N: And now for the greatest show in all of North Korea!! Lootas the otter will fly through the air!

Brain awareness

N: I'm getting all schnoodled! Every lump in my brain has a different idea!

First grade morning

N: (running up to me on the playground before school) Mom! Mom, Tommy has a tree puppet!
Mom: He does? What's a tree puppet?
N: Come and see it. It says hi and stuff.
Mom: O.K. I'll walk over.
N: Mom, I'm going to go ahead of you because I have a motorcycle so I go really fast.
Mom: Oh, go ahead. I'll catch up in a sec. That sounds like fun to have a motorcycle.
N: Yeah, it's great. It cost me 10% of my money.

A list

N: Hi mom. On top of your bathrobe is a towel and on top of the towel is a flea and on top of the flea is a....germ and on top of the germ is a FISH!

Summertime quotes

N: Did you know chopsticks are great for soup?

Mom: No. I didn't. What do they do for soup?

N: They just give it a little kick, you know.

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N: Mom! Lavender ran across the bathroom scale!

Mom: Was that surprising?

N: Well, I almost got to see what her weighment was but she ran too quickly to see it!

First words

N: Mom, when did I say the word "baby"?

Mom: Probably when you were about a year old. You started talking really early.

N: I said "baby" when I was a baby? (laughs)

Mom: Yeah!

N: Did I say a lot of things when I was one year old?

Mom: Oh, yeah. You talked a lot.

N: Could I say stupendous?

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In the middle of dinner.

N: Mom?

Mom: Yes?

N: Do you know what alliterations are?

Plans for the future II

N: (in the car on the way to SF) I wish I could be a nun when I grow up.

Mom: (calmly) Tell me more about that? Why do you want to be a nun?

N: Because nuns are really fun.

Mom: Yeah. Well you could be a nun if you wanted to.

N: No. You can't be a nun and be married and I want to get married.

Mom: You have to be Catholic too, and you're not Catholic.

N: Are all nuns Catholic?

Mom: The Adrian nuns are Catholic.

Dad: There are buddhist nuns too. You could be a buddhist nun.

N: I don't want to be buddhist.

Mom: Why not?

N: I'm not really into buddha.

Mom: You could be Catholic, maybe.

N: No. I don't want to be Catholic, it's not fun at all.

Mom: Why don't you want to be Catholic? I'm just curious.

N: They believe in things that aren't real.

Mom: What isn't real to you?

N: You know. People don't die and then come back to life.

Mom: Oh, yeah, that. Some people just believe that that's a story, a way of thinking about things and are still Catholic.

N: I don't want to be Catholic. It's boring.


And the moral of the story is?

Song before sleep

N: Mom, I know we should be quiet, but can I sing a song about jerboas*?

E: Sure, if it's short.

N: Jerboa, hop, hop, hop, jerboas, hop, hop, hop, hop away from the mountain lions. (etc.)

E: I liked your song, thanks.

N: (laughing) The joke of the song is that jerboas don't live anywhere close to mountain lions.

*jerboas - long-legged rodent that lives in hot desert areas of Asia and North Africa.

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N: Mom, I think A and I are becoming friends.

E: That's great! What do you think has happened that made you start to be friends.

N: I don't know. I just think I'm starting to build onto him.

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Waking up and reading

N: In the morning will you wake me up by singing opera?

Mom: I can try.

N: Oh, good. And then we'll have a snuggle contest.

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N: Watch this, mom. (N sits on the couch and opens up a book)

Mom: What am I watching?

N: I'm silent reading. (N says this as if I have never heard of such a thing)

Mom: That's great!

N: Do you want to watch again?

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N: Mom, what does a chick first think when it sees the world?

Mom: Ooo. What a great question. I bet it's different for each chick. What do you think they first think?

N: I think they must be emazed and think "Wow! what a beautiful world!"

The things we don't know about our parents..

Rushing around in the morning before heading out to school....

Mom: Wait, I think I'm forgetting something.

N: I have my snack!

Mom: Oh, that's it, I forgot my lunch.

N: You need a lunch when go to work?

Mom: I almost always eat lunch at work.

N: You do?

Mom: Yeah.

N: I'VE KNOWN YOU FOR FIVE YEARS and I didn't know you ate lunch at work!


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N: Mom, did you get sick a lot when you were a kid?

Mom: Yeah. I had a lot of sicknesses when I was little.

N: You mean as soon as you got well you just got sick again?

Mom: I don't remember but I think it was like that. I was sick for a long time with several sicknesses.

N: (very serious face) Did you pick your nose and not wash your hands?

Get your Sunday best ready...

N: Mom, I think I'm going to get married two or three times.

Mom: Really? What makes you think that?

N: I just really like people.

First Snow!

We spent the weekend in North Lake Tahoe and introduced N to the snow for this first time. Due to the new stimulation, N came out with some excellent one liners throughout the weekend.

On seeing the snow for the first time while driving she got almost choked up: "I just can't believe it's white everywhere. Oh, it's so beautiful. I can't believe we're really in the snow."

After a few more minutes of driving she offered: "When I grow up I'm going to write books about my life like Laura Ingalls Wilder and the chapter of this trip will be called 'Snow, Finally.'"

We broke off icicles from the roof and handed them to her: "My first icicle!" She broke off another one herself "My second icicle!"

"It's like a piece of glass, but it's cold!"

She also tried to get us to sled down the steepest sled hill available at a park telling us that it's "not THAT dangerous!"

On the way home two days later, N kept herself awake in the car by talking almost without stopping for over forty-five minutes. When she finally ran out of things she wanted to tell us (or steam) she reflected "It's nice to have a chance to talk for awhile. Especially when you don't interrupt me like you usually do."

Reading, writing and its consequences.

After finishing a tour of the Seymour Center at Long Marine Lab.

N: I want to write all about this in my journal.

Mom: That's a great idea. What do you think you will write about?

N: That dolphins know sign language and are smarter than you think.

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N: Dad, let's play "Little House in the Big Woods." *

Dad: O.K. How do we play?

N: Well, I'm Pa and you're Mary, Laura and Ma.

Dad: Uh. That sounds kind of hard.

N: Well, that's the way it's done. Now go into the cosy house and I'll go kill the pig.

* Wilder, Laura Ingalls. Little House in the Big Woods. Harper Collins, New York, NY, 3rd edition 1971.
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