Pet Names

January 8, 2005 9:29 AM

Inspired by this thread, in which someone confessed to using the same pet name for her dog and boyfriend, I simply must know: What sick-making nicknames do y'all call your spouses, partners and kids?
posted by naomi to Human Relations (66 answers total)

My father calls my mother Mootsie. She has no idea why.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:30 AM on January 8, 2005 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: My husband is called sweetie (+/- pie), snookums, sweet potato, sugar britches, honey bear, and boo.
posted by naomi at 9:31 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my girlfriend 'puppy' sometimes when I'm touching her hair.

She likes it! 'Cause she's so cuddly.
posted by dhoyt at 9:59 AM on January 8, 2005

People actually do that? I just use their names. To their face, anyway.
posted by cmonkey at 10:00 AM on January 8, 2005

I should have waited & posted this comment in this more appropriate thread:

You know, I keep getting in trouble for talking about my niece as if she were a pet... but her name is Elisabeth and I started out calling her Lola (before she was named) and then Elsie & Elisababy, but she grew so fast, especially compared to her twin brother (preemies) that I started calling her Porky and Pork Sausage and Pork Fried Rice and Taylor Pork Roll but my sister, her mother, strongly objected and thought I would give her body issues (at six weeks) so soon she became Tank... now Tankerbell & Tanker Truck and Tank Fried Rice.

My whole family calls my grandmother "The GM"
posted by palegirl at 10:00 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my 4yro daughter Tater. When she was born, we called her punkin potpie.
posted by cass at 10:04 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my newborn baby niece "The Tick" because she's on my sister's nipple like she can't live without it.

/she can't
posted by dhoyt at 10:06 AM on January 8, 2005

My sisters and I currently call each other, "Sitter". Sister -> Sissy-> Sitter.

My sister was Doody as a child. My other sister was Stumpy until just awhile ago.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 10:06 AM on January 8, 2005 [1 favorite]

Posting this will come back to haunt me, I know it.

My youngest sister got tired of hearing constantly that she was cute and cuddly, so to torture her even more, we came up with the most sickeningly cute nickname we could think of: Scruffy. My other sister was, even at a very young age, very haughty and fussy, so she got stuck with "Prissy."

My most recent gf once referred to me (in one of her less lucid moments) as her "warm, fuzzy, bucket of oats." I, in turn, called her things like "fuzzy muffin head." And her ex had sometimes called her "fuzzy elf." (Not sure what's up with all the 'fuzzies.') Finally, the gf before that wanted to be known as "pumpkin butt."
posted by Clay201 at 10:24 AM on January 8, 2005

Titwiggle
posted by mischief at 10:31 AM on January 8, 2005

My newest niece is called "squisher" by my Bro. That's about the only example I can think of in my circle of acquaintances. I don't think anybody else I know uses cute nicknames.
posted by weston at 10:35 AM on January 8, 2005

Well, there's the standard "honey", as in "Honey, remember when we did (X)?" but the only actual nickname I've given her is "Sugar Bunny", which I gave to her shortly after we met, back in high school.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 10:45 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my youngest "Bug Muffin."
posted by konolia at 10:51 AM on January 8, 2005 [1 favorite]

Well, this isn't cute, just a tad ... unusual: when we were courting, my wife-to-be and I quickly determined that honey and honeybunch just would not do, so for some reason we truncated the latter to 'Bunch.' Now it's the nickname we've called each other for the past 23 years.
posted by mojohand at 10:51 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my wife Sugar Pie Honey Bunches O' Oats. She calls me worse things.
posted by icontemplate at 10:54 AM on January 8, 2005

Hey, that someone was me! Truth be told, I called my boyfriend puppa well before we lived with a house with a dog in it, just as some sort of dorky boyfriend nickname. Now that we live with a dog, it's just bcome sort of natural to gravitate the name to the dog as well as the boyfriend. I usually just call him sweets.
posted by jessamyn at 10:54 AM on January 8, 2005

seven month old daughter: rachel cakes.
posted by mecran01 at 11:08 AM on January 8, 2005

My sister's name is Cherise; hence, we used to call her Sid. (For Cyd Charryse. Whaddya want, my brothers can't spell worth a damn and I was like 4 years old...)

