More thoughts....

[conuly]

(Yes, I'm thinking, weird, huh?)

The other day, Ana and I are sitting outside on the boat on our way into the city. And you should know, sitting outside on the boat is the highlight of Ana's day, doubly so if we get to do it twice, or if we're on the cool new boats with elevators where you can sit outside sans roof. Okay, that's not really necessary, but I thought I'd mention it.

There's another girl there, about 8 - 11 years old, with her father. English-speaking, no accent. We're talking a bit, and at one point she turns to her father to point out something "Look, Papa!"

I've never heard that outside of older books. Never, ever.

My mother calls her mother Ma. I didn't find that out into fairly recently, because to us she refers to her mother as Bonne-Maman, which is what we call her. My sister and I have called our parents Mommy and Daddy since we were talking. Sometime after my father died, my mother suggested that we didn't *have* to call her Mommy, we could say Mom instead, and Jenn just kinda gaped at her as though this was the most absurd thing she'd ever heard in her life. It would be kinda silly, to change our mother's nickname for the sake of conformity.

Now we call her Nanen, though, if we're around Ana, because otherwise Ana gets a bit confused. We don't mind calling Jenn Jenn around Ana, but we try to call Mommy Nanen.

So... what do you call your parents? Bonus points if what you call them is a term from somebody else's language/dialect. Half bonus points if it's a private term, or one from a language/dialect you have, but nobody else (or at least, very few people)in your area has.

Comments

[brownkitty.livejournal.com]

My parents are Nana and Pawpaw to my children, Mom and Dad usually to me and Steve, rarely Mumsie and Papa-san.

My in-laws are Oma and Opa to my children, Mom and Dad to me.

My ex-husband is "your father", "your biological father", or "your sperm donor" when I'm talking about him to my son, although the latter is VERY rare and only when I'm feeling particularly vengeful. My ex-husband's parents were grandmother and grandfather until they died, and were infrequently referred to or communicated with.

Steve and I, referring to ourselves or each other when talking to the children (or occasionally each other) are Mommy and Daddy. My son Colin has never called Steve "step-father" or any variant, and I'm not really sure he understands that Carrie is actually his half-sister ("But she's a whole person!"). I don't think that explaining Carrie is his half-sister is important enough to belabor: the sister is the important part.

And as kind of an aside, custom in my family growing up was that close friends of my parents were "aunt" or "uncle", occasionally "grandparent" if the generational gap was suitable for it. I've continued that habit with my children. Does anyone else do that?

[deceptica]

Yes! When I was little I had dozens of uncles and aunts. I sort of wish I hadn't though, because it became rather confusing to me once I actually asked about who was related to me and who wasn't. (Mostly because some people were related but weren't actually uncles or aunts... so what were they then?)