Words With Kids

No one really tells you about the hazards of having kids. They don't focus on the stuff like stretch marks or the possibility of embarrassment during sessions of public breastfeeding (while your other kids get much needed play breaks in the dead of winter at the mall playground), and they don't tell you about the absolute certainty of humiliation when your kids SAY things in public making you red in the face until you'd rather hide in a hole than see particular people ever again.

We all think we're immune to things like this. We're just all happy and excited and thinking to ourselves, I won't be the one to get stretch marks, I'm stocked and ready to go with all that shea butter goodness!. Or, I will NEVER breastfeed in public so that won't happen to me! Or better yet, I just WON'T CARE what anyone thinks while I feed my baby!

And, invariably, by the time reality sets in the little munchkins have us all wrapped around their little fingers and stuff, so we go on our merry way and completely neglect to tell our friends, who are thinking of starting their own families, about these things.

Then they start talking. And I don't mean in the cute 18-month-old, Oh, wow, you said "truck!" but it REALLY didn't sound like "truck!" kind of embarrassing way. I mean in the 6-year-old, Oh, WOW, you'd think this kid is being interrogated by LeRoy Jethro Gibbs sort of Let-me-tell-all-the-deep-dark-secrets-of-the-family AND let-me-go-crawl-in-a-hole way.

Yeah. That.

Maybe I homeschool because it seems safer (until we go to church) from all that baring of the communal family soul. Not that I don't share a few embarrassing tidbits of my own here on the blog. Usually those shared details are my own flubs and missteps, but now, it's time for a little payback. Oh, sure, the kids won't find these things embarrassing for about 10 more years (and knowing my kids, maybe they won't EVER), but I have to have a record somewhere of them so I don't forget!




Emmy: to me while trying on hand-me-down snowpants: MOOOOM!!!! (bursting into tears) They DON'T FIT!!!
Me: They look like they fit okay, where are they bugging you?
Emmy: They just don't FIT! (more tears)
Me: Let's see.... they're not too short, they're not too tight, what's the matter with them?
Emmy: THEY ARE BLUE!!!!! (and then flopping down on the bench, sobbing)


Joshua: to Emmy when they were sitting at the table (attempting) to do schoolwork: Look how sharp this pencil is!
Emmy: It's like a SWORD!
Joshua and Emmy: pshhp! Pshaaaw! Aaayaah! Shwoooop! (sword fighting with their pencils)
Me: STOP doing that you could put someone's eye out!!!
Joshua and Emmy: (pause) Then we could have an EYEPATCH! We'd look like PIRATES!!!
Me: (*fail*)


Okay, if you're squeamish, you might want to end this reading of my blog post right here.



Just warning ya!



Particularly if you are vegetarian, vegan, etc. or a member of PETA.




Okay, so we are *mostly* vegetarian. I will once in a while order something with chicken in it when we're out eating, but I don't ever cook meat of any kind at home. Well, there was that one time I made a baked salmon dish, but other than than, it doesn't happen. Until Thanksgiving.

It's Thanksgiving people. The day just NEEDS a turkey. So when we're home for that holiday I get past my absolute distaste of handling raw meat and... cook a turkey.

But that's not what happened here.

This year we were home, I didn't want to cook a turkey, I didn't want to THAW a turkey in my kitchen before I could cook it, etc. So instead I went and bought one of those pre-cooked rotisserie chickens. Yeah, totally the same thing, I KNOW, okay?! But anyways, so there we are with our nicely prepared dinner, and this little chicken thing sitting off to the side, and then....

Emmy: Momma, can I have the drumstick?
Me: (how does she know what the drumstick IS?) Umm, okay?
Emmy: YAY!
Me: Here you go, Emmy.
Emmy: Oh, boy, oh boy! (commences eating drumstick)
Emmy: Look, guys, there's the MEAT! (chomp, chomp, chomp)
Emmy: Look, guys, there a VEIN!!! (poke, poke, poke)
Emmy: LOOK, GUYS, THERE'S THE BONE!!! (hopping up and down, literally, on her seat)
Me: (slaps hand against face)
Emmy: Momma, can we clean off this bone so I can keep it?
Me: (ohdearLordhavemercyonme)

*and yes, for those wondering, I DID boil that bone (thank you, Temperance Brennan, for showing me how) until it was clean and give it back to her. 'Cause that's just the kind of girl she is, and the kind of mom I am. She thought she was being a paleontologist, and I do believe she would have taken it outside and buried it somewhere just so she could find it again except the dog stole it about 30 seconds later.

I think I'm embarrassing myself now, aren't I? Who needs the kids to tell on me when I plainly put out my redneck side for all to see right here?

Oh, dear. Time to go pick my teeth with one o'them leftover bones or somethin', now, ain't it?