December 2015 – Kitto Club

Expand Your Vocabulary: Clothing 1

Clothing 1 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Clothing 1 contains these words:
beanie, leggings, fleece, slippers, bow tie, bobble hat, suit, scarf

beanie – What’s the difference between a beanie and a bobble hat? A bobble hat has a bobble or pompon on the end – and traditionally, they’re knitted. Even more traditionally, your bobble hat was knitted for you by your grandmother or your aunt – but that probably doesn’t happen much now.
The other difference used to be that beanies are cool, but bobble hats are very uncool. Recently, however, bobble hats have become a fashion item.

Leggings– These are thick covering for your legs; they stop at the ankle and they don’t cover your feet. Most frequently they’re black, but they can be coloured or patterned too.

Leggings are similar to tights, but tights are thinner, and they cover your feet too. Leggings and tights are mainly for women, but men wear them for sports too.

A fleece is a casual jacket made of thick synthetic material. This material is usually made from recycled plastic bottles.

Slippers are shoes for wearing inside the house. Usually they cover the toes, but often the slippers you are given in hotels don’t cover the toes.

A bow tie is an alternative to the more common tie; most people nowadays used ready-made bow ties, but traditional bow ties are just one long piece of material which you tie yourself.

Bobble hat (also called a pompom hat ) is a knitted hat for cold weather, similar to a beanie.

A suit can be a two-piece suit (jacket and trousers) or a three-piece suit (jacket, trousers and waistcoat). All the pieces of a suit are made from matching material. A waistcoat is British English; in American English it’s called a vest.

A scarf keeps you warm in cold weather; usually they are long and not very wide, but the Arabic keffiyeh has become a feature of western fashion recently.

Expand Your Vocabulary: Christmas decorations 1

Christmas decorations 1 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Christmas decorations 1 contains these words:
Christmas tree, bauble, tinsel, mistletoe, holly, manger, Christmas crackers

A few points about some of the words:

Christmas tree – that probably doesn’t need any explanation, but remember there are two types: natural ones and artificial ones

bauble – in British English, this is a decoration, usually round, made of glass; in American English, they are just called glass ornaments

tinsel – this is the shiny metallic-looking stuff that people put around the Christmas tree

mistletoe – this is used to decorate inside the house; it’s a strange plant that grows on trees and has white berries at Christmas time

holly – a tree with dark green leaves with sharp points, and bright red berries; the branches are used to decorate inside the house.

snowman – probably no explanation needed; traditionally snowmen had two pieces of coal for eyes, a carrot for a nose and an old hat – but it’s difficult to find coal anywhere nowadays.

manger – also called manger scene, nativity scene or creche; it’s a model of the manger where Jesus was born, with Mary, Joseph, angels, and shepherds; the baby Jesus is usually added at midnight on Christmas Eve, and the three wise men on 6th January

Christmas crackers – a traditional part of Christmas dinner in England: during the meal, pairs of guests pull the two ends of the cracker, which split with a small bang. Inside each cracker, there is a paper hat, a joke and a simple toy, game or knick-knack. Crackers are not used in the United States.

Expand Your Vocabulary: Clothing accessories 1

(This post is about the Clothing accessories 1 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Clothing accessories 1 contains these verbs:
wallet, hanger, cufflinks, hairband, handbag, handkerchief, glasses, sunglasses

wallet – for keeping banknotes and credit cards. In American English, this is a billfold. In British English, men use a wallet and women use a purse. However, in American English a purse is a handbag.

hanger – to put your jackets, shirts etc on when you hang them in the wardrobe.

cufflinks – the end of a shirt sleeve at the wrist is a cuff; so cufflinks link (join) the two ends of the cuff.

hairband – in Am. Eng. this is a barrette. If it’s made of cloth, it’s called an alice band in both types of English.

handbag – in Am. Eng., a purse.

handkerchief – well, most people use tissues nowadays, but some people (like me) prefer handkerchieves (not the plural). A silk handkerchief which men put in the pocket of their jacket is usually called a pocket square now.

glasses – sometimes called spectacles – but that’s a bit old-fashioned.

sunglasses – in informal English, shades; in Australian English, sunnies

Expand Your Vocabulary: Cooking verbs 1

(This post is about the Cooking verbs 1 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Cooking verbs 1 contains these verbs:
bake, slice, chop, boil, add, pour, spread, grate

bake – to cook cakes, biscuits and pies in an oven
slice – to cut into thin sections – in the picture, someone is slicing the bread, or cutting the bread into slices
chop – to cut into small squares or small irregular shapes
boil – to cook in boiling water
add – to include in a mixture
pour – to transfer a liquid from a jug or glass into another container
spread – to make a thin cover of butter, jam, mustard etc
grate – to change a block of cheese etc into small strips

Expand Your Vocabulary: Fruit 2

(This post is about the Fruit 2 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Fruit 2 contains this fruit:
plum, prickly pear, pomegranate, peach, grapefruit, cherry, fig, watermelon

Probably most of these types of fruit are familiar, but let’s use some less-familiar words to talk about them

plum – in case you’ve never eaten a Victoria plum, a ripe English Victoria plum picked straight from the tree in August is, in my opinion, the most delicious fruit in the world. No other type of plum comes near it. All types of plum have a large stone in the middle.

prickly pear – watch out for the nasty spines on these! They have a very thick skin and there are lots of seeds inside.

pomegranate -another fruit with a very thick skin and lots of seeds

peach – a delicious fruit with a very soft skin and a big stone which is often called a pit. The problem with peaches is that they are often bruised.

grapefruit – a citrus fruit (like oranges, lemons and limes) but it’s quite sour. It has a lot of pips inside.

cherry – a delicious fruit with a large stone inside it.

fig – a very soft fruit which some people prefer dried.

watermelon – a beautiful fruit with watery, refreshing pulp that has lots of little black seeds.

So, a stone, a seed, a pit and a pip are all different types of seed in a fruit. When do we use each one? People use them in different ways, but generally:
A stone is big and very hard
A pit is just for peaches and olives (but it can be called a stone too)
A pip is for the seed of citrus fruits, grapes and apples
A seed is for more or less all other fruits

Expand Your Vocabulary: Fruit 1

fruit 1 jpg

(This post is about the Fruit 1 vocabulary flashcards on Kitto_Cards at www. quizlet.com)

Fruit 1 contains this fruit:
raspberry, blackberry, mango, lime, blackcurrant, redcurrant, lychee, kiwi

Some of the fruit in this vocabulary set might not be familiar. I put in some extra fruit-related words in the notes too.

Raspberry, blackberry, blackcurrant and redcurrant are soft fruits from the more northern countries of the Northern Hemisphere. They’re delicious for breakfast or in puddings and fruit salads.

Blackcurrants are one of my favourite soft fruits, blackberries my second favourite and raspberries my third favourite. Redcurrants? Well, I get a huge crop of redcurrants each year from the bush in the garden, and it’s rather difficult to use them up. They have a very sharp flavour – not to everyone’s taste.

Lychees are from China; inside the hard red shell, they have white flesh and a powerful scent.

A mango is a delicious yellow tropical fruit with a very scented taste.

A lime is similar to a lemon, but it’s green, a bit less sour than a lemon, and with a different flavour.

Kiwi fruit originally come from New Zealand. They have a furry skin which you have to peel.