cuddling

Pluralcuddlings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of cuddle.

   The couple spent the rainy afternoon cuddling on the couch under a blanket.

   The nurse paced the hallway, cuddling the crying newborn until he fell asleep.

   Note

   Which meaning the form carries depends on where you are. American couples cuddling are lying snugly together; in Britain, cuddling someone can simply mean hugging them warmly, the way family and close friends do. Cuddling a baby, holding it close for comfort, is common ground. Like any -ing form, it follows be in progressive tenses: they were cuddling.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act of holding someone close in a warm, affectionate embrace.

   All that cuddling on the couch meant the movie went mostly unwatched.

   The baby's first weeks were a blur of feedings, diaper changes and late-night cuddling.

   Similarhugging, snuggling, embracing

   Note

   The noun works two ways. Uncountable, it names the activity in general (all that cuddling); countable, it names separate occasions. That is how Lucy Montgomery's Rainbow Valley (1919) can give a motherless girl precious memories of “twilight cuddlings and morning frolics”. For a single embrace, the shorter noun cuddle is the everyday choice: a cuddle, not a cuddling.

Showing meanings only. Show all 2