A Word, Please: Take this quiz before you invite the Mancinis for wassail

Every year as the holiday season approaches, this column offers tips on how to avoid the most common grammar mistakes on Christmas cards, emails and other holiday greetings. This year, instead of telling you how the rules work, let’s make it a quiz. See how many of the following questions you can get right.

1. We’re spending the holidays with the (a. Smiths, b. Smith’s, c. Smiths’).

2. We’re going to Joe (a. Smiths, b. Smith’s, c. Smiths’) house.

3. We’re going to the (a. Smiths, b. Smith’s, c. Smiths’) house.

4. Merry Christmas from the (a. Williamses, b. Williams’, c. William’s, d. Williams’s).

5. We’re going to the (a. Williamses, b. Williams’, c. Williamses’, d. Williams’s) house.

6. We’re spending Christmas with the (a. Chavez’, b. Chavez’s, c. Chavezes).

7. We’ve been invited to the (a. Chavez’, b. Chavez’s, c. Chavezes’) house.

8. I’m looking forward to spending time with all the (a. Mancinis, b. Mancinises, c. Mancini’s).

9. The (a. Berrys, b. Berries, c. Berry’s) are coming for dinner.

10. Wishing you (a. Happy, b. happy) holidays, a (a. Merry, b. merry) Christmas and a wonderful (a. new year, b. New Year.)

Answers:

1. a. “We’re spending the holidays with the Smiths.” The rule here: Never use an apostrophe to form a plural of a name. Just as one cat plus another cat make two cats, one Smith plus another Smith make two Smiths.

2. b. “We’re going to Joe Smith’s house.” In this case, there’s just one Smith, so it’s not plural. But we are talking about something he possesses, the house. So just as you would write about a single dog’s tail, you’d write about a single Smith’s house.

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3. c. “We’re going to the Smiths’ house.” This name is both plural and possessive. The rule here is to use just an apostrophe after the plural S: the horses’ owners, the Smiths’ house.

4. a. “Merry Christmas from the Williamses.” When you want to make a plural out of a name that ends with S, do as you do for words like “boss,” “dress” and “bias”: just add es to the singular. So just as you’d write bosses, dresses and biases, turn the singular Williams into the plural Williamses.

5. c. “We’re going to the Williamses’ house.” Plural possessives that end in S pose some of the biggest pitfalls for writing holiday greeting cards. Take it one step at a time: first, make the name plural, then add the possessive apostrophe after the plural S: the Williamses’ house. If it helps, think of all the bosses’ bonuses, all the dresses’ hems, or all the biases’ consequences.

6. c. “We’re spending Christmas with the Chavezes.” Names that end in Z, X, sh and ch form their plural the same way as generic words: add es. Don’t get flummoxed. You already know that one blintz plus another blintz equals two blintzes. Proper names are no different. One Chavez, two Chavezes. One Nash, two Nashes.

7. c. “We’ve been invited to the Chavezes’ house.” Hopefully, this is getting easier by now. Just make Chavez plural then add the apostrophe to make it possessive. The same holds true for the Nashes’ house.

8. a. “I’m looking forward to spending time with all the Mancinis. Names like Mancini that end in vowels can fool you because the I at the end of Mancini is pronounced “ee,” but when we add an S, it seems to change the vowel sound to create an “iss” pronunciation. Ignore your ear here. Just add S to names ending in vowels: the Chos, the Sununus, the Riccis.

9. a. “The Berrys are coming for dinner.” Proper nouns never change their spelling. So the Berrys may enjoy berries, but unlike the fruit, they don’t have an irregular plural.

10. b., b. and tossup. “ Wishing you happy holidays, a merry Christmas and a wonderful new year/New Year.” Neither “happy” nor “merry” is a proper noun, so it’s lowercase. “New Year” is a proper noun when you mean the holiday and lowercase when you mean a year that is new.

June Casagrande is the author of “The Joy of Syntax: A Simple Guide to All the Grammar You Know You Should Know.” She can be reached at [email protected].