Out of the mouths of babes...

Well, one babe in particular.

Sometimes grownups forget that kids are around, especially if they're not sitting right in front of them. Kids, on the other hand, are always listening, even if we think they aren't.

Max was in the car with his Aunt Becky & Uncle Bill & Ian a couple weeks ago. Bill was telling a story that happened to have the work f***er in it & forgot to censor himself. Oops! All the adults look at Max, who seems to be oblivious, so they continue on their way after a reminder about appropriate language from Becky. As they pull up to their destination & Uncle Scott comes out to greet them, Max leaps from the car & runs up to Uncle Scott yelling, Hi F***er!
Guess he was listening.

On Tuesday, Ian, Max, Rob, Becky & I were having dinner with Ian's dad at his house. It was the usual banter around the table when Max took advantage of a lull to put in his two cents. As the adults grow quiet, some of us to put more food in our mouths, Max pipes up with "Uncle Robbie, you're a jerk!" He had the biggest smile on his face so you could tell that he had no idea what the word meant. He must have thought he was giving Rob a compliment. He soon figured out that it was not a good word when he looked around the table & saw our faces & heard all three of his names from Ian & I in stereo. His little face just crumpled, poor kid! He & Ian had a conversation about why you shouldn't use words if you don't know what they mean. I can't wait to see what word he comes home with next.

Today, I promised that if he was good during our shopping expedition, we would go to lunch & actually eat at the restaurant instead of getting it to go. He made good on his promise & was even really chatty with the stylist as he was getting his hair cut. That should have been my first clue that something interesting would happen at lunch. When we got to his chosen fast food joint, our first stop was the potty, where he proceeded to chat with the woman in the stall next to us. Luckily she thought he was hilarious. We proceeded to get our food & sit down without incident. As we were calmly eating our lunch, two guys from a local carpet cleaning place sat down at a table next to us. Max kept eating & dancing in his seat while surreptitiously looking over at them. Suddenly, in his not so quiet 4 year old voice, he asked, "Who are those guys? What are they talking about? ARE THEY ON A DATE?" As half the restaurant turns to look at Max & the guys in question, I vacillated between sinking into the floor & laughing hysterically. Luckily one of the poor guys had a sense of humor & replied "No, are you on a date?", with a smile that said he had a niece or nephew that age. To bad the other one didn't quite see the humor in the situation.