Funny Phoebe (and other stories)

Admittedly, Phoebe is not always funny. 

Sometimes—not every day, but sometimes—she dumps out a full bottle of water onto a laptop. 

I've matured a lot as a parent (and as a person) since I started raising kids. And I just want to let the record show that I didn't even yell about the laptop (not really). I sat Phoebe in timeout and gave her a little lecture. And Zoë got a little lecture as well (since she's the one who gave Phoebe the water bottle in the first place). But I didn't even yell. 

I yelled at Benjamin through the window this evening—in full view of who knows how many neighbours—to "STOP HITTING YOUR BROTHER WITH THAT STICK RIGHT NOW OR YOU'RE GOING TO REGRET IT!" to which he responded, "I'm not hitting him hard..." to which I responded, "YOU'RE HITTING HIM ENOUGH AND I'M TELLING YOU TO STOP!"

And then when he had stopped hitting Alexander with the stick (or threatening to hit him or whatever was going on there) he refused to stop tormenting him, so I yelled, "HEY, BENJAMIN! I NEED YOU TO CLEAR SPIDERWEBS OFF THE HOUSE, LIKE NOW!"

Because clearing spiderwebs off the house is the same thing as regret, right?

So, anyway, I still yell as a parent. Granted, I was yelling out the window and across several yards...so perhaps it was more like bellowing than yelling. But it's evidence that I do raise my voice at my children. 

Half the neighbourhood heard. 

But I didn't raise my voice about the laptop because...whatever. It was already done. 

Phoebe didn't understand the cause and effect of the water + computer (we're still working on that) and Zoë was miserable because it's the computer she uses the most and she does understand the cause and effect of water + computers. 

So a pat on the back for me on that front (as impossible as that sounds...back, front, get it?).

*****

Most of the naughty things Phoebe does are naughty...and funny (rather than naughty and...computer-killing), so we have to stifle our laughter a lot around here. 

She has been talking up a storm lately and is absolutely hilarious, so buckle up (for me to copy and paste conversations I've been saving up on Facebook):

*****

Phoebe likes to get her own water and ice from the fridge. This is unrelated to the water-on-laptop incident because she's pretty well-trained to stay in the dining room/kitchen area with food and water (the blurred line with the computer was that she had a water bottle that I knew she couldn't have managed to fill herself (so it should have been empty) but which has a lid that screws on (and it was off) rather than one of the many spill-proof water bottles she usually uses)...anyway...

She was standing on a stool by the fridge and she dropped an ice cube.

"Oh, no!" she said. "I dropped my ice!"

And then she looked down, saw the ice cube on the floor, and said, "Hey—good catch, floor!"

...which is possibly the most optimistic response to dropping something.

*****

When we got up on Monday morning to go hiking, Phoebe wanted to know all about time:

Phoebe: What’s this? Oh. What’s that? Oh. What’s this? Oh. What’s that?

Andrew: That’s my clock. You know that. It tells me what time it is so I know when to do things during the day. Can you tell me what time it is?

Phoebe: Yes! I can!

Andrew: You can?! Okay. What time is it?

Phoebe: 🙄 It’s daytime. 🙄 

Andrew: …yup. It is, in fact, daytime. 

*****

When we were driving from our hike to Grandpa and Darla's house, I tried to get Phoebe to repeat her little joke (that she doesn't know is a joke) about time for Rachel, but she came up with a completely different punchline:

Phoebe: Say, “I’m a puppy.”

Rachel: What? You can’t make me say things.

Phoebe: Can!

Me: To be fair, we make her say things all the time. 

Rachel: True. 

Phoebe: Say it!

Rachel: I’m a puppy. 

Phoebe: No! You’re not! I am! Say I’m a puppy!

Rachel: You’re a puppy?

Phoebe: Yeah. You’re a titten.

Rachel: I’m a kitten?

Phoebe: No! A titten!

Me: A chicken?

Rachel: Like the bird?

Phoebe: Yeah! Her is like a bird titten!

Rachel: I don’t think I like this. 

Me: Hey Phoebe—what time is it?

Phoebe: Me puppy!

Me: Fine. Puppy, what time is it?

