These are a few of my favourite things...

This page is devoted to my "quip of the day" - a short piece that has struck me as funny or interesting, that I want to remember but that will not make up a whole blog page.  Most recent ones appear first.

A rose by any other name...

Little Miss Snoopy had just woken up and I was carrying her down the stairs.  She breathed in deeply and said, "I love the way you smell, Mama!"  Given the fact that I was not wearing any perfume/deodorant etc., I thought it was a sweet thing to say.



Tissue time


Paddy was being driven mad by a nagging cough that he persisted on making worse by concentrating on it all the time.  "If you think about the cough all the time, all you will want to do is cough," I explained to him, in the hopes of getting him to think about other things.
"I am not thinking about the cough," he wailed, "but the cough is always thinking about me!"




Words to live by


I am your parent, you are my child
I am your quiet place, you are my wild

I am your calm face, you are my giggle
I am your wait, you are my wiggle
I am your dinner, you are my chocolate cake
I am your bedtime, you are my wide awake
I am your lullaby, you are my peek-a-boo
I am your good-night kiss, you are my I love you


God made some heads perfect - the rest He had to cover with hair...


The grandparents were here to stay for the boys' and Little Miss Snoopy's birthdays.  While they were here, my dad continued to do the exercises for his back every day with monotonous regularity.  The boys were fascinated by this, but more by the fact that they could suddenly see the top of their grandfather's balding head.  "Zoozie," they said, "how come your hair is running away?"


Chilly willy


I hauled Sam out of his warm bed on a cold-ish day, when my hands were icy.  "Ouch, Mama!" he yelled, "you are colding me!" 


A little dirt never hurt


We were travelling in the car when I noticed that the windscreen was really dirty.  I didn't have time to stop and clean it somewhere, so I used the tried and trusted method of squirting the water onto the screen from the windscreen jets and wiping with the windscreen wipers.  I didn't know that the boys were observing me so closely from the back until a little voice piped up:  "Is the car sweating, Mama?" Paddy asked. 


Bubble Trouble


The Sweetpea took the boys and Little Miss Snoopy to the car wash, and they were very impressed and excited by it.  However, later that night when I was toweling off their hair after washing it, they were not as thrilled:  "I feel like I am in a people-wash!"  Sam wailed through the towel.

Life's just not fair...

Sam had a day in which he tripped over things, fell onto things, slid on a book, stubbed his toes and bit his tongue.  Eventually he had had enough.  He lay on his back on the floor, covered himself with a towel, and wailed "I am just falling to pieces!"


Me first!


Standing in the kitchen, Sam and Paddy were fighting over who got the first plate of food.
"Me first!" they were shouting at the tops of their voices.
"Me first means me last!" I said to them, to get them to stop.
Without missing a beat, they both chorused: "Me last!"

The fine art of conversation

Sam was sitting in the back of the car while I was driving. 
"Please fix my car, Mama," he yelled. 
"Not while I am driving!" I replied, "we can discuss it later."
Later he came to me.  "Can you discuss my car for me now?" he asked me. 


The Food Bandits


The latest trend is the stealing of food.  Whenever I am distracted for a moment, leaving the door to the pantry unattended, the two boys sneak in quietly, steal whatever they can lay their hands on, and scuttle off to a special place under the dining-room table (where there is a floor-length cloth) to eat their spoils.  I was unaware of this fact until I found several empty biscuit packets, the sugar bowl (which I have been searching high and low for), and a large empty 3 liter bottle that used to contain fruit juice, under the table when I was vaccuming.  I laughed to find the instant coffee (only a tiny bit eaten) there too - must have been some disappointed thieves with that haul!