Liam: “Are you sleepy Frances?”

Frances: “No. I just tired.”

———————–

Nora: “Daddy. In how many months is Mommy’s birthday?”

Liam: “Four. What do you think we should get Mommy for her birthday?”

Nora: “Mommy? What is your most favorite thing to play with? Ever?”

Me: (thinking…)

Frances: (interjecting) “Eyebrows!”

Me: Umm. What?!

Nora: “Oh! I’ve got a great idea! A jack-in-the-box!”

Apparently my kids do not know me at all.

———————–

And, a day just wouldn’t be complete without a question or two about God and/or Heaven.

Nora: “Mama? Does God have a million eyes?”

Me: “I’m not sure. Why?”

Nora: “Because that’s how he can see everyone all the time.”

Me: “Oh. Well, maybe.”

—–

Nora: “Mom? How did God make the first baby, like ever, without a mom or something like that?”

Me: “I don’t know, Nora. But that’s a really great question.”

—–

Nora: “You wanna know my favorite place in the whole world?”

Me: “Huh?”

Nora: “Heaven. Because Daddy said you can get all the chocolate ice cream and cake you ever want when you get there.”

Me: “Yep.” (gulp!)

—–

And finally:

Nora: “Was God ever a baby?”

Me: “No, I don’t think so.”

Nora: “I think he was. Like a long time ago. Before he made the dinosaurs and all that stuff.”

———————–

Nora: “Mom? You know what I wanna be when I grow up?”

Me: “What’s that, honey?”

Nora: “A doctor. So I can take care of people when they’re sick.”

Me: “Well. That would be great.”

Frances: “When I be a grown up I wanna cut fruit.”

Me: “OK.” (pause) “Well, that would be great too!”

Heaven help us.

Loony and Toony at a recent trip to a local state park.

Silly friends one minute. Sibling rivals the next!

Nora: “Mom? Do you ever laugh?”

Me: “Ummm…yes.”

Nora: “When?”

She must’ve caught me on a bad day.

                         —————-

Nora: (singing a song to remember the days of the week) “Sunday, Monday…”

Frances: (cuts in) “Tuesday…Threes-day, Fours-day!”

So not right. But I love how she’s trying to apply what she knows. Ha! She’s a comedic genius already. And not even three years old!

                         —————-

The girls are super used to me being silly and speaking utter nonsense. That’s why I wanted to highlight the below conversation between Frances and me, since–without missing a beat–she replied to me in the same silly manner in which she was asked about the contents of her diaper.

Me: “Frances, you have any poopers in there?”

Frances: “No. Just peepers.”

                         —————-

Me: “I only got four munchkins. So, Nora, that’s two for you and two for Frances.”

Nora: (slyly) “Or, mama. It could be three for me and one for Frances.”

Me: “Yes, it could be. But it’s not.”

Nora: (giggles)

My budding mathematician.

                         —————-

Nora: “Mama. Know what I wanna be for Halloween?”

Me: “No. What?”

Nora: “A princess.”

Frances: “Know what I be, mama?”

Me: “What, Franny?”

Frances: “Goo-goo ga-ga head.”

Nora and Me: (hysterical laughter)

Always with the goo-goo ga-ga head, that one.

Nora: (upon waking one morning last week) “You know that everybody dreams?”

Liam: “Uh-huh.”

Nora: “Well, everybody except for Santa and God. Because they don’t sleep, right?”

Liam: “Right.”

———————————

Our washing machine has been a bit wonky lately, so this past week I took the kids to my parents’ house so I could get some laundry done. My sister’s cats reside (mostly) in the laundry room there.

Me: (enthusiastically) “Frances, want to come with me to do laundry? We can see Titi Liz’s cats!”

Frances: (grumpily) “Me no like Titi’s cats.”

Me: (admittedly) “Me no like them either.”

———————————

And Frances, on a similar monologue rant of all the things which she does not like, while she was watching me make guacamole.

Frances: “Me no like awacado. Me no like uh-mato, Me no like onion or gar-lit. Was dat?”

Me: “Lime.”

Frances: “Me no like nime.”

Me: “What do you like?”

Frances: “Me like chips. An cookies. An ice-peem!”

Trying to keep it healthy here, folks!

———————————

Nora: “Mommy, when do you have to go back to work?”

Me: “August sometime.”

Nora: (disappointed) “Awww.”

