Lucky Lemons, Lovely Limes: An L Tongue Twister

Lucky lemons and lovely limes will lie still is a twister that trains the L sound at the start and the end of words.

Lucky lemons and lovely limes will lie still.

Seven of the eight words contain an L. If you swap L for R, lime turns into rhyme.

👅 Sounds to Practise

L at the start, as in lucky, lemons, lovely, limes and lie. The tip of the tongue touches the ridge behind the top teeth, and the sound is light.
L at the end, as in will and still. The tongue tip still touches the ridge, but the back of the tongue pulls back and down. The L sounds darker and deeper.

Quick test: say light, then tell. Feel how the L changes.

Say each chunk slowly.

Lucky lemons
and lovely limes
will lie still.

Say it at a natural pace, with the stressed syllables in capitals:

LUCKy LEMons and LOVEly LIMES will LIE STILL.

Say it three times in a row, as fast as you can:

Lucky lemons and lovely limes will lie still.

If it falls apart, that is normal. Slow down and try again. Keep the tongue tip on the ridge for every L.

The tongue touches the same spot again and again, and the L is a different sound at the end of words.

lucky / lemons / lovely / limes / will / still

Five words start with L, so the tongue tip keeps tapping the same place.
Will and still end with L, so the tongue must touch again at the very end.
Lovely has two L sounds close together, one at the start and one in the middle.

These pairs change when L becomes R:

The last pair is interesting. Rhyme has a silent H, which you can read about in Why Is "Rhyme" Spelled With an RH and a Y?.

Say each pair slowly. The tongue touches the ridge for L, and stays back for R.

Bonus round: if you survived all three, try this one:

Lily licked a little lemon lolly.