WHAT'S A FWAPIT?

The language of a three year old is fascinating. Theo has a full range of words now which he puts into very complicated sentences but occasionally he leaves us saying "Huh?"

Like tonight's example. I was sitting with him and after a range of very normal questions, many of which included "Why?" he asked "Nana, where's my Fwapit?"

I suggested he take me to the kitchen and point to whatever it was. This got us nowhere because, as it turned out, a Fwapit has nothing to do with the kitchen. I finally said, "Let's wait until Ma Ma and Ba Ba come home. They'll tell me what a Fwapit is." All this time I was hardly able to contain my glee. Fwapit is the type of word children's authors love and I write children's books. This is a Dr. Suess word! Imagine what Dr. Suess would do with a Fwapit. Maybe he's already done something with a Fwapit: A Fwapit and a Fwipit? Can't you see them? The possibilities are endless.

My husband came home. Ba Ba and Ma Ma were no where to be found. I could hardly wait. "Pop Pop, where's my Fwapit?"

The same confusion. He didn't know what it meant either. I grinned. I mean I grinned. It's like I jumped up and down like a three year old. Fwapit. It's such a marvelous word. Fwapit. It's such a deliciously silly word to roll around the tongue. Say it, you'll agree. You have to draw out the first syllable: Fwa pit.

Finally Theo, trying like the earnest little guy he is, said "It's something you play music with." That should have lit a bulb in my brain but it didn't.

Ba Ba and Ma Ma came home. "Wendy, what's a Fwapit?" I asked my daughter-in-law.

Leave it to a mother to know the answer to everything.

"I know where it is Theo." She went outside and brought it in and gave it to him. A trumpet. A Fwapit is a trumpet!

An hour later he said trumpet perfectly but I will never forget Fwapit!