Once she mixed up the number of units for salt and sugar in a sugar snap recipe. (E.g, instead of 2 cups sugar and 1 tbsp salt, she used 1 cup of sugar and 2 tbsp salt.) We called her "Nackle" [NaCl] for months after that.

After same sister read the 'Little House' books, we all started calling our father and mother "Pa" and "Ma". Mother took it from us; but she would get visibly irritated when my eldest brother's wife started calling them that, which she still does to this day, some twenty or more years later. (Pa doesn't mind, but for us it's one of a fairly long list of names that we use interchangeably. Unlike our sister-in-law.)

My XSO used to call me Ricky, after Ricky Ricardo. Naturally she was Lucy. (When she didn't understand something, but was uncoformtable about admitting it, she's say, "'Splain it to me, Reeky.")

Same XSO also used to call me "Pookie." She now refers to the cats as "the Pookies."
posted by lodurr at 11:13 AM on January 8, 2005

I'm really, really horrible about this. See, I tend to refer to just plain ordinary objects by derivations and modifications of their names. My wife's name is sandy but she'll get called anything from Sandy to Sandles to Chandy to Trandy to Trendy to Chendy to Brendy to Chandles and so forth. This is not something I try to do, it just happens. Then for any given pet name I might call her there are thousands of such variations. She's almost as bad. Around here when a pet name is said you sometimes have to stop and ask who it's referring to (which dog, cat, or person)
posted by RustyBrooks at 11:18 AM on January 8, 2005

Shiter (pronounced shy-ter) or Shiteypants.

Don't quite know why. Have to be careful when in public.
posted by davey_darling at 11:21 AM on January 8, 2005

A friend of mine used to call his wife "shitpipe." They are getting divorced in 3 weeks.
posted by Turd Ferguson at 11:25 AM on January 8, 2005

Pet names are for pets, right?

That said, I called my last bf "Mister" and he called me "Miss".
The one previous called me by my last name and I called him by his last name.
Sadly, I can't remember ever being called 'honey', 'sugar', 'muffin' or anything cutsey.

*runs off to her lonesome corner and cries*
posted by kamylyon at 11:29 AM on January 8, 2005

My sisters and I currently call each other, "Sitter". Sister -> Sissy-> Sitter.

My sister and I call each other "seastar," another modification of sister. I stole it from a friend and I love it, because now if I find things with starfish on them I can get them for her.
I also used to call her chica because it rhymes with her nickname. Her name is Marika but was often shortened to Meeka or Reeka (though she doesn't like that one anymore now that she's in high school; go figure). There are many fun variations of Meeka, though.
Our mom also calls us both "sister," which is kind of confusing when we're both at home since we can't tell which of us she's talking to.

I never have nicknames for significant others, though, and they never have them for me. This is totally fine with me.
posted by librarina at 11:35 AM on January 8, 2005

My husband puts up with the nicknames "wolfie" and "big woof" ("woof" being another evolution of "wolf"). His revenge is that I'm "little weasel," sometimes shortened in Jeffersons-esque style to "weezy".

And no, we are not furries. *shudders*

These nicks have become deeply ingrained habits. We'll eventually have some very confused cubs...eh, kids.
posted by clever sheep at 11:40 AM on January 8, 2005

I call my 4-month-old nephew "Dr. D." (short for Dr. Drool).
posted by bendy at 11:47 AM on January 8, 2005

I call him: "hvirvelbalde elskovstudse",and he calls me: "sukkerlæber mus". We're not furries, either.
posted by reflecked at 11:50 AM on January 8, 2005

I do the same thing, RustyBrooks. There are just way too many names for my girlfriend and my dog. New ones being made every day...

I really hate when I slip in public and say some of the silly names though. I always feel like everyone turns away disgusted. It's really just a playful thing between me & my love, it's not meant to be shared at all.
posted by spaghetti at 11:53 AM on January 8, 2005

Clay201 -- my Mother called me "Prissy," too. She let that slip in front of my boyfriend a few years ago, and I've never heard the end of it.
posted by Zosia Blue at 12:18 PM on January 8, 2005

I called my niece "fuzzy" when she was born, but my sister didn't appreciate it, so the nicknamewas changed to "stinky". Said niece turned it around on me when she was two - I called her stinky, and she looked over at my butt and mock gagged, "no, YOU stinky!"

