kidding

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of kid.

   She wasn't kidding when she promised to finish the work by noon.

   We were just kidding around with each other at the party.

   Note

   One spelling carries two very different verbs. Most often it is the colloquial one. Kidding someone means deceiving them, usually as a joke, and kidding yourself means holding hopes that will not come true. Without an object it simply means joking, as in kidding around. The same form also serves the farmyard verb used of a goat giving birth, which the goat-birth noun names.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act of joking or teasing, especially in a lighthearted or playful way.

   Their constant kidding kept the long road trip from getting dull.

   What started as harmless kidding turned into a real argument.

   Similarteasing, joking, banter, ribbing, joshing

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The process of a female goat giving birth to one or more kids.

   The barn was prepared well before kidding began this season.

   Successful kidding depends on keeping the doe calm and warm.

   Note

   This is a herd-management and veterinary word, and unlike the teasing noun it is readily counted. Keepers speak of each kidding and of attended kiddings, where someone is present at the birth. Being there lets the owner take the newborn kids from their dams before they suckle and take in colostrum. The mother is the dam or doe, and her young are kids.

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