"Heh heh. Allllll riiiiiightt."

One of the greatest things I can hear from Abbie is laughter. Of course, since she still can’t/won’t talk, laughter is the only pleasurable sound she makes. In a pleasurability contest between laughter, whining, and crying, laughter wins; it isn’t even close, like a football game between Iowa and Ohio State.

Until she belts out a “dada,” laughter is the best thing I can hear from her. Laughter is good, it lets me know that she’s enjoying life at the moment as opposed to the rest of the day that she spends in stone-cold silence or whining in response to the horrible agony that is being denied access to the dishwasher. Laughter lets me know that occasionally I do this parenting thing right.

Fortunately I recently found a nifty new ways to make her laugh and validate my parenting. All I have to do is announce “giggity giggity giggity” in front of her. This is the same catchphrase used by Glen Quagmire on “Family Guy,” which makes it a vaguely disturbing thing to say to a child if you know anything about Quagmire. I discovered this tactic while swinging Abbie in the park. I talk to Abbie constantly throughout the day in an effort to expose her to as much language as possible and show her that all the cool people talk. While swinging her, I generally declare, “swing” every time I push her in the hopes that one day she will put two and two together and say, “swing” when she wants in the swing. Or she can say, “swing” when she wants a drink of milk, or to point out the cat; the important thing is she learns to say something.

After exclaiming “swing” for the 8,173,725th consecutive time in under five minutes, my speech starts to slur and my mind starts to wander. Having watched my “Family Guy” DVD earlier in the day, the term “giggity” popped into my head. I don’t remember exactly what I saw Quagmire do or say, but I’m pretty sure it (a) was amusing, and (b) ended with “giggity giggity giggity.” So I started saying “giggity” every time I pushed her, and instead of her normal emotionless expression like she was indulging my wild fantasy involving swinging my daughter, she chuckled. Intrigued, I started exclaiming “giggity giggity giggity” every time I pushed her, and she thought that was pretty funny. Then I just started saying “giggity giggity giggity” without pushing her, and she thought that was hilarity rivaling even her dancing stuffed lamb.

Now when I take her to the park, I wait for her to look like she’s not paying attention to me, like when she’s trying to decide between the swing or the slide, I walk up to her and declare “giggity giggity giggity,” and watch her collapse into a laughing ball of toddler. For maximum impact, I can tickle her while saying the magic words; she laughs hard enough to pee her pants, which is okay since she’s wearing a diaper anyway. If I ever need a laugh, I can prompt Ellie to say “giggity giggity giggity,” which usually comes out as “giggity gig e gigy dammit.” I laugh hard enough to pee my pants, which isn’t okay since I’m the one who does laundry in our house. At least my laughter lets her know that she’s doing the parenting thing right. And it stops me from saying “giggity giggity giggity” for a minute.