My best friend from high school had a daughter 3 weeks older than my son. When the kids were 2, the friend drove me to the doctor for a minor procedure.
I don’t remember this happening, but my friend used to tell the story to anyone who’d listen.
The kids were playng at our feet in the waiting room. Diana, had a picture book, saying things like, “See? Pretty. Oh Birdy.” My son’s picture book was of BIG animals. He was saying “Elephanant, Broncosaurus, Hippopopimus, Rhinocerosos” Not perfect, but it impressed my friend. ( the misspellings are to convey his pronounciation) Even so, neither were using full sentences, so friend’s competitive side wasn’t aroused too much.
That is, until I expressed my nervousness by saying “Oh, my hand doesn’t hurt anymore, let’s just go home.” Without looking up from what he was doing, my son said “Mother, don’t be ridiculous.”
ggurl, until your post I thought I had nothing to share. I have no children. But I am a Sunday School teacher, of 2nd and 3rd graders. Two years ago one of my second graders, a very bright girl, was looking really hard at a pib poster I had up of all the books of the Bible, in order. She was looking at the Old Testament side, and finally she said to me “Those name(of the prophets and so on), they’re almost all men!” I replied, “yes, in those days the men did most of the writing and history, and women weren’t thought to be as important as men”
Says my student “But that’s terrible!” and I replied, “it is, isn’t it?” All the while inside I was saying “Yes, yes, yes! Someone has been paying attention.”
What a great thread!
An exchange while driving home after picking my 5 yr old son up from kindergarten. As usual, NPR is on the radio.
Suddenly Charlie says, “Mom, They said Jerusalem. Jerusalem! That’s where Jesus died.”
Me: “Yeah, it is” (not really thinking about it)
C: “But mom they said Jerusalem!”
Me: “Yeah, I know…where Jesus died…” (again not really thinking about it)
C: “And apparently seven other people!” (in a very matter of fact voice)
Me: “What?!?” (what?!? as I hadn’t really been listening)
C: “Yeah, apparently seven other people died there too. They just said they died in Jerusalem.”
Me: “Umm, I didn’t know you really listened to the words on the radio.”
C: “Well, yeah” (as in ‘well, duh’)
Apparently the child is actually listening to NPR. I guess I’m doing something right.
That was just too funny… Thanks, great laugh for the morning!
I was putting my kids to bed a few weeks ago, when my daughter (9) told me that my son (4) was asking how he got into my tummy. I thought, “Oh, boy, already?” but I gave him an extremely simple explanation about a seed from Mama and a seed from Daddy, and so on. Afterwards, my daughter said, “Yeah, but he wanted to know who stuffed him up in there!” :eek:
I really did try not to laugh in front of him! 
If we are going to brag about the daughter, we have to throw one in about the son.
He’s four years old sitting in the back of my parents car when - out of the blue - he says.
“Grandpa, why do policemen like donuts so much?”
I have shared this one in the past, but reading these great posts reminds me of it all over again:
My then 2 1/2-year-old son got up early - about the same time I did. And he knew the difference between how I got dressed for work (business casual) vs. the weekend (shorts, typically).
So this one morning I am on my way out the door, when I hear this thump and running and I look up to the 2nd floor bannister to see my son coming out of his room and grabbing the bannister, looking down at me in the foyer like he’s in Kiddie Jail or something.
“Daddy - you CAN’T go to work!!”
“But, son, today is a work day and I have to go.”
(jumping up and down, clearly upset) “No - you can’t go to work, you can’t go to work!! Take off your PANTS!! TAKE OFF YOUR PANTS NOW DADDY!!!”
I just about died trying not to laugh, which would’ve upset him even more…
Just yesterday, my four-year-old followed me into the bathroom (as she often does), and I said to her “Mommy wants privacy for a few minutes, honey; you can go into your room or into my room or downstairs, but I just need some privacy” She said “okay”, but on the way past our set of shelves, turned and took down a pack of Kotex and handed them to me! When I looked surprised she said “aren’t those the right ones?” WTF?? All I did was ask for privacy for a moment, and the kid figures out that I have my period! It’s scary sometimes to think of what their little brains are absorbing.
One of the funniest things my son ever said…
I was at the computer, typing something. Middle child was about 5 at the time, and reading over my shoulder. Something I typed included the word “mocking” so she turned to my son, 6 and said… “Z, what does mocking mean?”
Z, without missing a single beat said, “Z, what does mocking mean?”
My daughter nodded knowingly and said “Ohhhhhh!”
Meanwhile, I’m staring at my son with my jaw on the floor, and promptly burst into laughter.
Oh and once, I was attempting to dye my hair at home. I had the cap on my head, and was sitting on the edge of the tub getting ready to rinse it out. My son walks in, takes one look at me, flashes me the thumbs up sign, and says “Love the hair, mom,” in a perfectly sarcastic voice. I lunged at him (playfully of course) and he tore out of the room squealing with laughter.
He’s a future SDMBer if I ever saw one.
As if the zombie-like stumble from lack of sleep, the peanut-butter and jelly stained work clothes, and the constant need to brag weren’t enough, I know I’m a father because my heart dropped to my stomach reading Bricker’s post. Noone ever told me that being a father meant that I would turn over the ability to rip my heart out with a simple look to a 3 year old. Your kid sounds like a keeper, Rick.
