Chkum!

Back when Alice was younger, like a couple of months ago, she started to parrot what we would say. That in itself is dangerous as I started to hear my bad words repeated. Oops. But one word had us confused: "Chkum!" She'd repeat it a lot. She loved saying that word and we had no idea where she picked it up. She didn't seem to associate it with any toys, books, rooms, or people. We had just figured that she liked the way that it sounded and we'd never figure it out.

One day as I carried Alice to a different room Laura called out and told me that she had figured out where she learned the sound from. "It's from you!" she cried. "From me? When"? "Just now. You're making the sound when you carry her."

To give you background, it's not fun to just walk when you're holding a baby. You have to make it fun and interesting, at least for yourself. So, like most times in life when I want to entertain myself, I pretend that I'm a robot. Robots are heavy and when they walk they clearly make a chkum! sound each step. This is a perfectly normal thing to do, everyone at the RSG agrees.

So if you find your child making awesome robot sounds, look to an awesome influence, or awesomence as I like to call it, as the source of the sound. Now you'll have to excuse me, I must go for a walk. Chkum chkum chkum ...

Update: Laura pointed out that while I was saying "chkum", Alice was saying "thukum". Totally different.