At Lincoln Park Zoo yesterday, I spelled a word so that Reid wouldn’t know that I know swear words. Like her daddy does. Shea’s grinned and said that he remembered when he didn’t know what we meant when we spelled things. It made me think of a book that we’ve been reading to Reid lately, [1] A Birthday for Frances by [2] Russell Hoban. Frances, a lovely little badger, likes to spell words. At one point, she mentions that her imaginary friend doesn’t get a cake and F-R-S-Q (or something like that) and her mother asks what F-R-S-Q means. Frances replies, “Cake. I thought you could spell.” (or that’s the gist of what she said.) I’m looking forward to when Reid catches on to what we’re spelling. I know I will regret it later but right now I focusing on the joy of sharing my love of words. But I don’t know if I’m ready for pig latin as Liz at [3] This Full House just wrote about. I just discovered her blog. But I’ll go back, you should check it out.

Does everyone spell in front of their kids? Are there other tips for subterfuge that I should know about?