Me: (thinking: ‘This is so sweet. She wants me to be a stay-at-home-mom forever.’) “Why?”

Nora: “I want you to go back to work tomorrow. And daddy too, so that Candace can watch us and Tella can come play.”

Me: (deflated) “Oh.”

Well, at least this is proof that we chose a great babysitter and that the kids love her. Couldn’t ask for a better situation than that! Ha!

Me: Nora, what did you have for snack at school today?

Nora: Pretzels. They were yellow. Circles and sticks. They were gluten.

Me: You mean they were gluten-free?

Nora: No, I mean they were gluten, not free.

—————

Nora: Mama, have you ever seen or heard of a scooter without handles? ‘Cause I just saw a brown shirt boy riding by on a scooter without handles.

Me: Yeah, it’s called a skateboard.

Nora: Oh. (giggles)

—————

Me: Frances, where’s Baby?

Frances: (sadly) Dunno. Me lost her!

Me: Oh no! You did?

Frances: (looking around, spotting Baby) Me find her!

Me: Oh good! Where was she?

Frances: She hiding. Under book.

(Love me some cave girl speak!)

—————

Frances: I ludge you, mama.

Me: I ludge you too, Franny.

Nora: “Did God have swim lessons when he was little, like me?”

Me: “No.”

Nora: “Why not?”

Me: “Because God was little a long, long time ago.”

Nora: “Like how long ago?”

Me: “Billions and billions of years.”

Nora: “Oh. And they didn’t have swim lessons then?”

Me: “No.”

                          —————

Me: “I spy, with my little eye, something orange.”

Frances: “The trees?”

Me: “Nope.”

Frances: “The grass?”

Me: “No.”

Frances: “The bushes?”

Me: “No, Frances. Those things are all green. Guess again.”

                          —————

Me: “Frances. I like your new purse.”

Frances: “Pizza in dere.”

Me: “What? Your pizza’s in there?!”

Frances: (holds purse open so I can look inside) “Pizza in dere.”

Me: (horrified) “No, Frances, honey! Get that out of there. We don’t put pizza in purses!”

Only, apparently, we do.

                          —————

Me: (extremely frustrated and cantankerous; at 2:30 a.m. at the start of breastfeeding session with Rowan, who was bumbling around like an animal trying unsuccessfully to latch) “What in the world? It’s not fucking rocket science! You’ve been doing this since the day you were born! Fucking eat!”

I asked my husband the following morning if he had overheard me cussing out our five-week-old in the middle of the night. He had. So ashamed.

Even though we have our moments, I sure do love the hell out of that little cuddle ball. Even when he forgets how to nurse and I’m dropping F-bombs on him left and right. I like to think of it as dropping F-bombs on the air, though. Not my boy. It’s just my way of venting. A necessity if I’m not going to lose my mind.

I’m not sure from where they picked it up, but for months, when the girls have been playing at make-believe as babies, they’ve been saying, “Goo-goo, ga-ga,” (as no real baby has ever said).

Then, one day a few weeks ago, I heard them outside on the porch calling one another goo-goo ga-ga heads, and cracking each other up. It was pretty funny. Also a rare time they were genuinely getting along, which is always great to see.

Then, last Monday we picked up some library books after our weekly story hour outing. One was called Myrtle, and as we sat down to read it, we discovered, to our delight, there was a character in the book named Frances. 

Turns out a few pages into the story we learned, much to our horror, that Frances was a mean bully. Our Frances, being the sensitive spirit she is, immediately disliked the book upon hearing that she was so naughty. At least that was her interpretation.

“No like it, mama. No read it,” she said,  with a serious frown, and kept trying to shut the book. Of course, I found this to be hysterical. I did put away the book though.

Two days later Nora asked to read the book again. I told Nora to choose another story because we didn’t want to hurt Frances’s feelings again. 

Nora looked disappointed, and then quickly suggested that instead of reading the name Frances, we simply substitute a different name. 

After I told her this plan was a great idea, I asked Nora to tell me a name to use instead. She thought for a moment and then broke into a huge grin.

“How about Goo-goo Ga-ga Head?” she said.

“OK. Goo-goo Ga-ga Head it is,” I said.

I then proceeded to read the book, and each place I saw the name Frances, I read Goo-goo Ga-ga Head instead.

When Myrtle and her little brother went outside, Goo-goo Ga-ga Head sang mean songs and played mean tricks.

