Conversation stopper

In the middle of dinner tonight, Benjamin dropped this non sequitur: "But seriously, I'm a spoon."

He laughed really hard at our confused expressions.

Revenge

For the full year that Rachel had to sit in a rear-facing car seat, Elisa would reach over with her foot and kick her. Now they are both in forward-facing car seats and Lisy has stopped kicking her sister.

Today Elisa fell asleep in her car seat. I heard a strange thumping noise coming from behind me. When I looked back to investigate, I started laughing. Rachel had taken off her shoe and was using it to hit the sleeping Lisy in the head!

Lisy didn't wake up until we got home, and Rachel was pleased as punch until I took away her shoe.

Children and pregnancy

I enjoy listening to my children's comments about my current pregnancy.

Samuel:

I tend to get a bit emotional when I'm pregnant. One day Samuel bore the brunt of my needless anger. I apologized profusely, then I explained that pregnancy hormones make me a little crazy. I also told him that it would be alright if he told me to go take a nap, which he does sometimes. About a week after that first incident, I started ranting and raving during dinner (Dominic was at work - he is good at helping me calm down). I stopped myself, then apologized to the children (I apologize a lot when I'm pregnant). Samuel looked at me and said, "lt's ok, Mom. It's because of all those hormones."

He says he has sympathetic memory loss.

Samuel was lamenting to Dominic, "I want to eat ramen noodles, but Mom's pregnant, and they make her nauseous."

This morning Samuel asked why boys can't have babies. So I told him it's because boys don't have the right parts, only girls do. He was very sad. Dominic said that the ability to stand up to pee makes up for it.

Benjamin:

Before I made the announcement to the kids, Benjamin, who is fairly observant for a 5-year-old, asked if I was sick. Yes: morning sickness, the 9-month flu.

When Benjamin found out that the baby could hear because the ears had developed, he immediately started growling at my belly. "I want the baby to come out growling," he said. The annoying part is when he growls at my belly in public. He thinks it's hilarious.

I get clumsy and drop things a lot when I'm pregnant. The other day I dropped the pot of spaghetti sauce, and it splashed all over the kitchen. I made the boys help me clean it up. Benjamin was very happy to help. When I commented on his good attitude, he said he didn't mind, because he's a boy. Wait, what? Then he explained that because he is a boy, he won't ever get pregnant and drop things all the time, so he doesn't mind helping me now.

Elisa:

She's happy and excited, though I'm not sure how much she understands. However, if someone asks, then she tells them, "Mommy has a baby in her belly." I guess she understands enough.

Rachel:

Rachel wants to be like her big siblings, and so she growls at me, too. She doesn't fully understand the concept of growling at the baby in my belly, because she growls where she can reach - at my legs.

I get pregnancy-related headaches. One morning Rachel heard me say "Ow," as I held my head. A couple of hours later, she came up to me and said, "ow." "What's wrong, honey? Where does it hurt?" She climbed into my lap and pointed at my head, then she gave me a hug.

Ladies' man, part 2

Samuel likes Natalia, the girl who sits next to him in class. He told me the other day how she is so pretty that he can't think straight and that sometimes he has a hard time concentrating on his work. Then he showed me that day's assignment - he had colored it red so Natalia would like it.

I didn't realize that kind of behavior started so young.

And then there is Benjamin. First of all, Benjamin is always lamenting about how he doesn't know who to marry. "That's OK," I assure him, "you probably won't meet her for another 10 - 20 years." Then he calms down. He doesn't usually talk about individual girls, though.

Today he came home from school talking about how much fun he had in gym class. They were playing tag, and he was the tagger. He had fun because he kept tagging the same 2 girls. Why did he keep tagging those girls?

"Oh Mom, they are both as beautiful as each other." Then he gave me a happy, smug smile.

Oh boy. Not him, too.

Ladies' man

The boys ride the bus to and from school. Benjamin, a kindergartener, has to sit in the front seat. Samuel usually sits with him. Samuel has a few friends on the bus, including Rebecca from church and Kenia from school, but the girls don't know each other.

As they were getting on the bus one morning, Benjamin saw Kenia and told Samuel that he could go sit with her instead of him.

"I started going over to sit with Kenia, but then Rebecca caught my eye," Samuel said with a twinkle in his eye and a smile, "so I sat with her instead."

I fear the time he is 16 and not just 6.

The onion

There is a town nearby that has a lot of onion farms. It is now harvest season. As we drove through the onion fields the other day, we saw quite a few onions by the side of the road, having obviously fallen off the trucks. Dominic commented that we could collect all those onions and fill up a bag.

Then from the back seat Lisy said, "I need an onion."

"Oh? What would you do with an onion?" asked Dominic.

In her sweet little voice she replied, "I will pick it up, and I will eat it, and it will be yucky (said in a disgusted voice), and I will throw it away!" she ended happily.

Dominic drives through those same fields on his commute, so when he could, he pulled over and picked one up for her. She was thrilled when she saw her onion. It was just what she wanted. I sliced off a piece and gave some to her, Rachel and Benjamin to try. Poor kids, they started out so eager as they each took a bite and then were so grossed out.

"She was right," noted Dominic."She knew exactly what would happen."

However, Lisy did not want to throw away her onion. I put it in a plastic bag for her, and she carried it around for the rest of the day.