My other niece and nephew are, respectively, twitchy and skwawky.
posted by notsnot at 12:24 PM on January 8, 2005

My 3 yr old son has been monkeybean, peanut butter, and now answers to boodle. The other day, when he was mad at me, he turned around and scowled, "I am not your boodle. I am not your monkey (his dad's name for him). I am not your boy (his grandmother's)." He did finally agree to be my radish.
posted by bibliowench at 12:30 PM on January 8, 2005

My growing up nickname was George. I was the only girl out of five kids and I guess I needed a boy's name.

My oldest brother calls me Seester.

I call mr. deborah: Love (most of the time), SugahBum (he has a cute ass), Darlin', Schmoopie (very tongue-in-cheek) and the ever-popular Bastard.

As above, I was strongly influenced by the Little House books. I started calling my mom "Ma" and everyone else picked up on it. Now that I'm in Canada she's "Mum".
posted by deborah at 12:44 PM on January 8, 2005

I tend to call my boyfriend sweet pea. Oh and also honey bun, but not because it's cute and lovey, but because he used to buy me a honey bun every morning at work before we were dating because he had a crush on me and knew I liked them. He becomes poopypants when he is being a jackass. For some reason he calls me chief so naturally I call him big chief. When we have a baby, he will be little chief. (poopypants should be in the spell checker.)
posted by chiababe at 12:58 PM on January 8, 2005

Lovely Wife = baboo
Darling Daughter = weiner or goofus
Handsome Son = boudreau or goofus
posted by donpardo at 1:09 PM on January 8, 2005

My sister and I regularly greet and refer to each other with "SIS-TAAAARH" said exactly like Darth Vader. Exlaimation points are optional, but often used. We all call my sister (Karen) "Care-Bear" which is on the decidedly sappy side of cute.

My father calls my ten-year-old brother Ducks or alternatively Mr. Ducks. Really, no one knows where that comes from. When he was much younger he was just "The Boy" to everyone since he's the sole male child. Nowadays I call him Buddy, Bud or Kid when I'm taking to him.

The only really sweet thing I call my boyfriend is lovely or sweets (never sweetie) although we call each other dork and geek often enough that they might as well be an affectionate term.
posted by nelleish at 1:32 PM on January 8, 2005

Sadly, I was known as princess poopy for many years.
posted by yodelingisfun at 1:37 PM on January 8, 2005

My husband and I both call each other "Bwnni", or "Bwn" for short. Also, Snug, Snuglet, and I call him Puppyhead.

Melon, the kitty, is Melonious or Melonius Snug, Mr. Silkypants, Slim, Melboy and the Orange Paws fo Doom, Orangie, Orangino, Stinker ot Stinkpot, Menony (Snickett).

Tubby, another kitty is Tublet, Tubgirl, Hissyface.

Babs, the last kitty, Fatty, Fatioso.
posted by oflinkey at 1:42 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my mother MomCat, she calls me Bee. I call my sister Cakey (from Cait) and see calls me Sweetie. I call my brother Natty Bumpo (from Nathaniel) or Dude and he calls me 'Du (short for Indu). My friend Alison and I refer to each other as Bun Bun, Nub Nub, Bun Nub, Al-bean, and 'Du-bean. My friend Jennifer is the Red Ninja and I am the Blue Indu. My boy and I call each other sweetie, sweetpea, sugar, cutie, honey, etc etc etc.
posted by Specklet at 1:50 PM on January 8, 2005

How do you pronounce "bwnni" or "bwn", oflinkey?
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 1:53 PM on January 8, 2005 [1 favorite]

Tobbo - My dad still calls me this.
posted by puke & cry at 1:58 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my mother Angry Jack. She knows I'm teasing.
posted by Smart Dalek at 1:59 PM on January 8, 2005

People think it's cute when they hear me refer to my husband as Snookums or The Snook... but really it's just because that's his name. Mr. Snook. I kid you not.
posted by web-goddess at 2:01 PM on January 8, 2005

My partner and I are pathetically cute. We have a lot of different nicknames for each other. The most dorky? S'ee'ee. It started out as Sweetie, then somehow the t disappeared and became an e, becoming Swee'ee. Then the w disappeared....

