Passing time with the kids: penises, guns, and beer

I'm just waiting these days: waiting for my husband's test results to come in; waiting for the docs to decide what's going on with his foot; waiting for them to decide how to treat it; waiting for generous friends to give me feedback on my book manuscript so I can get to work rewriting it. I've been keeping busy, keeping on the surface of things, trying to make the time pass as pleasantly as possible. So I've been looking over old pictures and notebooks I've kept as the kids grew. Here are some of my favorite kids-say-the-darndest-things moments of 1996.

Jan. 1996
The twins are in a penis stage. They've started drawing figuratively - circle bodies with eyes, nose, mouth, stick arms and legs, and usually a penis. S. showed me her picture today and said, "This is me with a penis." I said, "But S., you don't HAVE a penis. You could draw yourself with a vagina...." To which she replied, "But I want to draw myself with a penis!" Oh that damn Freud.

Jan. 1996
I was gossiping with a friend today about an acquaintance who's a neat freak. I said, "Her house is so CLEAN!"
R. who was nearby said, "And our house is so, so, dirty!"

May 1996
I was sitting with R & S on the sofa and R (R always brings these things up while S just listens and absorbs) said, "Miss D. is my birth mother, right? So what are you?" I answered that I was her "mother by law," which sounded to her like mother-in-law. i tried hard to explain the concept of law and what it had to do with moms and kids and love, but finally I just gave up.

At bed time, as I hugged and kissed R. goodnight, she sighed and said, "Whoever you are, I love you."

August 1996
As I was out walking with R & S up the little commercial area in our neighborhood, I noticed out loud that the local gun shop had been replaced with a hotdog & beer shop. The girls asked if the old store had sold "real guns?"
"Yes, real guns," I said.
R said, "Well that's good, because hotdogs are better than guns."
I agreed. Then she added, "And beer is better than guns."
I agreed again. The S chimed in, "And getting drunk is better than getting killed!"