Random Quotes, issue one

Below are all the quotes I wrote in one document on my phone.  There may be repeats.  If I go through them all to make sure they've never been posted here, they may never make it onto here.

 

1/31/21

Allie, singing Pirates of Penzance:

"How beautiful his tail, how rare his beauty

How beautiful his BUTT."

(The real lyrics are: "How pitiful his tale, how rare his beauty...")

2/3/21

Nicole after seeing My Fair Lady: “Wait, is that the end?? How did they solve the problem?!


Another time...

Allie:  "Does alcohol change your bum like brown?"

Me:  "No."

Allie:  "What does it change? What does it change????"


3/5/21

Allie pauses while eating her soup: “I was actually not expecting this. I was expecting...peas.”

2/26/21

Nicole’s face all scrunched up and confused: “This doesn’t sound like music.” (Italics)


3/6/21

Nicole: “Wow, that’s a lot of poop!”

Allie looks up and smiles coyly, and says: “Indeed.”


3/29/21

Allie:  “Mommy, all my dolls already ate fluoride, including the cheetah—it’s lost, but it already ate fluoride.”

4/8/21

(After I put lotion on Allie.)

Allie:  “Trying to eat,” she whined. “Why did you disturb me??”

Another time...
Allie:  “May I please have one a different of a blanket?”


4/9/21
Allie did all the CVC flash cards Auntie sent her. After reading the word, “pip,” she said, “That is not a very nice word. It’s weird.”


Sometime in March 2021:

Daddy says to Allie, “Can you elaborate please?”

Allie opens her eyes wide in concentration and gurgles.


4/11/21

Nicole, after presenting her Primary lesson to the bishop's wife and their children:

“You may now...escape.”


April 2021

Me:  “You can have a little bit of cereal.”

Allie: “I’m scared of a little bit of cereal!”

Nice try.

4/23/21

Allie to Nicole:  “I pip you.  A ‘pip’ is another word for seed.”


5/14/21

Allie: “I wouldn’t say, ‘bald.’  That’s a weird word. ‘Bald’ means you have no hair.”


5/18/21

The wind kept blowing Allie’s paper that she was trying to hold down with rocks. Finally, an exasperated Allison yells, “Exhausting!”


5/20/21

What Nicole said about the chocolate milkshake that she didn’t like:

“It kind of tastes like a garden. A garden that has never been watered, or cared for, or loved.”


At the RS activity tonight, we were painting and there was also some chocolate in the middle of the table. I ate some and gave a piece to Allie.  She asked for some more but I said that was enough. I turn around to socialize and when I turn back to our table, I see Allie has painted with a Q-tip in purple paint, “choclit.”  You know what her mind was on.


Sensory details:
Nicole’s description of what it felt like to put lotion on her broken skin:  
“It felt like it was on fire and someone was pinching it over and over again.”


6/5/21

At the track meet in the sun, Nicole:

“It feels like someone lit me on fire and put hot water all over me that is a thousand degrees.”


6/6/21

Conversations with Nicole:


Nicole:  “I hope a girl wins.”

Me:  “Why?”

Nicole:  “Because, if a boy wins, he’ll probably be all selfish.”


“They’re gonna lose! Yay!”

“You want those girls to lose?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Well, those girls are ‘Barbie Babies,’ and Barbies are bad!”

“Do you know what Barbies are?”

“Yeah, they’re these little toys that other girls like to play with.”


6/17/21

Nicole:  “The only cakes I like are Brazilian cakes.  They’re spongy, I like the sponginess.  Other cakes are like crackers.”


6/29/21

Allie, around sunset: “It’s a beautiful world. It’s a beautiful world…[I could] stay outside forever.” With a sigh, “It’s a lovely night.”


9-7-21

Nicole:  “...and then I would have a thousand dollars, and I would be rich, and I don’t want to be rich.  Plus, people would think I was cool, and I don’t want to be cool; I want to be ugly.”

Allie:  “You’re ugly right now.”

Nicole:  “Thank you.”


10/12/21

Alarm goes off on the way to pick Nicole up from school.  

Allie sings along, “Time to leave, time to leave.”  She chuckles, “We’re already leaving, Bud.”


10/25/21

Nicole describes her painful brain freeze: “It felt like my brain was about to be split in half.”


11/6/21

Nicole:  “Okay Allie, you won Quaker.”

Allie:  “One, two, three, talk!”

“Okay!…”

Another time...

Allie speaks something that no one understands.  “Seh Fwah, foo tup, put on.”

Daddy:  “I didn’t understand any of those words.”


