Mots Flottants

'Elle est tombee amoureuse. Les garcons disent rock n' roll!'

Last week Ma Fille was singing this in the shower. She's learned all these little diddies from the school playground. Most are accompanied with hand clapping. You know, the kind we did in elementary school where you'd clap together from the top and bottom, then straight ahead, then your own hands together, starting over again and again to the rhythm of the chant.

She's one of those kids who wants to know everything about words. She was annoyed when she first started reading and couldn't stop reading all the signs around her....on buses, billboards, shop windows.

Now all those signs are in French. And she's still reading. She and I are constantly trying to figure things out. 'Venir comme vous etes!' 'Gagnez un voyage!' 'Les bons plans de l'ete.' We'll shout it out when we've got it translated. Woo hoo! Another one down.

So we work out all these songs. Like the one about the witch who ate too much chocolate and got a stomach ache then had to hide from all the children. It's cuter in French.

So it was with 'elle est tombee amoureuse'.

S: 'What's elle est tombee Mommy?'
M: 'That means she fell.'
S: 'Hmmmm, she fell, she fell, she fell? What's amoureuse?'
M: 'I'm not sure.'
S:  'Oh, Mommy! Amoureuse is love! She fell in LOVE!'.
M: 'And all the boys say rock n roll.' HA!

This is how it goes. All these words float around in our heads just waiting for us to piece them together.