One, Two, Three Funny

Some funny snippets of kiddo conversation:

ONE
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 2am
Reason: Kate has the Croup and sounds like a sea lion.
Scene: Kate is sitting in her jammies in the ER with her arm in a blood pressure cuff. It is the automatic kind, hooked up to a machine. Kate is terrified of what one nurse once called “the huggie bear” and the name – and fear – remain today.

I had a chat with Kate on the way to the hospital, anticipating a meltdown when it came time for “the huggie bear”. I basically told her that she was 5 years old, now, so was old enough to use special tricks to get through it. I told her to think about happy great things while it was going on and JUST when it seemed like it was super tight on her arm, she had to think about the HAPPIEST thing in the world and then, surprise, the tightness would go away. This was a very lame attempt on my part as nothing else had ever worked on getting her to be calm during a BP check. It would lead to a vicious cycle – because of her stress, her BP would be high for a little peanut like her and they would want to check it again. SIGH.

Imagine my surprise when during “the huggie bear” Kate took a deep breath and said “OK, Mom, I am going to try your special trick”. She was tense, but closed her eyes and just as I expected her to say something like “ponies” or “princesses” she took a deep breath and said “Ok. There is an anaconda on my arm. There is an anaconda on my arm. It is squeezing my arm but will go away soon. Go away anaconda, go away.”

Not exactly what I had in mind, but whatever works!


TWO
Location: The Children’s ER
Time: 3:30am
Reason: Again with the croup.
Scene: Kate is getting ready to leave the ER after receiving steroids to make her breathe easier, literally. It is the middle of the night and we are tired…

Nurse to Kate: "Bye bye, Kate! Have a great rest tonight! Get some sleep for me – I am here the rest of the night working."

Kate – turning to look at the nurse – very calmly and frankly says : "Well, you know, if you are lonely and want to talk to someone in the middle of the night, you can call China. Everyone over there is awake right now because it is daytime there, so you won’t wake anyone up and I am sure they would love to hear from you!

Ok, then!!!!!!

THREE
Location: the mini-van
Time: sometime deep into a road trip
Scene: the kids have been in the car for hours and are ready to watch a video. This is from our Colorado trip and I have been meaning to blog about it for a while. I had purchased some special road trip games and videos and had been spreading out the disbursement over the trip. The kids were starting to get antsy so I told them I was about to introduce another surprise. The kids, especially Liam, were SO excited.

Liam, bouncing in his car seat, squealing: “Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!!!!!!”

Kate, somewhat indifferent due to her being pretty fed up with being in the car: “OK, thanks Mom. So what is it?”

Maggie, building it up from the front seat as Nick drives: “I don’t knoooowww. What could it beeeeee?”

I reach into the bag and find the new Strawberry Shortcake video (some gifts were more for Kate, some for Liam) that is tempered in it’s girly-ness in that it is about going to a Dude Ranch and camping etc. Given our wild-west vacay I thought it would be nice. Liam is giggling and squealing and practically escaping his car seat in excitement.

Maggie: “Here it is!!!!” (And I reveal the video).

Liam, instantly freezes in his seat and all joy flies from his visage. “Oh,” he says with a completely flat tone. “It’s pink.” He looks out the window, depressed.

Everyone in the car erupts into laughter. Well, except Liam.