Katie-isms Post #5

When I woke up my daughter this morning for school she was in a panic.  She had had a REALLY scary dream and was anxious to tell me all about it. 
"Mom, I had this terrible dream. It was SO scary.  I got so much candy for Halloween!  I got so much that it filled up my entire room!   I couldn't have sheets or covers on my bed -- I was just covered in candy!  And I ate so much candy that I blew up to be HUGE!  And then I exploded because I ate so much candy and I died!"

"Wow," I said calmly, "that's a pretty scary dream.  Does that mean you don't want to go trick-or-treating to get candy this year?"
She swung her legs out of bed and stood up, suddenly completely fine without missing a beat.  "Ya right! (she rolls her eyes at me) I'm totally gonna go."

Mr. Fredricksen

My youngest son, age 4, has changed his name to "Mr. Fredricksen" (he got it from the movie, "UP")...so for the last week and a half, instead of calling him Josh, we call him Mr. Fredricksen.  In fact, he even refers to himself as Mr. Fredricksen...so he will correct me if I make a mistake and call him by his given name.  This makes me laugh, partly because when I was pregnant with Mr. Fredricksen, my daughter (age 4 at the time) wanted me to name him Mr. Whiskers. :)

So, Mr, Fredricksen gave me a present for my birthday last weekend.  He had wrapped the gift in beautiful green leaves and pink flowers he had found in the front yard.  I opened it slowly...wondering what treasure he could have found for me.  Inside, I found a cat food coupon for 50 cents off Whisker Lickin's.  Stifling my giggles, I thanked him immensely and told him how much I loved and appreciated the gift.  Mr. Fredricksen just shrugged his shoulders like it was no big deal as he walked away and responded, "I found it in the garage."

Katie-isms Post #4

This actually happened a few months ago but I've been so bad about writing these things down in my blog I wanted to do it before I forgot.  If you don't already know this about my daughter, she is the queen of random.

While riding in the car one day, Katie asks me, "Mom, how big can hail get?"

"I'm not sure of the record," I tell her, "but I've heard about hail the size of golf balls and baseballs..."

She is silent a moment. Pondering. Then she asks, "Could hail get bigger than a can of yams?"

"Katie-isms" - Post #3

In my car, Katie points to a weird little button next to the dashboard.

"What is that button for, Mom?" she asks.

"I actually have no idea," I admit.

She looks at me with knowing smile and says matter-of-factly, "I think it's for a parachute."

"Katie-isms" - Post #2

Sitting around the house last weekend, Katie suddenly asks my husband,

"Dad, did you have a skateboard when you were younger?"

"Nope, I didn't," he responded.

"Oh," Katie replied a little sadly, as if she felt sorry for him. "Had they not invented skateboards yet back when you were a kid?"

"Katie-isms" Post #1

My daughter, age 8, is the queen of saying random things that crack me up. Sometimes you just have to wonder where she comes up with the stuff she thinks of. So, in honor of Miss Kate, I have decided to start a new topic for my blog where all of her randomness can just bask in all its glory...I like to call these "Katie-isms"

Yesterday, while riding in the car, Katie asks me from the backseat, "Mom, if just your HAND got ran over by a car, would you be dead?"

Bewildered, I answered, "Um, no...probably not. Why?"

She shakes her head, as if trying to erase the image in her mind and shrugs,
"Just wondering."

Aliens

Katie had her parent/teacher conferences this week and at this time of year the students do a self-evaluation and actually lead the conference themselves. It is a time for the kids to shine, and shine they do. During part of the conference, my daughter was showing us a sheet where she was told to reflect on her own work ethic and mark how strong she thought she was in each of the study skill areas. I noticed that she had ranked herself “Very Strong” in almost all of the categories which included things like “ability to focus and concentrate in class,” “ability to work independently,” and “ability to keep on-task” …things of that nature. Then I happened to notice a drawing off to the side, in the right-hand margin of her page.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to the creatures drawn on the side of her work.
She answered nonchalantly, “Oh that? Those are aliens. I drew them 'cuz I got bored.”

My funny little pal

My youngest son, Joshua - age 2-1/2, cracks me up constantly, all day long. The kid is a HOOT, a natural comedian without even trying. The last couple of days have been no exception.

