Excuse Me.

Owen is very polite. He often says “excuse me” when he burps or toots. It’s pretty cute. We also have strict rules about what words can be said at the table…if one says something they shouldn’t the other quickly says “you said no ‘table talk’…”

Recently while Owen and I were eating lunch the following conversation happened…

Owen: “Excuse me.”
Me: “Bless you, bud.”
Owen: “Oh, I didn’t burp.”
Me: “Oh, ok.”
Owen: “I…oh wait, nevermind.”
Me: “Ok.”
Owen: “I didn’t burp, but I can’t say the other thing that I did because I’m at the table.”
Me: “That’s ok you don’t need to say it.”
Owen: “Do you know what I did even though I can’t say the word of what I did?”
Me: “Yes, you tooted.”
Owen: “How did you know, did you hear me?”
Me: “No, but you would only say ‘excuse me’ if you burped or tooted and if you didn’t burp then you must have tooted.”
Owen: “oh.”

Who Do We Root For?

The following conversations took place while watching the National Championship game between LSU and Alabama…

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Grace: “Who do we want to win?”
Danny: “You can pick whichever team you want.”|
Owen: “I want the yellow team to win!”
Danny: “That’s LSU, they beat the Ducks at the beginning of the season.”
Grace: “Then I want Alabama to win!”
Owen: “Me too!”
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Owen: “This is good, Alabama’s got a plan.”
Me: “What do they have?”
Owen: “A plan.”
Me: “How do you know?”
Owen: “Cause they’re standing in a circle, talkin’ ’bout a plan.”
Grace: “You don’t know that, they could be talking about other things…”

Fresh Step

Owen: “Mommy, does that stuff make kitties sparkle?”

Gems from “Up”

I love the movie “Up“. No kiddo movie can have me teary-eyed in the first 15 minutes!

I was watching it with the kids on Friday night and as it quickly goes through the life of Ellie and Mr. Fredricksen, Grace quickly made these comments…

As they are hoping for and then lose their baby…
Grace: “I want a baby so bad! But I just don’t want to get it out because either way seems like it would hurt really bad when you wake up from the medicine!”
Me: “Well, you are only 7, I think you shouldn’t worry about that right now…”

As they are growing old and cleaning house…
“I think that when people get married and grow old they should still always love each other.”

When Ellie dies…
“When the boy that I marries dies I am going to be so sad and lonely. Especially since by then Mommy and Daddy will be gone and the boy that I marry will be gone. That will be so sad.”

Blondes

I have written before about Owen’s interest in tall girls…Well his interest now includes blondes too…He often stops in the middle of what he is doing to watch a blonde woman on tv.

Owen: (pointing to the tv) “There’s a blonde one. I like blondes.”
Me: “What about Emma*?” (a blonde girl in his class.)
Owen: “No, I don’t really like the blonde ones with glasses.”
Me: “Oh, really!” (I am “blonde” and wear glasses…)
Owen: “Uh, except for the ones with curly hair, those ones with glasses are ok…”
Me: “Nice save buddy…”

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*Not her real name…

Am I Smart?

These are snippets from conversations that happened today:

Owen: “Wait! I want to spell the letters on the STOP sign. S-T-O-K”
Me: “Owen! That is a great job spelling! You got all the letters but the very last one, listen when I say it, s-t-o-p-p-p, p-p-p what sound is that?”
Owen: “p-p-p pumpkin pie, p-p-p, P! It’s a P! S-T-O-P”
Me: “Yes! Great job!”
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Owen: “Mommy, am I smart?”
Me: “Yes, you are very smart Owen. Why?”
Owen: “I don’t think I’m very smart, I don’t even know what 2 + 0 is.”
Me: “Well, you are only 4, you aren’t supposed to know some of those things yet.”
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In the van while we were waiting for Grace at the bus stop, Owen picks up some pennies. I take 2 in one hand and none in the other. I ask how many are in the empty hand and how many are in the other…
Me: “How many are in this hand?”
Owen: “None.”
Me: “How many are in this hand?”
Owen: “2”
Me: So how many do I have?”
Owen: counting “1, 2”
Me: “So what is 2 + 0?”
Owen: “1, 2 (little light bulb) it’s 2!!”
Me: “Yep, ok, so what is 0 + 4?
Owen: “4!”
Me: “Yep, you got it bud.”

