Listening Ears

If you keep your listening ears open around our house, you're bound to hear some amusing things. These are a few of my recent favorites.

"Mom! Van wants a beer!" George bellowed to me as Van was putting his hands on a box of BJ's home-brewed beer that was carbonating in bottles.

Silas: Mom, do we have any string?
Me: Probably. What do you need it for?
Silas: I want to make a zip-line from my top bunk down to my dresser.

"George, don't lick my car. I'm not sure when it was last washed, but it's not in recent memory," said BJ during yesterday's snowstorm.


Silas has an affinity for Peppermint Patty quotes, probably because I do too. Lately we have been watching lots of Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. Yesterday he sidled up to me and whispered unexpectedly in my ear, "Let's not play lovers' games, Chuck." This may have been rivaled only by his previous Peppermint Patty display toward Tex, when he sailed past Tex out the door one day and nonchalantly stated, "Tex, you're not coming. You're not allowed to go places except Bark in the Park, you sly devil you!"

In a conversation about the resident mouse in our garage:
BJ: I saw Mickey again tonight. I'm beginning to think that my relationship with Mickey is entirely too cordial.
Me, laughing:"Oh?"
BJ: Yeah. I mean, we say hello to each other. Exchange pleasantries.

Silas to BJ, regarding a letter to his grandparents: "Dad, you write the letter and I'll draw the pictures, because you're good at writing and I'm good at drawing."

A few days ago, a friend of mine and I were remarking about how dangerous life is with small children. This she remarked upon after having let her young son go unattended for a mere sixty seconds before finding him wielding an ax from the woodpile. Similar hair-raising events are regular around here. The other day I was changing Van's diaper and I heard Silas goad in the boys' bedroom,
"Jump from a really, really high distance, Georgie!"
I let out what seemed a slow-motion "Noooooooooooo!" and hurried to their room just in time to see George hurl his thin little 27-pound body off of Silas' top bunk and all the way down to the floor. He landed perfectly and laughed, the little stink.

He's about to jump off that too. I just know it.

Kids will be kids!

Batter-stealers