Genius.

Nearly every single time I said Goo-goo Ga-ga Head, Frances and I erupted into serious giggles. Nora just smiled and chuckled a little. I think she regretted the idea, wanting instead to just get on with the telling of the story.

Apparently, Nora’s far more mature than Frances and me. I mean, she’s more mature than Goo-goo Ga-ga Head and me. Go figure.

I’ve got to get a new strategy for writing. Turns out that if I leave the task until nighttime, it just doesn’t happen. You see, the witching hour begins at our house around 4:00 p.m., right after nap time—when one would think the kids would be well rested, and therefore not whiny, clingy, and claiming to be starving, despite the fact that they refused to eat half or more of their lunch—and ends, roughly, between 7:30 and 9:30 p.m., the range of time during which one or more of the children fall asleep.

And by that point, after many, many consecutive nights of restless sleep, there is absolutely NO chance that I am getting up out of bed to compose anything of any worth. So, sadly, I haven’t even been trying.

The new idea is to get the writing done during the daytime. Right now, as I hopefully type away, my oldest is with the babysitter and her oldest girl, at a swim lesson. I have her younger daughter here at the house asleep for a nap, along with my two youngest. All is quiet, although I am hearing an occasional whimper and moan from both of the bedrooms. Please, please, stay asleep dear children!

It seems the weather has changed for the better around these parts, knock on wood, if one is willing to overlook the tornado watch that went on here for much of the day yesterday. So, we spent a good deal of time out in our yard on Sunday, pulling weeds and raking leaves—getting ready for some spring planting.

While the two younger kids were indoors napping, Nora and I helped Liam with some tasks. She and I set about pulling small weeds from inside the cracks between our patio stones. One weed I uprooted clearly upset an ants’ nest, as the little buggers starting climbing out of the crack by the tens and twenties.

I called Nora over to show her, knowing she gets a kick out of all things bugs. I love how she’s not grossed out by them, and enjoys picking them up and holding them when she can.

For the first couple of summers when we encountered bugs and insects I made a point to tell Nora about how we should be mindful and considerate around them, taking care not to smush them if we can. For the most part, she abided by these measures.

Seems as though we might need to have the talk again, because as soon as she saw all the ants, after she exclaimed, “Oh my goodness, look at all those little guys!” she followed up with, “Mama, wanna see how I kill the ants?”

“Hmmm?” I asked, half distracted.

“Wanna see how I kill the ants?”

Curious, I told her I did.

“Hold on,” she said, and then ran through the back door of the garage to the front porch.

She came back a moment later with a piece of sidewalk chalk, and began to explain as she acted out the steps:

“First, I take my chalk and I chalk them. See? Like this. I chalk them and then they become dead. They become dead,” she repeated, as if I hadn’t heard her clearly enough the first time around.

I returned to my weeding, wondering what had happened to my bug-loving child, only to be interrupted by her steadfast chalking and grunting.

“Got him. Got him. Got him. Got him, too!”

This reminds me of warm summer nights when I used to smush lightning bugs with my cousins in the alley behind our house, on the lids of rusty old trash barrels, just so we could see the brief smear of glowing luminescence when we did. Much as I want Nora to learn to be kind to all living things, I guess bug-killing is right up there with other childhood rites of passage, like learning how to ride a bike, and telling a fib for the first time.

————————–

Speaking of telling a fib, our middle child—Miss Frances—has been in the habit lately of outright lying when she wants something, but one or more adults tell her no. She simply tells whoever is saying no, that the other parent said she could (But mommy said so—or—But daddy said so). She’s not even two yet! Where does this come from?!

Take for example, this little incident:

Yesterday morning there was a little cup of trail mix that Nora or Frances had left out on one of the end tables from the day before. All that was left in the cup were a few peanuts and raisins, as someone had eaten all of the M&Ms from inside it. Frances asked me if she could have more M&Ms, and I told her no. She countered with, “But daddy said so!”

Ha! Daddy was not even home at the time. He was at work, and I knew better.

“Daddy did not say so,” I told her sternly.

“But daddy give me,” she pleaded, hoping against all hope I would say:

“Oh? Daddy give you? Well, in that case, let me go get you some more chocolate.”

Instead, I said, “Daddy gave that to you yesterday. And you’re not eating chocolate for breakfast today.”

At least the baby is not giving us any trouble.

Yet.