Kids Say the Darndest Things

I got this email today, and it made me laugh! I thought I'd post it after adding some of our Funny Family Folktale Kid Funnies.

TESSA (age 3) was sitting by the bishop's wife in sacrament meeting. She looked up at her and said, "You must be really old."
The bishop's wife smiled and replied, "Oh, I am really old."
Then Tessa looked at her and asked, "then why aren't cha dead?"

ROSS (age 5) "Mom, you need to buy a new bed."
"Why do we need a new bed?"
"For the baby," he said.
"Oh, honey, your Dad and I aren't going to have any more babies," I replied.
My husband piped in, "When you get married, you can have all the babies you want."
Ross could hardly contain his joy and said, "When I marry Hunter (little girl that he played with), I'll just cough it [the baby] out!" Cough was the word he used for vomit. Dan almost crashed the car, and I about peed my pants.

RYAN (age 11) After we had driven up Arizona's dirt "Hell Road" into the Superstition Mountains for 20 miles of narrow switch-backs, white-knuckle blind turns, and thousand foot drop-offs, we finally reached Roosevelt Dam. Ryan asked what the piece of equipment on the top of the dam was. Dan said, "it is a crane." Ryan replied, "I've seen a lot of cranes in my life, but I've never seen a dam crane!" It was just the comic relief that we needed. It was a good thing that the road had straightened out.

ROSS (age 7) While living in Mesa, Arizona, we would go to my brother, Jamey's house and the kids would jump on his trampoline. In the 110* weather, the sun had deteriorated the trampoline mat and whenever the kids would jump they would be covered in black. One day I said to Ross, "There is black all over you. I see you've been jumping on the trampoline again. " He said, "the bad guys snuck into the backyard at night and painted the trampoline black!"

Now the email

TAMMY (age 4) was with her mother when they met an elderly,
rather-wrinkled woman her Mom knew. Tammy looked at her for a
while and then asked, "Why doesn't your skin fit your face?"

SUSAN (age 4) was drinking juice when she got the hiccups. "Please don't
give me this juice again," she said. "It makes my teeth cough."

JACK (age 3) was watching his Mom breast-feeding his new baby sister.
After a while, he asked: "Mom why have you got two? Is one for hot and
one for cold milk?"

MELANIE (age 5) asked her Granny how old she was. Granny replied
she was so old she didn't remember any more. Melanie said, "If you don't
remember, you must look in the back of your panties. Mine say five to six."

STEVEN (age 3) hugged and kissed his Mom good night. "I love you so much
that, when you die, I'm going to bury you outside my bedroom window."

BRITTANY (age 4) had an earache and wanted a pain killer. She tried in
vain to take the lid off the bottle. Seeing her frustration, her Mom
explained it was a child-proof cap, and she'd have to open it for her.
Eyes wide with wonder, the little girl asked, "How does it know it's me?"

DJ (age 4) stepped onto the bathroom scale and asked, "How much do I cost?"

MARC (age 4) was engrossed in a young couple that was hugging and kissing
in a restaurant. Without taking his eyes off them, he asked his dad, "Why is he
whispering in her mouth?"

CLINTON (age 5) was in his bedroom looking worried. When his Mom asked
what was troubling him, he replied, "I don't know what'll happen with
this bed when I get married. How will my wife fit in?"

JAMES (age 4) was listening to a Bible story. His dad read, "The man
named Lot was warned to take his wife and flee out of the city, but his
wife looked back and was turned to salt." Concerned, James asked, "What
happened to the flea?"

The Sermon I think this Mom will never forget ... This particular Sunday
sermon ... "Dear Lord," the minister began, with arms extended toward
heaven and a rapturous look on his upturned face. "Without you,we are
but dust ..." He would have continued but, at that moment, my very
obedient daughter, who was listening, leaned over to me and asked
quite audibly in her shrill, little, four-year-old-girl voice, "Mom, what
is butt dust?"

Shadow, Paris, and the Elephants

Tale II in Funny Family Folktales. This is Grandma's story.

One summer our little black Pekingese, Shadow, had tangled with a skunk. No matter what I washed her with, I couldn't get the stench out. Because it was summer and the weather was nice, I just had to keep her outside.

One evening, I was watching my grandson, Paris, who was around five years old. He was very concerned about Shadow being outside and kept asking me if he could let her in. I told him no several times.

He said, "But Grandma, she is shaking. She is cold."

Sure enough, Shadow was shaking, but I knew she wasn't cold. "No, she isn't cold. She just wants in. It is warm outside," I said.

"But, Grandma, she is scared. That is why she is shaking."

"Paris, Shadow isn't scared."

"She is scared," he continued. "We need to let her in."

I, again, told him that there was nothing for Shadow to be afraid of and that she couldn't come in because she smelled too bad, but he wouldn't give up.

"Grandma, Shadow is scared of the elephants."

"What elephants? There aren't any elephants!"

"Oh, they are out there!" He said, "you just can't see them."

LDStorymakers, Bitten by the Bug

I had wanted to go to the LDStorymaker's Writers' Conference and when I went to register a couple of weeks ago, it was sold out! Then this morning I received a comment on this blog from Candace Salima and linked over to her blog. Hurray! She had a post saying that there were a couple of unexpected openings in the conference for anyone interested. Mindy and I got the last two seats!

For those of you who don't know, I've always wanted to write. First, when I was in third grade, I started writing romances. I wish I had kept them. My mother would roar with laughter when she read them. She never has been very supportive of my big dreams. Then in junior high school when my 8th grade English teacher assigned the class two page stories to write, much to her chagrin, I would turn in twenty page stories. She had me spend the time reading the book Dune to study his writing style. Looking back, I just think she didn't want to read or grade my long stories. Yet, at the end of the school year she told me to send her my first published work. (I don't think this blog counts...)
So onto Logan High School I went. I continued to love English, literature, and creative writing. Therefore, I took a journalism class my junior year. I thoroughly was taken with it, and much to my surprise the Grizzly Newspaper Adviser told me to apply to be on the staff.
I remember the conversation well. "Terry, I think you should sign up to be on the newspaper next year."
"Really?" I was flattered. "What position should I try for?"
"How about for the editor-in-chief?" he said.
I couldn't believe that he would suggest that. When they announced that I was the next year's editor-in chief, I couldn't believe it. I was so happy. It thrilled me to be a part of a team, and to write. I guess that counted as something that I could have sent to my 8th grade English teacher, but it never occurred to me until this very moment.
So fast forward 30 years, give or take a couple. I, yet again, have the urge to write. Finally, now that I have a little life experience, I may have something to share. I just need to do it. I've started with my blogs, found real writers and their blogs, and have been bitten by the bug.

Mindy went to the American Night Writer's Conference in Mesa two weeks ago, and loved it. She said that I should go to this one if I could. I didn't even think about the fact that she would be here to go with me.

So a small prayer has been answered. There are two openings with our names on them. I just hope now that the brain storms from the past will return and I'll be able to articulate them onto paper. What fun!

Make a Caption

These are my beautiful children! Don't you think they are somethin'?

OK, I want your captions for this picture. What do you think the mugger is saying?