11/7/21

Allie:  “I’m fine with everything.  I mean I’m happy with everything.  I’m happy if it’s good, I’m fine if it’s bad.”


11/21/21

Allie is holding her baby doll in her lap and starts singing very loudly, “…You failed to kill the alien!…”


11/21/21

Nicole interviewing Allison about which necklace pendants she liked:

Nicole: “What if I gave you this one?”

Allison: “I would have a smile on my face but I wouldn’t be happy.”

Forgiveness, and Everything's Fine

Yesterday, Nicole and Allison were being rotten to each other, so I separated them and put them into time-out for a while.  I later had them apologize to each other and say something nice to each other.  Allison, with a big smile, squeezed Nicole in a giant hug.  Nicole, however, remained a cold statue, so I sent her back to time-out.  Allison asked why I had sent Nicole back to time-out.  I told her it's because Nicole hadn't forgiven her.  Allison said, "I don't care if she forgives me."

"What do you care about?" I asked.

"I care about Nicole," she said.

At the butterfly world

Tonight, I read the children's book, Chrysanthemum, to Allison.  In the book, Chrysanthemum loves her name...until she goes to school.  At school, everyone has short names, like Jo, Pat, Max, Eve, Sue, and Rita.  The other children think Chrysanthemum's name is too long, and it doesn't even fit on her name tag.  I asked Allison how she thinks Chrysanthemum should feel.  "Fine," she said.  I asked her how she would feel if she were Chrysanthemum and all the children thought her name was too long.  She said, "Fine."  I asked her what she thinks Chrysanthemum should do.  She said, "Maybe she should make her name 'Chrys.'"

Guess which uncle the one in black pencil is

We like to call this "the sad ghost."

Sewing by Allison, under Grandma's supervision

Paintings by Allison

 

 

I made graham crackers in the shape of hearts.  This one was a triple heart.  I split it in half for Nicole and Allie, and naturally, Allie discovered it looked like an ear.

 

She's learning a lot this year

Yesterday, Nicole told me that they visited another class where they ate mealworms.  In her straightforward, no-nonsense, sincere way, she said, "I ate five of them.  They were really good."  She told the other students right afterward, at lunch, that she liked the mealworms, and they just sat there and stared at her.  Finally Janie said, "I don't believe you."  Apparently, a bunch of the kids who ate the mealworms felt sick afterward (because they had lunch right after), and one boy felt so badly that he was going to throw up that he wore an N95 mask.

Another doozy - Nicole's teacher told the class that her older brother was chopping wood once and wasn't paying attention and chopped his thumb off, and then she showed a slide of his severed thumb to the class.  Nicole said that a bunch of the students closed their eyes or felt sick, but, in her own words, "I was perfectly fine.  I was like, 'Huh, interesting.'"  Hahaha

One more to showcase the unique value of Nicole's teacher - The teacher was teaching them about the human body, and they were studying the stomach that day.  So they filled plastic bags with a whole bunch of food and stuff and squeezed it around to look like the inside of a stomach, and then Nicole's teacher reported that Conrad had thrown up.  I can only approve of this science lesson.

Card to Mommy

Nicole and Allie decided to make a card for me today.  Allie drew her picture first, then Nicole.  I like it!

Church lesson

Today, Daddy was giving a church lesson to the children about us being created in the image of God; ie. human beings have bodies like God's body.  So he asks Allison, "What does Jesus have that's a part of his body?"

She says, "Skeleton?"

"What else?"

"Uh, lungs??"

So Daddy searches for a picture of Jesus and shows it to Nicole.  "Nicole, what else does Jesus have?"

Nicole:  "A brain?"

Allie:  "Skin?"

Daddy:  "What else do you see in the picture?"

Allie:  "The sky?"

Finally, after further prompting, they give normal answers like "eyes" and "a chin."

Strange children.

Sensory details and the Harvest Festival

As I may have mentioned before, Nicole seems to have a talent for head-cocking and, at times, mercilessly critical descriptions.  Here are some things that Nicole has said that I've jotted down over the past several months.  I've put them in descending order by date so my favorite can be the last:

 

10-25-21
Nicole describes her painful brain freeze:  "It felt like my brain was about to be split in half."

 

6-17-21

Nicole:  “The only cakes I like are Brazilian cakes.  They’re spongy, I like the sponginess.  Other cakes are like crackers.”  (Not a very good endorsement of other cakes.)

 

6-5-21

At the track meet in the sun, Nicole:

"It feels like someone lit me on fire and put hot water all over me that is a thousand degrees."

