in most languages the word for ‘mother’ usually starts with an M, because phonetically [m] is one of the easiest sounds for a newborn to make when they start babbling, and mothers tend to be the one most around the child. so in my mind that crosses M off the list, because it’s automatically associated with a feminine figure

similarly, ‘father’ tends to start with D, T, P, or B. (phonetically these sounds are very close together; [p, b] and [d, t] are all only different because of being voiced or unvoiced.) these are also phonetically easy letters and ones kids pick up on earlier.

now the hard sounds for kids are the following: [ɹ, d͡ʒ, tʃ, θ, ð] or in normal speak: the English R, the “j” or “dge” sound in “judge,” the “th” sound in “thigh” and the “th” sound in “the.” and we don’t want kids unable to say their parent’s name for years, so those are also off the list.

additionally, it’s easiest for young kids to just repeat the same sound twice rather than figuring out the tongue gymnastics of putting different sounds together, which is why kids will say Ma-Ma or Da-Da and not Ma-Mo or Da-Po. and we’ll want to stick with low back vowels like “ah” and avoid ones like the hard “i” or “ee.”

so what does that leave us? when we want a sound kids can learn easily and early but don’t want to just put a funky spin on “mama” or “dada”?

my suggestions: G, K, W, L. i personally lean towards W and L. they’re called liquids, since they’re the consonants that kind of aren’t consonants, and kids (and ESL learners) will tend to swap out the English R for a W or L until they can learn the R.

if i ever have a child, they’ll start calling me Wawa. then when they get older, they’ll call me Wala, or maybe even Wally.

and then, once they’re finally phonetically developed, they can call me by my true title as their nonbinary guardian for their 18+ years:

A few years ago, when I was living in the housing co-op and looking for a quick cookie recipe, I came across a blog post for something called “Norwegian Christmas butter squares.” I’d never found anything like it before: it created rich, buttery and chewy cookies, like a vastly superior version of the holiday sugar cookies I’d eaten growing up. About a year ago I went looking for the recipe again, and failed to find it. The blog had been taken down, and it sent me into momentary panic. 

Luckily, I remembered enough to find it on the Wayback Machine, and quickly copied it into a file that I’ve saved ever since. I probably make these cookies about once a month, and they last about five days around my voracious husband - they’re fantastic with a cup of bitter coffee or tea. I’m skeptical that there is something distinctively Norwegian about these cookies, but they do seem like the perfect thing to eat on a cold day. 

Norwegian Christmas Butter Squares

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

1 egg 1 cup sugar 2 cups flour 1 tsp vanilla ½ tsp salt Turbinado/ Raw Sugar for dusting

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Chill a 9x13″ baking pan in the freezer. Do not grease the pan.

Using a mixer, blend the butter, egg, sugar, and salt together until it is creamy.  Add the flour and vanilla and mix using your hands until the mixture holds together in large clumps. If it seems overly soft, add a little extra flour. 

Using your hands, press the dough out onto the chilled and ungreased baking sheet until it is even and ¼ inch thick.  Dust the top of the cookies evenly with raw sugar.

And it is GREAT.

It basically makes the platonic ideal of commercial sugar cookies, only in bar form. When I give them to people (which I do a lot, because this is one of those simple recipes where the results seem very impressive), I just tell them they’re sugar cookie bars.