We also have been known to call each other dork or spaz. He also calls me turkey.
posted by nyxie at 2:07 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my kids all kinds of weird things: Wuzzle, fuzzlepunkinhead, squooozy baby yumma dingdong, mama's little DARLIN cupcake and so on. Oh, and I sing to them: terrible made up songs and rewritten songs and so on. All of this was a big hit when they were little and hasn't gone over well in some time - but watching them react to it is great, especially if their friends are around. /evil mother
posted by mygothlaundry at 2:07 PM on January 8, 2005

ThePinkSuperhero-- uh, lesse. How can I write that.
Like Bunny but with more rounding on the "u"- put a little 'w' in it.
posted by oflinkey at 2:10 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my wife "Poopie" (poopy). Terrible, terrible nickname... gotta be careful in public. :-)

It's from early on in our relationship. Whenever I asked how she was feeling, she'd say, "I feel like poop." It was a catchall emotional state and after awhile I just started calling her poopie. It's a reflex now and will likely never change. Oh well... :-)

Our cats, Sophy and Ian, are known as Baby-cat and Fat-ass respectively.
posted by C.Batt at 2:26 PM on January 8, 2005

For us, nyxie left out "snugglebunny" and "monkeyfucker".
posted by mendel at 2:54 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my husband Love, Babe, or Honey. In high school his family would call him Bubba-Bubba Beef Cake. He calls me Hon, Sweetie, or Babe.

The dog gets a Puppy Dog, Sweetie or, most often, Sweet Pea followed by a musical rendition of the song.
posted by rhapsodie at 2:57 PM on January 8, 2005

T-u-r-k-e-y was the first word I learned to spell, because my mother would spell it out in referring to me. A recent favorite has been Grace, for the irony of it all and the lines
"Say goodnight, Gracie."
"Goodnight, Gracie."
posted by redsparkler at 3:00 PM on January 8, 2005

I call my S.O.: Sweetles (rhymes with beetles) and occasionally Princess Pony (or, rarely, Princess Pony Ass). Her favorite toys in the early 80s were her damn My Little Ponies.
posted by D.C. at 3:11 PM on January 8, 2005

I call her 'boopie' or 'schmoopie' and she calls me the same. Sometimes I call her chef, but she really is one so I'm not sure if that counts.

Caution: what follows is weird and may be limited to an extremely small geographic/ethnographic region. The South Philly Italian-American princesses that I work with call their kids "Mom" or "Mommy." For real. For example, Andrea (aka Ange) is on the phone with her ten year old son (Ant-a-nee) who just got home from school. "What are youse doin', mommy?" It blew my mind the first time I heard it.
posted by fixedgear at 3:34 PM on January 8, 2005

My wife's name is Autumn, and I started calling her "smautumn" as an abbreviated version of "small autumn". Now she calls me smandre, as well. I also call her McGillicutty, McGee, O'Shaughnessy, and pretty much any other Irish name you can think of, for no really good reason. Monkey, Monkeychan, sweethead, quiethead, and loudhead may also be used, depending on her demeanor.

We also have a tradition of using celebrity names/movie names/book names in a weird way - so if she's zoning out, I will call her "kevin SPACEY", or if she has a cough, I'll call her "COFFY, starring Pam Grier".

But we're weird.
posted by sluggo at 3:48 PM on January 8, 2005

Sugar Booger goes over fairly well with the wife, on occasion.
posted by yalestar at 3:49 PM on January 8, 2005

I call Banjo "Shitface McUgly." We're in love.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 4:42 PM on January 8, 2005

Mrs. Wet Spot is The Spousal Unit. The offspring is The Daughter Unit (formerly The Infant Unit). Collectively they are The Units.
posted by Wet Spot at 6:13 PM on January 8, 2005

Response by poster: You people are so funny and totally insane... my kind of crowd.

bibliowench, thank you for unearthing my latent memory of being called "peanut butter" by my dad. He also used anklebiters and rugrats as collective endearments. My mother often calls us kids by each others' names, but not on purpose.

jessamyn, I hope you didn't mind being my Example. It's just that your "puppa" comment was, well, adorable.

