Thursday, September 06, 2007

"What in the Wumberly World..."

The sweet girl had a hard day..she didn't seem to be feeling well, and kept complaining of tiredness. I let her have some extra rest time on the couch. She was lounging against the pillows, cuddling her stuffed giraffes, when all of a sudden a very loud engine (like a motorcycle revving) sounded on the street just outside our front windows. She sat up startled. "What in the wumberly world WAS THAT?" she asked.

And I had to laugh. The phrase comes from one of her favorite poems at the moment, "The Llama Who Had No Pajama." I say one of her favorite poems because she's also adoring "The Seven Silly Eaters." Both poems are by Mary Ann Hoberman, whom we've only recently discovered. The sweet girl has always enjoyed poetry, but she's just been riveted with these poems (and they're long, both of them). She was fascinated with the world "wumberly" and the fact that it was made up. I've noticed a sudden upsurge in her own playing with language and that she's sometimes making up new words of her own.

So a long, hard day all around, and we're all tired...but that one moment just felt so "wumberly" I had to share it.

2 comments:

Erin said...

Great word! I'm not familiar with Mary Ann Hoberman, but she sounds like someone to check out. :)

Beth said...

Here's the funny thing...I said we just "discovered" her, but in fact we've read two of her books before this, and I just didn't register the name! In fact, one of her books, "Whose Garden Is It?" I really loved and reviewed for epinions just a few months ago.

I think you'd like her. She has the rhyming gift, like you.