Breakfast Conversations

This morning we had a typical breakfast. It was so funny that I kept thinking we should have been recording it somehow. And this is how.

Dominic heard the cat meowing at the door and told Benjamin to let her in. He complied while complaining, "But I don't want my milk to get soggy."

One of Lisy's birthday presents was a baking set with an oven mitt. Samuel was playing with it, and Lisy was trying to get it back. Benjamin took her side and said, "Hey, that's Lisy's oven mint!"

Lisy spilled some milk, like usual, and this time she tried picking it up with her fingers to put it back in her cereal bowl.

Lisy has a singing birthday card that goes something like, "Every girl can beee a princess..." and she plays it all the time. Dominic sang along but altered the words slightly: "Every girl can beee an aardvark." We all laughed. Then Samuel sang his unique version: "Every girl can beee a princess, if she eats an aardvark." Dominic was so proud of him.

And finally, as we were clearing off the table, I noticed a spot on Benjamin's t-shirt. "What's that on your shirt? You just put it on. It can't be dirty already."
Benjamin: "Well, it happened when I wiped up my spilled milk."
Me, trying to clarify the situation: "You used your shirt to wipe up the table?"
Benjamin: "Heheh, yeah."

I love our family meal times.

Lisy sayings

Lisy is such a girl, but she also has older brothers. She is so used to hearing her brothers talk about Batman that she has a hard time adjusting to new superheroes. One day the boys were playing Spiderman, and Lisy kept calling him Spiderbatman. They could not convince her to take out bat.

She recently received hand-me-down Batman pajamas. When Dominic saw her playing by herself, he asked her what she was doing. Lisy has a high-pitched voice, and yet in her lowest voice possible, she glowered and replied, "I'm Batman." No matter how much we correct her, she is not Bat Girl.

Lisy enjoys the t.v. show Ben Ten (check out the wikipedia link, or you might not understand this paragraph.) Whenever I wear my watch, she constantly hits it and tells me that I'm different aliens. One day she got a hold of her brother's omnitrix, and she would hit it, make all the appropriate sound effects, and pretend to be the various aliens. She was pretty good, too. Even if I couldn't understand what she was saying, I could still determine the correct alien by the way she talked.

All the kids have a favorite Beatles' song. Benjamin prefers "I Want to Hold Your Hand." Samuel and Lisy both really like "Yellow Submarine." I think it's adorable when Lisy goes around singing, "we aw yive in a yeyow submawine!"

If the cat goes somewhere it isn't supposed to be, Lisy likes to helpfully shoo the cat away with, "Soo! Soo!"

I'm a little teapot

First verse:
I'm a little teapot short and stout
Here is my handle (put a hand on your hip)
and here is my spout (stick out your other hand)
When I get all steamed up, hear me shout
Tip me over (lean over at the waist)
and pour me out!

Second verse:
I'm a little teapot short and stout
Here is my handle (put a hand on your hip)
and here is my ... (put other hand on other hip, then look down in surprise)
Oops, I'm a little sugar bowl!

Benjamin's verse this afternoon:
I'm a little sugar bowl short and stout
Here is my handle (put hand on hip)
and here is my other handle (he stuck out his other hand)
Oops, I'm a little teapot!

I can explain ...

The kids were downstairs first this morning, as usual. When Dominic and I came down, we heard the cat meowing at the door to come inside. Dominic let her in.

Samuel said defensively, "I told Benjamin to let her in, but he didn't even get up." He constantly delegates things to his servants, also known as his younger siblings.

Benjamin piped up, "I did get up! I got myself a granola bar." Well, since you put it that way, I guess there was no harm done.

Overheard

This morning I overheard the kids playing:

"It was Grandma! She's evil," said Samuel.

"That would explain what happened to poor Grandpa!" said Benjamin.

I never did find out what they were playing. More importantly, what happened to "poor Grandpa?"

Did she think she was helping?

Lisy was sad. She came over and sat next to me and cried. At almost 3-years-old, Lisy cries about a lot of things.

Rachel was nearby. She picked up a toy and held it over Lisy's head. I gently moved the toy away so that if it fell, it wouldn't land on Lisy. We did this several more times. Rachel holding up the toy, and me gently swatting it away.

After a while Lisy felt better and stopped fussing. While I was distracted and talking to Lisy, Rachel snuck in one more attempt, this time succeeding. She dropped the hard plastic toy directly on Lisy's head. Luckily Lisy felt better and barely noticed. Rachel, happy with her successful drop, turned away.

If only Rachel could talk. I want to know what she thought she was doing, and why she did it. Unfortunately no one can explain the mind of a baby.

The force is strong with us

During meals, our kids will sometimes reach out their hands and make a fist. The person across the table from them will act as if they are choking. The force choke is common in every household, isn't it?

This evening the children took it a step further. They would wave their hands in an attempt to do the Jedi mind trick. Then Dominic got in on the action. When someone would start the Jedi mind trick, he would do the force choke in their direction, and they would abruptly stop talking and make choking noises.

At one point Samuel looked at me, waved his hand, and said, "you want to give me more potatoes."

To which I replied, "I'm your mom. Jedi mind tricks don't work on me."

Dominic waved his hand at Samuel. "You want to ask politely."

Samuel, laughing almost too much to speak intelligibly, sheepishly asked, "Mom, can I please have more?"

"Sure. Just remember that we're older, more experienced, and stronger in the force," I answered.

There was definitely more laughing than eating going on here tonight.

Rachel, back in January.

an order of meat with a side of meat

For dinner we had hamburgers and hot dogs. There were enough hot dogs for everyone to have one, but not two. Benjamin quickly ate up his hot dog and wanted more.

Dominic said, "You can have a hamburger. What do you want on it?"

"Half a hot dog," Benjamin instantly replied.

Blow darts

Yesterday morning we drove around looking at yard sales and listening to NPR's "Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me!" We heard a funny story about an elderly woman who was arrested for shooting blow darts at people walking past her house. When asked why she did it, she said she liked to hear people say "Ow!"

Thus began a very silly game of all the boys (including my husband) pretending to blow darts at each other and lots of "ow's" abounding. At one point Samuel kept "shooting" darts at Benjamin, who was getting very frustrated. In a commanding voice Dominic yelled back, "Let Benjamin shoot darts at you!"

I started laughing hysterically. Dominic just looked at me and sighed, "Oh, that's gonna go on the blog."

~~~

Oh, it gets better. Today on the way home from church the boys started "shooting" darts again, which made Rachel laugh. The "shooting" didn't last long, and Rachel began to fuss. Ever the helpful dad, Dominic called out, "You need to start shooting darts at Rachel again to make her laugh!" They did, and she did :)