Does This Mean She Has to Marry GI Joe?

Denise's family loves nicknames and plays on words. Her father is a master of them. Through time, many nicknames undergo further modification such that they are unrecognizable next to their original forms. Kind of like modern corn compared to its predecessors. As a result, my sisters-in-law and wife are known as Sputter, Sputter, Bena, and Geener. Yes there are four of them and yes two of them have the same name. Please don't ask me to explain it.

Much like the result of selective genetic manipulation in corn, this renaming phenomenon seems to be amplified in one of our children. Caroline, who turned three this summer, has been making up her own lyrics to songs for some time. She renamed Rachel "Shira" (this apparently relates to a children's show). She insists on calling Denise and I "Mother" and "Father" in spite of the fact that no one else in the family does this. Within a day of moving into our new house she decided the back stairs, which wind in a tight spiral, were castle stairs. This led to each member of the family receiving a royal title. She condescended to name me King, for which I have granted her a particularly fine Duchy in the north country.

My current favorite renaming is for Emma. Caroline doesn't get all the credit for it, though she did deliver the coup de grace. One of the nicknames Denise uses for Emma is "Ermy Germy". Again, please don't ask me to explain. Because Caroline has lived all her life in New York, she has a recognizable accent. Somehow she's twisted the soft 'e' to a soft 'a' and modified the second word. Thus my oldest daughter, the pacifist who cowers at the mere sight of my paintball gun, is now known as Army Guy.