Theresa wrote asking for help with a childhood rhyme that’s possibly of Russian or German origin: Greetings from WA State. My grandfather passed away years ago, and when I was a small girl, I remember him sitting little ones on his knee and bouncing them to a familiar sing-song.  I DO NOT have any idea what...

Elizabeth wrote asking for help with a Swedish song.  Here’s her note: My Swedish mother would sing a Swedish song to me as she bounced me on her knee. In Swedish it started out, "Mormor’s lilla lassa". Her English translation was: “Once there was a little boy and he wanted to go for a ride, but he...

Rida, Rida Ranka is a rhyme and song known to many in Scandinavia and to the families of Scandinavian immigrants in the US. Lance N. Peterson wrote to me of its significance to his family. (I added links below to the versions of Rida, rida ranka he talks about.) Dear Lisa: Words are what we...

Antonio wrote: Hi, I’m traveling through many sites trying to find an identifying word in Sicilian dialect to get the true words and the possible meaning of a little diddy my family was raised with. My grandparents came from Sortino, Sicily in 1912, and all my cousins and their children were placed face up on grammas lap, and...

Gloria wrote to me: Hi, my grandma (born in Eisleben in 1875, emigrating to the Midwest in 1902, married her second husband (my grandfather) in St. Paul, lived most of her life in Wisconsin with her third husband), recited a rhyme when dandling a baby on her extended foot, either with legs crossed at the...