Now I feel compelled to reveal that my childhood nicknames included both Nematode and Miss Nomer.
posted by naomi at 6:19 PM on January 8, 2005

The pre-wifey and I have a bunch. Berry is the one we use a lot, also Bear. More: Pookah and Pookah-bear, Pontoof, Pontoon, Toofie, Poofie, and also Stink-head and Stink-foot when appropriate.
posted by inviolable at 6:21 PM on January 8, 2005

I call her Penguin. She calls me Turtle. She's not the first to call me turtle, for some reason.
posted by atchafalaya at 6:55 PM on January 8, 2005

Klanging can be a sign of schizophrenia. Beware!
posted by rushmc at 8:35 PM on January 8, 2005

I used to call my daughter my binny nootkin, Shushuba, and Elena Bobena. Now she's usually Lena or when she's doing one of her little dramatic pouting sessions, Princess Poutypants. Sometimes I laugh when I call her that, then I feel like I'm being too mean.

I miss being called Betta or Beta by one of my long-ago ex-boyfriends. I kind of liked that name.

In high school yearbook, I was Bteh due to an unfortunate misspelling of my own name.
posted by beth at 9:44 PM on January 8, 2005

What sick-making nicknames do y'all call your spouses, partners and kids?

None. Ever.
posted by al_fresco at 11:05 PM on January 8, 2005

What sick-making nicknames do y'all call your spouses, partners and kids?

None. Ever.

…not that I'm against it or anything. Jus' sayin'…
posted by al_fresco at 11:06 PM on January 8, 2005

Sadly, I can't remember ever being called 'honey', 'sugar', 'muffin' or anything cutsey.

I do have a friend that calls me 'goof', so I call him 'doof' or 'doofus'.

Does that count as klanging?
posted by kamylyon at 11:26 PM on January 8, 2005

That seems sorta weird, to me, kamylyon, that you've never been called "honey" or anything like that. Here, let's date for thirty seconds: "Hey, sugarpie, you're the coolest of the cool! Let's get ice cream." Did that help? Ah, probably not.

My XSO called me her "grouchymonkey". With affection (I think).

I like "sweetie" a lot and have used it for my SOs and my (recently late) cat. And my two young girl cousins, 11 and 5. I'd been a little self-conscious of it all-the-sudden recently thinking to myself, "Gosh, I'm calling Samantha the same nickname that I call my cat."
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 2:19 AM on January 9, 2005

ugh i think i said i wasnt going to do this in the pets one, but now i have to.

bf: primarily and almost exclusively instead of his name - bean.

alternately and almost as frequently - munchkin, smallest munchkin, munchk, smallest, pickle, smallest pickle in the pickle jar.

hes tall and skinny and has an oblong head. not a midget as half of those names indicate.

and he calls me pooper for whatever reason he has deemed it nessesary.

fwiw, we are far from a mushy gooshy couple and try to keep these names away from the 3 other roommates. but i do oftentimes very straight-facedly call him bean or munchk in a quite stern and serious voice when i need to get a point across. in the same way your mom would use your full name while scolding. im lame lame lame.

my brothers speech impediment as a toddler made it impossible for him to pronounce my 'ss' filled name and therefore hed call me "our 'i'ter" (our sister) when hed recount things ive said to my mother he would say "our -iter -ed" (our sister said). yeah so i became Ed. and my mother still calls me that.

is this actually interesting to anyone? or do we just respond because we dont want to be left out of the party?
posted by c at 12:04 PM on January 9, 2005

The boy and I just call each other dear, semi-ironically when we're being couple-y. As in: "Did you remember your keys, dear?" "Yes, dear."

My dad used to call me "My little cauliflower" ("Mon petit chou-fleur" in English) and "Brenda, the great Walenda." (like the circus perfomfers).
posted by SoftRain at 8:02 PM on January 9, 2005

My dad used to call my brother and I "swine" and "punk" ... affectionately of course. My son sometimes calls his mom "sergeant" or the "fun police."
posted by terrier319 at 12:26 PM on January 14, 2005