Conversations with Confusion.

mmmm, vanilla cupcake

Lion: "Mum, my shirt, It's not green!"

Mummy: "You're right sweetie, it's not green is more khaki."

Dragon: "Our car has khaki!"

Mummy:  "what? No our car is silver."

Dragon replies in an exasperated voice, and starts speaking slowly for silly Mummy to understand.

"No. Muuuuum. It's HAS khaki! Hur-umm" (last bit is his frustrated noise)

Mummy: "What part of our car is khaki?"

Lion: "Mum he is saying our car has CAR-KEYS, you know to start the car."

(In Australia we pronounce that muddy green colour "kar-kee" (with a soft 'r' sound... I'm not good at all those phoneticy explanations)

a reecacino for Dragon (named after one of their kids, I think)

I just walked into the toilet to find Lion standing there pants around his ankles covering his mouth, nose and ears with his hands.

Mummy: "What are you doing?"

Lion: "I'm breathing through my butt"

Mummy: Stares in stunned silence.

Lion "I can you know, I can breathe through my butt".

Mummy: Turns away still in stunned silence but now pondering why on earth he needed to cover his ears too... can he breathe through them as well?

the best babycino I have ever seen

We went out for morning tea this morning with a very pregnant friend and her little guy.  It was a lovely morning, at a very child friendly cafe.  There were none of those "looks" that you get that are filled with daggers if your child so much as lifts their backside off the seat. They must want them to suffocate.  Instead there was a whole stack of highchairs in one corner all in good working condition.  Half the tables were black... With chalk containers on each table for the kids to draw ON THE TABLE!  There was a big set of shelves with plenty of toys.  There was a whole kids menu with a great variety, not just a little section in the main menu with a couple of things like frozen chicken nuggets and fish fingers.  It was FANTASTIC.  The best thing was that Dragon didn't like the vanilla cupcake I bought for him so I got to eat that too!  The following "conversation" was partly in my head and partly Monkey's own words.

my orange cake with lime syrup and cream

(I think this is the most 'homemade' tasting thing I have ever had in a cafe,

the good kind of homemade, it was delicious!)

The kids are all getting tired, we put away all the toys and do a quick tidy of our table and start to leave.  I turn around and while we were tidying Monkey has lay down on the floor too worn out to carry on, he looks up at me...

Monkey: waving "Buh" General translation: "Bye". My translation: "go on without me"

Mummy: "It's time to go"

Monkey: waving/shooing me away "Buh".  My translation: "I'll only slow you down, just leave me here"

Mummy: "hop up, it's time to head home"

Monkey: looking up at me tired and defeated he waves me on... "Buh" My translation: "you've got to leave me here, I'll be fine, you go on without me"

Mummy: scooping up the poor defeated soul... "come on kid, you know our rule 'no one left behind' "

Monkey: waving to all in the cafe as we head out the door "Buh". Translation: "Bye"

I think he just wanted to stay and get some more of that good food!

the aftermath.

The name of the place we went was "Betty Blue and the Lemon Tart".  Dragon asked me 50 times on the way there what it was called.  In the end he just started calling it "The Lemon Tart and the Blue Balloon"... I think that's going to stick.

The really scary thing about these conversations is that I just went to a public meeting with a bunch of adults getting up and having their say and I did occasionally have the thought cross my mind that talking with my kids makes more sense than what some of them were saying... I also had the though cross my mind that some of them were talking out of their... well, anyway, that's all for today.

"Buh"