From the Mouths of Babes

A guest blog from the Mrs.

Have you seen the commercial for the granola bar where the kid is sharing some intimate little piece of information that the parent doesn’t really want shared?  The advertised “chewy” granola bar supposedly keeps them in check.

Well, granola bars may be fine when out in public, but quite frankly, now that my daughter is getting older (she just turned 4…where does the time go?!), I prefer to keep her speaking freely while at home.  How else is a mom to get the REAL story about what goes on when Dad is the one who stays home with the kids?

Sometimes the statements just come out of nowhere.  A passing thought of something that occurred during the day that she innocently shares, such as “I watched Daddy’s Babylon 5 today." Huh?  Babylon 5?  Looking to my husband to confirm what I think I’ve just heard, I notice the sheepish look on his face as he mentions he recently bought a DVD of one of his favorite shows.  No secrets in this house. Hmmm.  Wonder how far the bonbons were.

All right SAHDs, I know…it’s not really like that.  All the time. 

The other day I was just enjoying the kids in the family room while hubby chatted with his folks on the phone.  My daughter was engaged in another of her wonderfully animated imaginary games, sitting on the love seat with 2 cushions – one placed in front of the other.  She sat on one and her new monkey puppet (thanks Nana and Grandpa!) sat on the other – the “back” seat.  Her arms were extended forward in the traditional “driving” pose.   I was half-watching, half-listening to hubby, when I noticed she was repeating the same gestures.  Her destination soon became clear as she "pulled up," rolled down the window and said the following: “Hello.  I’ll have a number 5, a large coke, and a 10-piece chicken nugget.  Yes, that’s it.  Thank you.”  She then “pulled forward,” spoke out the window again and said, “Hi, how are you?”   She passed over some money and accepted her purchase saying, “Thank you.”  After rolling up her window, she offered her monkey some french fries and was on her way.

After I fell in love with my cutie pie all over again because of her brilliant (yes, brilliant!) little mind, I had the opportunity to look at this little reenactment in one of 2 ways: 1) hubby has been making way too many little trips to McDonalds, or 2) hubby is certainly very polite.  I have to go with number 2.  “Bonbons” or not, fast food or not, there’s nobody I’d rather have watching our kids.