On Sunday we went to church and it was his first time to Sunday School in his "big boy pants"...no more diapers for my little man, (WOO HOOO!) Before we left the house I made a comment that I wanted to be sure and bring an extra pair of undies for him, just in case. He must have heard me say that because when I took him to the restroom at church later that morning, he had not one, but TWO pairs of underwear on under his jeans. Hey, I said he needed an extra pair, right? Apparently he thought he needed to WEAR the extra pair...:)

Yesterday I had the day off work so I took Josh to the zoo. On our way we stopped at Starbucks for coffee (for me) and hot chocolate (for him) and he picked out a little snack bag of nuts and dried fruit to eat in the car. I'm driving along and he is eating his snack, when suddenly he says, "Mommy! I have a strawberry in my nose!" I quickly adjusted the rear view mirror to look at him and sure enough, I can see he has lodged something in his left nostril. He is poking around at it and I say, "Joshy! Why did you stick something in your nose?! Don't touch it! Mommy will have to get it out when we stop the car!" All I could imagine was having to take this child to the ER with some sort of dried berry stuck in his nose (it turned out to be a dried blueberry, by the way, not a strawberry). He says, matter-of-factly, "I put it in my nose for the Oogie-Boogie Man." Um, okay...
Fortunately I was able to retrieve the fruit from his nose without a trip to urgent care.

At the end of our zoo trip, when we were back in the car I said, "I had fun with you at the zoo, Joshy...thank you so much for being my pal today."
Josh: "Huh?"
Me: "Thank you for being my pal today"
Josh: "Huh?"
Me: "Thank you for being my pal today"
Josh: "Huh?"
Me: "Thank you for being my BUDDY today."
Josh: "I'm not your buddy or your pal. I'm your baby."

Yes, yes you are, my love:)

Who is the parent and who is the child?

Saw the grossest, biggest, longest, fattest, crawliest, scrunchiest earthworm on the sidewalk today. "EEEEEEEEW," I totally grossed out as I almost accidentally stepped on the nasty thing. "Disgusting!!" I shriek.

"Mom," says Katie calmly, "worms are important, helpful creatures. They make our plants and soil healthy."

Thanks for the reminder, Kate.:)

King of Pop

I am a huge Michael Jackson fan. There, I said it. I don't know if I should categorize this blog under "confessions" or "random conversations with my kids"...maybe I will do both. Anyhoo - I own the Michael Jackson "Essential" Collection, which is basically a collection of all of his music, from the days of the Jackson Five, up through his latest recordings for the "This is It" movie. It is an amazing group of CDs with a TON of great music and I listen to it all the time in the car. My two older kids love it too and they know which songs are on what disks, so when we get in the car to head to school in the morning they take turns telling me which song they want to hear. Sometimes it is something from Michael's little boy days, sometimes it is from my growing up days - the 80's, and sometimes it is something more recent. The point is, there are a lot of choices and amazing variety.

So, in the car this morning, Zach's choice was "Billie Jean." He loves the beat. Soon after the song started though, Katie asked me to turn it down for a second so she could tell me something.

"I think I know why Michael Jackson had to take all those sleeping pills and why he died," Katie says seriously. "It's because he had so many songs stuck in his head!"

"Yeah," Zach agreed, solemnly. "He probably had a migraine."

Bird is the word

This morning as we were leaving for school, the kids and I found a GYNORMOUS feather from some sort of bird on our front porch.

"What kind of bird do you think it's from??" we all wondered.

"I think it's from a hawk," Zach said matter-of-factly.

"I don't know, it's pretty big. Maybe it's from a pterodactyl!" I offered with a grin, to see what they would say.

"Mom," Zach retorted, rolling his eyes. "Pterodactyls don't have feathers."

Silly me.

Do as I say, not as I do - Example #1

We all have these moments as parents (I hope more people do than just me!) where we say something and then our kids repeat it...or have something to say about what we just said...and then we (sort of) regret saying it.

First case scenerio: We are doing "MadLibs" in the car tonight.

Katie, age (almost) 8, says, "Mom, what is a plural noun?"

Me: "Well, a noun is a person, place or thing. And a plural noun is, like, more than one of those. So, instead of a "butt" it would be "butts." I giggle. (Am I five years old?)

My son, Zach, age 9, in a disgusted voice says, "Mom, that was inappropriate."

Geez, tough crowd.

Don't worry, there will be a lot more of these...I tend to have a potty mouth. Good thing my kids are there to keep me in line.