?

What sayings did your family use?