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| Me: | "These are your good boots, right? They don't leak? Your feet are dry right now?" |
| Luke: | [age 8] "My feet are as dry as a pig's glooger." |
| Me: | "What's a glooger?" |
| Luke: | "The dry part of a pig, obviously." |
HERMIT CRABS: original video from And I’m the Dad
We visit beaches as often as possible. Many times, the kids will find and catch little hermit crabs, putting them in a blue bucket that we bring with us. This particular time, we brought along a waterproof camera (Sony Cybershot DSC-TX10) and took video of the crabs being picked up, crawling all over each other in the bucket, and finally being released en masse.
We’ve since learned that you should not take marine hermit crabs home from the beach, if you were curious. We looked it up before trying it, and simply put: if the stress of the relocation doesn’t kill them, it is difficult to give them the proper environment to keep them alive. So leave them at the beach.
Kind of odd timing to release this video when our other marine video (Sea Jellies) was just posted last week. Maybe I don’t want winter here yet.
| Beth: | [age 4] "Mommy, can I please have some of your sandwich?" |
| Mom: | "Yes, you can have one bite." [hands Beth the sandwich, of which Beth takes a bite] |
| Beth: | "Here you go, Mommy." [hands back sandwich] "Can I please have a drink of your water?" |
| Mom: | "Yes, you can have a sip." [hands Beth her water thermos, from which Beth takes a sip] |
| Beth: | "Here you go, Mommy." [hands back thermos] "Thank you." |
| Mom: | "You're welcome! And you said that very nicely." |
| Beth: | "Okay, but when I was drinking, I also put some of your sandwich in your water." |
| Beth: | [age 3] "Let's play 'Princess Feeds the World'." |
| Me: | "Hmm. I've never played that before. You'll have to tell me what to do." |
| Beth: | "It's easy! You sit down in that chair and I'll stand over here. This --" [gestures to middle of the room] "-- is the world." |
| Me: | [sits] "Okay. Now what do I do?" |
| Beth: | "You are the Sunshine King. I am the Water Princess. So first we have fly around the world and throw seeds over the ground, like this." [tiptoes gracefully around the room, scattering imaginary seeds onto the floor] |
| Me: | "Can I do that?" |
| Beth: | "Open your hand. ... Here are some seeds." [drops imaginary seeds into my hand] "Now, plant them!" |
| Me: | [attempts to imitate graceful movements around the room] |
| Beth: | "Oh Daddy. Really. No. Not like that at all. Like THIS." [repeats what she did earlier] |
| Me: | "I thought that's what I was doing." |
| Beth: | "You were doing it wrong. Just sit down and let me do it." |
| [she continues hovering around the room, scattering seed, for a minute or two] | |
| Beth: | "Okay. Now we need to water the seeds." |
| Me: | "Can I do that?" |
| Beth: | "No, you are the Sunshine King. A Sunshine King cannot make rain. Only a Water Princess can make rain. Like this." [puts hands behind her back and flutters around the room, passing over the scattered imaginary seeds] "There. I watered the plants with rain." |
| Me: | "Now what?" |
| Beth: | "Now you shine on them." |
| Me: | "How do I do that?" |
| Beth: | "You're a Sunshine King! All Sunshine Kings know how to shine. Just do it!" |
| Me: | "Okay, okay. I'll try." [I get up, put my hands out, and move around the room trying to look like I'm beaming sunrays toward the imaginary seeds] |
| Me: | "How's that?" |
| Beth: | "It's not bad. Do it again. They need more." |
| Me: | [repeats] |
| Beth: | "Stop. That's enough. Now sit down and wait with me." |
| Me: | [sits] "How long do we have to wait?" |
| Beth: | "Until the plants grow." |
| Me: | "Okay. I'm going to talk a sunshine nap. You let me know when they're done." [leans back, closes eyes] |
| Beth: | [waits a minute, then grabs my arm] "Look! They're ready!" |
| Me: | [opens eyes] "Great! So what did we plant?" |
| Beth: | "We have corn and tomatoes and lettuce and carrots. Now we just have to pick everything and give it to the world to eat!" |
| Me: | "Is this enough for the whole world?" |
| Beth: | "Of course it is! As long as you don't eat too much. Now help me pick it or you don't get any." |
| Luke: | [age 7] "Clouds are made of gas, right?" |
| Me: | "Well, water vapor... I don't think it's quite a gas." |
| Luke: | "I mean gas like out of your butt. Are clouds the gas of God?" |
| Me: | "What?" |
| Luke: | "Are clouds the farts of God? Wait, no, that can't be right. Clouds are white. Farts should be brown." |
| Me: | "Brown clouds would be really gross." |
| Luke: | "Or maybe God has special gas. He's God, you know." |
| [Scene: | Luke, age 7, has been splashing at a swimming pool, and just soaked a little girl about the same age as Beth, age 3, who then goes over to her out of sympathy] |
| Beth: | "I am so sorry about that. It was that boy of ours! He does things like that. Oh that boy of ours!" |