For me, it’s not the cute, funny things my kid says, there are plenty of those, it’s her jaw-dropping ability to make me well up at a moments notice. Our usual routine is that I drop her off at day-care in the morning, with a couple of hugs and kisses, and then she stands at the window and waves at me goodbye for the day. Well, last week, as I was hurrying off because I was running late to court, I told her to go to the window to wave at me. She looks up at me with the saddest look in her eyes and says: “My hands won’t wave because I miss you too much.”
God, I love her.
Ah.
A Persephone appreciation thread. 
When my daughter was little, she called ponytail holders “Hair Pretties.”
She still likes to combine words…calling our dog “Cutieful” and her new shoes “Comfeetable.”
We have a routine we still do at bedtime, and I have no idea how it started, but she’s 12 now, so I figure I have one or two more years before I get the :rolleyes: from her.
In our most snobby socialite voice, we say in unison, “Smooches!” Then we air-kiss each other’s cheeks. Then, in unison, it’s “Dahling! Let’s do lunch! Have your people call mah people.”
Then she runs off to bed.
The weepiest my son ever made me was the year I was going through the divorce. The ex told me he wanted a divorce just before Christmas, so my mood was anything but jolly. After Christmas vacation, my son brings home a bundle of papers from school from before the holiday. I found two letters:
*Dear Santa Claus: I want a Transformer. And for my mommy to feel better and not be sad so much. I tried to be a good boy. Thank you.
Dear Z: Hi, I am one of Santa’s elves, helping him answer his letters* [a fifth grader from the same school]. I am glad to hear you have been trying to be a good boy. Santa appreciates it very much. I’m sorry your mommy isn’t feeling well [man I’m crying just typing this] but I know she loves you, and she knows you love her. Give her lots of hugs and kisses. That will help her feel better. I will see what I can do about the Transformer.
Luckily, he had gotten a Transformer for Christmas. I wish I knew the kid who had written back. Good heart there
A few weeks ago, my 4 year old daughter was wearing her Snow White costume when I got home from work, and asked me to play with her. She told me I’d be Prince Charming. I asked who her 2 year old sister was, she replied “She’s Grumpy the dwarf.” Trying to be clever, I asked “Shouldn’t mommie be Grumpy?” (mommie was sitting on the couch at the time). My daughter replied “Oh no. Mommie is the evil witch.”
Two years ago, my fiance’s family and my family were at our house for Christmas Eve dinner. My nephew, JD, and my fiance’s nephew, JN, had only seen each other 3 times in their lives but they were best friends. It was time for Mr. Congo’s family to leave so my family could do our Christmas stuff. My future MIL told JN it was time to leave. JD looks up at her and says in all his 4 year old glory, “I’m sorry, JN and I are playing right now. We never get to see each other. You’ll have to come back for him later.”
Mr. Congo’s mother cracked up and told her daughter to get her own damn son, she wasn’t going to be responsible for breaking my nephew’s heart.
I don’t have kids of my own, but often babysit my nieces and nephews.
When my one nephew was around 2-3, I was watching him at my folks’ house. I had plans with a friend later that night, so around 30 minutes before I was supposed to leave, I began giving him advanced notice that <insert number of minutes here> we would have to stop playing because I was going to go have dinner with my friend.
He was not happy that I was leaving and kept asking me why I had to go. I explained that I made a “promise” to my friend, and it was important that I keep it, but that I loved playing with him and that we would play again sometime very soon.
After many attempts to try to convince me that I shouldn’t go with my friend, I thought he had given up. Suddenly, he comes down the stairs and from between the railings says to me, “No, you can’t go. You’re my baby.”
His sad little face, his almost desperate hope that that ploy would work… I almost called my friend and canceled.
My mother insists that this is a true story, though I have no memory of it. She had a hysterectomy due to cancer when I was just a baby, and for many years had a hormone replacement shot about once a month. When I was about four, I only knew that Mom went to get a shot every once in a while, and seemed to be in a better mood afterwards.
So one day, Mom and I have struggled with each other all day (I was the type of kid you didn’t turn you back on or I’d be out the door and two streets down, just exploring). As she was sending me to my room or otherwise chaistising me, I said, “You need to go get your shot and get in good mood!”
I also once kicked (really just a little tap) my Grandmother (Mom’s MIL) and later, when Mom was taking for me task for doing it, I said, “yeah, like you’ve never thought of doing it.”
I’m the reason I never had kids! 
My little one, Kizarvexilla, is currently five going on thirteen. She’s always been a few steps ahead of the crowd, I’m proud to say. At the tender age of two, she said to me “Daddy, when I’m big, I’ll drive, then YOU can sit in the baby seat!”
Due to my somewhat unorthodox linguistic background (lived in German and Italy, took French in high school, Greek and Latin in college, and hear Spanish spoken every day), my vocabulary includes words and phrases from all the heck over the place. Whenever I want Kizarvexilla to stop dawdling and move, I tell her schnell (German for “quickly”). She once looked up at me with an exasperated expression and said “I’m schnelling! I’m schnelling!”
Recently my five year old son was, for some odd reason, poking around my feet and noticed some dried skin. I told him I had “the athaletes foot”. He said, “I’ll pray for you but I want to do it in private.” (He goes to a daycare in a Baptist Church.) Then he crawled off on his knees and, get this, the next day my athletes foot was GONE.
My fave story;
Riding in the car with my brother, with his 5 year old in the back seat. This child has been raised pretty much without any religion. He pipes up from the back seat and asks my brother who Jesus is. My brother lauches into an explanation of ,
" Well, son , some people believe…" and tells him about the Virgin Birth, the wise men, the apostles, the crucifixation,the rising from the dead , etc. etc.
I hear my nephew, muttering to himself under his breath,
“That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard.”
