Besides just having names for things, my family also has phrases that were commonly used. Heath posted one of these on his return home to San Diego after his recent visit. I'll start with that one.
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Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jig: Any time we went somewhere, when we returned my parents would say this. I'm not sure if this was a Mostrom thing or something that came from my mother, a Phifer. Without even thinking about it, when we return home from a trip I say this to my own children. It actually comes from a little nursery rhyme that I never heard until I was grown.
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Skin the Rabbit: When we were very young and Mother would help us undress, she would have us raise our hands in the air. As she pulled our shirt or dress over our head, she would say, "Skin the Rabbit!" Again...I'm not sure if this originally came from my Mom or Dad. Of course, by the time I had my own children it had been many years since my Mother had helped me undress. But the words out of my mouth were always--Skin the Rabbit! One day the kids and I got to talking about this phrase and I realized just how GROSS this saying actually is... especially since I've witnessed a rabbit being skinned. It's not a pleasant sight!
____________________________Do you realize that my fist is bigger than your whole face? My Dad used to hold up his fist near our face and say this when we were being belligerent as children and young ladies. Never do I remember my father raising a hand to any of us, so this was always said in jest. If we had really done something that called for correction, we all agree that Dad just had to give us "the look" that said he was disappointed. Then we crumbled...
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Pitiful: My Mother's favorite singer is definitely Elvis. All of us girls spent hours and hours listening to the King sing from the "Music Room" (that eventually became my bedroom). Whether Mom was cleaning house, exercising, or enjoying a visit from a friend, Elvis kept her company. Dad, of course, was a little jealous. Elvis was not called "The King" by my Dad, he was called, "Pitiful." For example, one might've heard my father say, "Do you want to listen to Pitiful?" or "Is your Mother listening to Pitiful again?"
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Gary and the Girls: We had a full size van that was used for family outings and vacations. Wow...we had lots of great times in that van. In fact, from the top of the World Trade Center in New York City we looked down at it and joked that it was probably getting broken into--then when we got down, it HAD been broken into! The leather tire cover was custom-made for my parents and read, "Gary and the Girls." I remember Dad complaining as we were driving down the road that young men would be straining to look in. It took us a while to realize that their idea of Gary and the Girls was not a father, mother, and young daughters!
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Boz: My Dad's friends have always referred to him as "Boz." My sisters and I have asked before where this nickname orginated and, of course, we've heard some pretty far-fetched stories from his friends and brothers. Maybe he's just had this nickname for so long that nobody even remembers anymore where it started. When we got older, we used to ask Dad why the van didn't say something like "Boz and the Babes!"
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Slop the Hogs: My parents often work together in the kitchen and they also did so when we were young. Usually when a meal was ready, my Dad would round us up for dinner by hollering, "It's time to slop the hogs!" or "Let's slop the hogs!" Again, this was something we heard so often we never even thought about it being so RUDE until we were older.
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Oh goodness...at some point I will need to work on some of our own Tylerisms. One just never knows what might come out of Todd's mouth!
