Mixing Up Words: The Funny Side of Life

I’m a morning person and I like to stay up late at night, but I have to take a nap every day. This morning I woke just after 5 am and stayed in bed for another 40 minutes just because it was too early even for me. When I did get up, it was so dark that the stars were still shining brightly. Since my husband isn’t a morning person and he also likes to stay up late, but doesn’t take a nap like me, I try not to wake him.

Amanda and Samantha

The other day, both Amanda and Samantha were already up after I had showered and wanted to get dressed, so I took my things to their room. A little bit later, Amanda came walking through to the office and thrust my pajama bottoms at me and said, “I found this on my bed!” She then told me to follow her to her room.

When we got there she said, “Look! Your dry hair is on my bed too and it’s making it so messy!” She meant my hairdryer and she isn’t normally so concerned about her bed. Later that day she mixed up another word. She called corn-on-the-cob "cob corn." This morning she gave me a new one, horse seals as in sea horses, too funny!

It’s hilarious when little kids get their words mixed up. By the time the evening of last night rolled around, I found the opposite to also be true. Both Amanda and Samantha were watching a cartoon. I asked them if it was the show where the kids turn into dinosaurs. Amanda felt that it was important that I know the proper name of the program and so she told me in her best teacher’s voice with great emphasis, “It’s Dino Squad.”

Well, I just burst out laughing. She could say Dino Squad perfectly, but not hairdryer. It just goes to show that some things are more important than other things in a 4-year-old’s life.

Read More

An Unconventional Question

I asked Amanda an unconventional question and I got an unconventional answer.

I’ll begin with the conventional question. As soon as Amanda got back from her Nanna’s, we all basically asked her the same thing, “Did you have a nice time with Nanna?” Of course, the answer was yes. She was very excited to tell us all about it.

Here are a few of the things she told me:

Her Nanna bought her small yoghurts with Barbie pictures on them. She got to pick out a squeeze bottle of honey at the store. She got to have treats all the time. Her Nanna let her to do anything she liked (I’m sure within reason). For dinner, they ate Gnocchi, which she struggled to pronounce. (It’s funny how a detail like that is important to a four-year-old, but I like it when she shares the details. I’m pretty sure she mentioned it because it was new for her.)

The part her Nanna told me was that they spent as much time at the beach as possible.

Not long after Amanda arrived home from her visit, I decided to ask her a less standard question. Instead of “Did you have a nice time with Nanna?” I asked her, “Did Nanna have a nice time with you?”

With barely a pause, Amanda replied, “No.” Then she looked straight at me and, with the voice of a teacher wanting to explain something to her pupil, said, “It’s hard work babysitting.”

For me, that was a remarkable answer, especially since she came up with it all by herself. I do know her Nanna had a nice time with her, she adores her grandkids, but I’m also sure it was hard work. This is the wisdom of a four-year-old.

I took this photo of Amanda in her Hello Kitty swimsuit running on the beach by her grandparents’ house at Britannia Bay, South Africa, December 2011.

Here are more posts on the funny and/or profound things that Amanda has said:

• Never Underestimate Your Child
• Out of the Mouths of Babes
• Why We Don’t Have a Cat
• A Birthday Card in the Mailbox
• Introducing Your Child to the World of Books
• More than a Prince

Read More

Protecting Your Child Even from the Relatives – Part 1

Recently I received a phone call from a desperate mom. She told me that her daughter’s grades had dropped drastically and she was no longer communicating with them. The mother decided to make an appointment with the school and she wanted to know from me what the procedure would be.

I always believe in instilling hope in a person when their walls seem to be caving in, so, after answering questions about the school, I said that I believed the daughter was avoiding communicating with them because she didn’t want to hurt their feelings. To me this is monumental. If the child is still on your side, then the task of reaching that child is so much easier. The mom confirmed that her daughter had said something to that affect. I replied, “That’s great! It shows your daughter still loves you!”

Now, the girl had shared with me about a week prior that she was stressed by the grandparents who were visiting. I asked the mom if her daughter’s behavior had changed more during the past week or so. She said it had. I then explained that she had told me how the grandparents had been favoring her younger brother and that she also didn’t like how the grandmother treated her mom.

The mother understood that her daughter might have felt rejected by the grandparents. However, I could sense that she didn’t realize how much it hurt her daughter to see her mom being ill treated too. I used the example of an abusive marriage to explain how her daughter must feel. I described a marriage where the child knew that the father sometimes beat the mother and even if he never hit the child, the child would still be wounded emotionally. It’s important for us as moms to realize that how we allow other people to treat us affects our children.

Another thing I suggested to help the daughter with her emotions was that she should keep a journal and write down her feelings on a daily basis. In this way, she won’t be burying her feelings, but she’ll be able to process them more constructively. I mentioned to the mom that one day her daughter will leave home and if she has unresolved issues then she will carry that baggage with her into her marriage and future family.

Read More

Never Underestimate Your Kids

Amanda and her big brother, Jeremiah, have a special bond. When we first shared our news with the kids that I was pregnant with our fourth child, Jeremiah was so thrilled that he ran to tell his friends who lived nearby. To be honest, I wasn’t sure how the kids would react to the news and so I was a little surprised that he was so excited.

Yesterday, Amanda told me about a conversation that her brother had with her. She told me that he had said how adorable and precious she was. She then told him how special he was to her. As she was telling me this, I could see that it touched her deeply. Amanda finished off by saying, “It was so sad.”

I asked her, “Don’t you mean ‘so sweet?’”

“No, Mom. It was sad. You can be happy and sad at the same time.”

Her choice of words was unusual, but I realized that she was speaking about something touching her so deeply that it almost hurt. I had explained to her before in movies why some people cry when they’re very happy. Later I told Jeremiah the odd thing she had said and he replied, “She’s a philosopher.”

Never underestimate your kids’ abilities to understand and reason no matter how young they are. I think adults in general are too quick to brush kids aside thinking they are too young to say anything of value and therefore don’t need to be heard. I have known my kids to say profound things at just the right moments.

I recommend you read (if you haven’t already), “Out of the Mouths of Babes.”

I took the above photo of Jeremiah with his baby sister, Amanda, in 2008.

Read More