5-20-21

Nicole’s description of what it felt like to put lotion on her broken skin:  

"It felt like it was on fire and someone was pinching it over and over again."

 

What Nicole said about the chocolate milkshake that she didn’t like:

“It kind of tastes like a garden. A garden that has never been watered, or cared for, or loved.”

 

****************

At the end of September, we attended the local harvest festival, where Nicole and Allison had way too much fun.

We went to the festival once with Daddy, and returned a few days later with just me and the kids.  On our return visit, we discovered the "kids only" section.  There was an amazing two story castle with dress-ups and a Cinderella carriage.  Nicole and Allie donned adorable dresses and were having such a charming time when they suddenly discovered the world beyond the fence.  Staring through the fence, they saw a world that was better than the one they were living in.  "How can we get in there?" they asked.

So we left the castle and the princess carriage and the dress-ups and entered the mini village, which read at the entrance, "For 12 years and under."

Nicole and Allie were each whisked away into two entirely different fantasies.  Nicole was dressed up like a police woman and kept running around the village in chaos; at one time, she sprinted past me shouting urgently, "A case to solve!  A case to solve!"  Juveniles were running around all over the place, often in police uniform or fireman attire; there was tons of shouting and crime; arrests were being made left and right.  So many events were happening at once, I have no idea what went on there.

Meanwhile, Allison discovered the nursery school, where she acquired a baby in a car seat.  She peacefully tended to all her baby's needs, and then ventured out into the village.  She moseyed around the village, stopping by the ice cream parlor, pausing to adjust her baby's car seat straps amidst the doughnuts and ice cream all over the floor.  She later returned to the nursery to tend to her baby, and managed to gain another baby, who she placed in a car seat.  She visited the local schoolhouse, where she sat against the wall listening to the school teacher's lecture--her babies in car seats placed carefully beside her.  At one point, she took both babies with her for a ride in the car.  Wanting to investigate something, she left the babies alone beside the car briefly.  But when she returned a moment later, the babies were gone!  One of the ever vigilant teenage workers had whisked the babies away, and was already striding toward the nursery to put them in their rightful place.  Allison looked around, wondering.  Where could her babies be?  As a witness to the crisis, I quickly pointed Allison in the direction of the kidnapper, tipping her off that the nursery would be her best bet.  Allison arrived only barely in time.  Other children were already clamoring to claim her babies.  She competently fought them off with stern words, "That was my baby," and perhaps a bit of gentle force.  She soon learned the hazard of governing two babies in a community of 2 to 4-year-olds, as she often had to divert her attention to fend off other children from one baby while she had been busy tending to the other.  And, of course, now having her attention on that baby, the other becomes a target.  And so on.

The doctor visit

The butterfly cakes I improvised for Allison's birthday.  It was going to be a double layered round cake, but it occurred to me as I was baking them that I could do a butterfly...and then I realized two butterflies was better and easier!
 

The day after her birthday this year, Allison was to see the doctor for her well-check visit.  She was excited.  She loves going to the dentist and the doctor.  The morning of her doctor visit, we were in the car, having just dropped Nicole off at school.  Allison says:

A:  I like both of them.

Me:  Who?

A:  The doctor and the dentist.

Me:  Why?

A:  Because…….they help people.

At her appointment, the doctor advised Allison could get her kindergarten shots now, so she wouldn't remember them.  I told her, "Oh, Allie likes shots."  The doctor said, "We don't get much of that!"  

When the nurse came in, Allison was giddy with excitement.  She told the nurse that she liked shots; they tickle.  She watched the 1 inch needle go into her thigh, and just grinned broadly.  When the second shot was administered into her other leg, I could tell it hurt a little because she flinched, but then she just giggled, and we talked about how much she loves shots.  She was so energized after coming out of her doctor appointment!

When Allison decides something, it's decided.  It's pretty pointless to ever get her to change her mind through persuasion.  If it's fun, of course, she'll often follow.  I guess she decided shots are the best!

 

Proudly displaying her band-aid after getting her shot

 

 

Unfortunately, a month later, I took both Nicole and Allison to get their flu shots, and Nicole requested that she go first, because she thought that would help her be braver.  Well, that didn't work.  She cowered behind me as if I were a shield between her and the nurse, trembling and pretty much in tears.  The nurse was eventually like, "I have a hundred more of these to administer today, so we gotta do this."  So when it was Allison's turn, she reflected Nicole's fear--though not to the same extreme.  I've learned my lesson:  Don't take Allison along when Nicole gets shots, or at least have Allison go first!