Ruby, playing with magnetic letters (as though they are people—nothing is safe from becoming an action figure at our house):
“We had leg surgery tomorrow. That’s why we tip over.” 9/27/10
Haley, as the blender startles 3-mo. Ian, making him cry:
“Mom! Don’ scare Ian a smoothie! I don’ wike it!” 9/30/10
Claire, tattling: “Haley hit me with a rock!”
(after a pause)
“It’s a beautiful rock, but that was unkind.” (Claire loves rocks) 10/13/10
Claire, when asked if the report was true that she’d scratched and hit Haley:
(Emphatically) “No! I did NOT! I only slapped her face!” 10/14/10
Haley (with a cold): “I need to blow my nose, Mom, because my nose is coming out.” 10/14/10
also: “My nose is running out,” and “I just have a nose in my boogers.” 10/19/10
Claire, coloring a fish-in-an-aquarium-picture: “This is gonna be mold at the bottom, just like in our bathtub.” 10/16/10
Ruby, wistfully: “I love pets. All I have is pet bugs, but I want to have a pet what could stay alive all winter.” 10/25/10
Claire, during calendar time, noticing there aren’t many more days left in October: “When we run out of days, will we die?” 10/26/10
Claire, after I was gruff with Haley: “Mom, you’re not supposed to do that. Remember, you need to let the peace of God rule in your heart, and be thankful?” 10/27/10
Ruby, having wished on a star the night before: “Mom, my wish didn’t come true, to fly up in a basket. That’s too bad.” 11/1/10
Claire, holding a wooden spoon from their kitchen set: “This is my gun. It’s automatic.” 11/1/10
Ruby, explaining to me what she meant when she came in from playing outside and told me she was “soaking hot.”
“It means I have tears coming out of me for having two jackets on.” 11/14/10
Serving the girls slices of the apple cinnamon bread brought by the neighbor:
Me: “Wasn’t it kind for Daddy to fix Sharon’s laptop, and wasn’t it kind for her to bake Daddy some bread?”
Claire, puzzled: “How did she make her laptop into bread?” 11/17/10
Claire, in pain: “Two of my ears are hurting.” 11/29/10
Ruby, coloring with me: “I still have more imaginations to color.” 11/29/10
Haley, singing (to the tune of Mary Had a Little Lamb): “Mary had a muffin man, muffin, man, muffin maaaan. . . 12/1/10
Haley, playing with her pretend camera (batteries dying): “Oh! My cheeseball is broken!” 12/10/10
Ruby, discussing our trip to Colorado: “It’s gonna take forever till we get to the ‘nother world . . . . . . Mom, get ready for this hard trip, because it will be a disaster.” 12/13/10
Haley: “Mommy! I burp!”
Me: “Yes. What do we say when we burp?”
Haley: “Thank you, burp.” 1/2/11
Claire: “Last time we went to church, I forgot my notebook, so I had to just sit there with my rock.” 1/2/11
Reviewing yesterday’s science experiment on matter:
Me: “Was the ice solid, liquid or gas?”
Ruby: “It had a shape and you could hold it. . . . . It was a solid.”
Claire (whose eyes have a light-bulb-over-the-head-look):
“Poop is a solid.” 1/13/2011
Haley, upon hearing the telephone ring:
“It’s Mr. Daddy.” 1/28/11
(While Claire and Ruby play that they are moms.)
Me: “How many kids do you have?”
Claire: “Just two.”
Me: “And how do you like that?”
Claire: “Good. ‘Cause if I had three, I’d be like, ‘I need to sell one of these kids. . .’”
Ruby: “If I had three, I would say, ‘I’m so nervous, I have to put one of you to bed.’” (For the record, I have never said either of these. )
2/9/11Claire (to Haley, who is wearing a dress-up dress): “May I have a turn wearing that?”
Haley: “No, Claire. First I have to marry to Ian.” 3/1/11
Daddy to the girls as they discuss police officers: “I was riding in a car that was pulled over today. Do you know what two people weren’t wearing in that car?”
Ruby: “Clothes?” (Also for the record, the correct answer was seatbelts.)
3/1/11Haley (making small-talk while I change her diaper): “I don’t like to eat my poop.” 3/6/11
Claire (looking out the window of a crowded restaurant): Dad, Look! That person’s smoking!”
Ruby: “But they’re already old. They’re probably going to die soon anyway.” 3/3/11
Haley (stepping out into the pungent country air at a friend’s house): “Somebody pooped out here.”
{demandingly} “Who pooped out here?!?”
{more demandingly, as we make it to the car} “Who did it!?!?!” 3/14/11
Haley (pretending one action figure is speaking to another): “Do you know the muffin man?” 3/19/11
Haley (after having tooted while eating her lunch):
“S’cuse me. That was my carrot tooting.” 3/14/11
