Meaning & use
tootsy
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountableinformalhumorous
A foot, especially a small or delicate one, named in a cute, affectionate way.
Grammar: Countable and usually in the plural, since people have two: warm your tootsies.
Patterns
- warm your tootsies
Put your socks on, or your tootsies will freeze.
The baby wiggled her tiny tootsies in the air.
After the long hike, he soaked his tootsies in warm water.
Word forms
| plural | tootsies |
|---|
Common combinations
- cold tootsies
- Cold tootsies make it hard to fall asleep.
- warm your tootsies
- Come and warm your tootsies by the fire.
- little tootsies
- Her little tootsies poked out of the blanket.
- tickle someone's tootsies
- He tickled his sister's tootsies.
Synonyms and how they differ
- foot
- Foot is the neutral everyday word, while tootsy sounds playful and affectionate.
- toes
- Toes names only the end parts of the foot, though people sometimes use it for the whole foot in baby talk.
- piggies
- Piggies is baby talk for toes and is used for small children, more narrowly than tootsy.
Word family
Commonly confused: tootsy or tootsie?
tootsy vs tootsie
Tootsie is just a variant spelling, but it can also be an old-fashioned term for a woman, which tootsy does not mean.
Practice
Which sentence uses 'tootsies' in its everyday meaning?
Choose one answer.
Tootsies means feet in playful speech, so rubbing a baby's feet fits. The other sentences give it meanings it does not have.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “tootsy”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.