Owen: “Now all I have left to learn is how to tie my shoes!”

Owen’s Staring at Me!!

The kiddos and I are creatures of habit in the morning. If it is a school day we follow the same routine every day…pretty much to the minute.

Owen’s breathing treatment takes 25 minutes so that means we really have to be careful of the time so he can finish it. Each morning he starts eating his oatmeal but I have to stop him and start the breathing treatment because he takes so long to eat (seriously, 20 minutes to eat half a packet of oatmeal?)

And since we are such creatures of habit, they must have the same argument every morning (I have posted about this habit before…)

Today’s conversation:

Grace: “Owen can’t sit there, I’m going to watch tv and I can’t see with him there.”
Me: “We aren’t turning on the tv during breakfast because I want it to get eaten, not ignored.”
Grace: “Owen’s staring at me!”
Me: “Owen, stop staring at your sister.”
Owen: “I’m not, she’s just right there! I’m just looking up.”
Grace: “Owen’s staring at me!”
Me: “Owen, stop staring at your sister or I’ll have to move you. And Grace, you must be staring at him to if you know he is watching you.”
Grace: “I feel it!”
Me: “Owen, do you need to move to the seat beside Grace?”
Owen: whining “NO! I don’t want to sit by Grace because her cereal smells disgusting!”

Apparently Owen has a super sensitive nose. He even complains of the smell of her cereal when the bowl is clean and empty and he just sees it sitting on the counter.

There must be residual smell in the bowl…

Holy Cr@p!

Mr. Potty Mouth has returned.

Yesterday at school Owen built something in my classroom and got very excited and he yelled “Holy cr@p! Look at my [whatever he had made]!”

I didn’t hear him but my lead teacher said “what did he say?” I asked him to repeat and he did…

I asked where he had heard those words…”I didn’t hear them anywhere…” he said, looking away.

When we got home I pumped him for some additional information. He said he didn’t know they were bad words and he thought that he heard it in a song they sang in class…

Yeah, right.

When I told his teacher about it this morning she laughed. I walked across the hall to the school office, on my way back, I heard Owen playing with the car race track and in his excitement I heard again “Holy cr@p, did you see that?!?!?”

We all heard it that time.

He has been instructed that a better choice of words might be “Holy moley…”, not “Holy cr@p a moley”, just “Holy moley…”

They’re Awfully Sweet

Owen is 4 years and 7 months old today. We figured this out on our way to pick up Grace at the bus stop. He’s closer to 5 than 4 now and he’s really growing up fast.

Yesterday at school I saw him leaving the bathroom heading back to his class. One of his teachers (who he may have a slight little crush on) was waiting for him to come back. I squatted down and puckered up for a smooch and he walked right by me and smiled and waved. After school, I got the biggest hug, even his feet were hugging me. I asked about the smooches and was told that “smooches at school embarrass me in front of my friends.”

Yikes…

So we set up some ground rules about what are acceptable forms of Mommy affection at school…waves, hugs, and blowing kisses…

Got it…but can you blame me if I try to sneak a smooch in every once in awhile?
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Then yesterday afternoon when Grace got home from school she was asking me how many years you go to high school and college.

I explained bachelor’s degrees, medical school, law school, how some are four years and some are additional time.

Then she asked “how many years do you have to go to be a Mommy?” I said you don’t really have to go to school to be a Mommy (I should have said a master’s degree at least).

She looked surprised, so I asked if she thought that you should have to go to school to learn how to be a Mommy and she said yes, it didn’t make sense not to, except “I haven’t gone to Mommy school and I’ve already learned so much about being a Mommy from you!”

Awww…they’re both awfully sweet!

 

Shorty

All of these comments on Wednesday after school…

“Our substitute teacher was really tiny, but not as short as you Mommy.”

“Mrs. M is either older than you or younger than you, I’m not sure. But I do know your shorter than her cause she’s tall.”

“If you were a teacher in my class you’d have to stand on a chair to do calendar.”
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It’s a good thing I don’t mind being so short.