Phoebe: The chicken can tell you. 

Rachel: I think I’m done being a chicken. 

Phoebe: Then be a kitty!

"The chicken can tell you" is what we've been saying all week long when we think Rachel has information. I don't think I'll ever get over the deadpan way she announced that thought. 

"The chicken can tell you."

It was right around 2:20, by the way. I know because the chicken told me.

*****

Here's a bit Phoebe pulled when the girls were leaving to hang out with friends last week (and it's a bit she repeated—with Alexander, so I guess we know who taught it to her now—this week while the girls were pulling out of the driveway to go hang out with friends, and she'll probably repeat it tomorrow when the girls will be going to a bracelet-making activity for the students at Apalachee (hosted by some YW in our stake because...hi, there...all these kids know each other)):

Big girls: Okay! We’re leaving! Bye!

Phoebe: Bye, suckers!

Rachel (sticking her head back inside the door): Did you just call us…suckers?

Phoebe: Hahaha! Yeah!

Rachel: That’s crazy. 

Phoebe: Hahaha! Suckers!

Rachel: Who taught you that?

Phoebe: I don’t know. 😇

*****

And I think that's about it in my Phoebe repository for now, at least on Facebook. I can also tell you that we saw a turtle today, which was very exciting. We always like getting visits from turtles. 

This was a common box turtle, but it's not very common for us to get box turtles in our yard (that we know about), so we were excited about it. 

Here's Phoebe gearing up to give it a gentle little poke. She was so nervous about touching it. She said, "I don't want it to pounce on me!"

And I was like, "We're going to have to learn more about turtles because they're not really known for their pouncing skills. I think you'll be fine!"

I just love her in these little yellow boots. I try to get a lot of things (a lot of kid clothing in particular) secondhand, not only because it's cheaper that way but also because I'm a bit of an environmentalist. These boots, though, I purchased for Phoebe. I had been asking around about a pair of rain boots her size and hadn't gotten any kind of response (and I, uh, don't often go to thrift stores...even though I like secondhand things) so I decided I would just buy her a pair. Of course, as soon as I did, then someone offered me a pair of rain boots that would fit her soon. 

Anyway, seeing her in these yellow boots makes me so happy for some reason, so I'm still glad I got them (even if she now has two pairs of boots to wear for the time being):

As you can see, rain boots are somewhat of a necessity here because it rains a lot. That said, you can also see that my children enjoy going around barefoot in the rain, so...evidently boots are less necessary than I might think.

Here's our turtle friend safely on the other side of the driveway:

With the turtle out of the way, Rachel and Miriam left. Alexander and Phoebe stood on the sidelines and yelled, "Goodbye, suckers!" And then the kids played outside in the drizzly evening until bedtime.

*****

That was lovely because this morning, Andrew, Rachel, Miriam, and I all got our flu and COVID vaccines for this coming season of respiratory illnesses. Here's Phoebe with her wild hair, snuggling Daddy at the CVS/Target:

We were all happy to get "boosted," though I wish we could have gotten all the kids vaccinated at the same time. None of the pharmacies near us have pediatric COVID boosters in stock right now...so we'll keep trying. And Phoebe can only get her COVID booster at the doctor's offie, which would be cool...except that our doctor's office hasn't been able to get any shipments. 

Anyway, we felt smart about getting all of our vaccines done in one go...until we all started to feel crummy this afternoon. Having all the big people down for the count wasn't perhaps the best timing. But Rachel and Miriam still rallied to hang out with their friends and I still managed to yell at Benjamin through the window, so we weren't completely out of capacity. I certainly was glad the kids decided to just stay outside, though, so I could sit and read and not have them climbing all over me because I am sore!

We were joking about how funny it would have been if we had been able to get Alexander, Zoë, and Benjamin vaccinated as well. Then everyone in the house would have been feeling poorly and Phoebe would have been left to run around like the tiny tornado that she is. 

So perhaps it's for the best that we'll be vaccinating people in installments!

*****

Some more good news is that the laptop is still somewhat functional! We put it in rice hoping everything would dry out (because...that's what you do with cell phones, I guess...so why not computers?) and it did! It turns on and the keyboard and touchpad(s) are all functional. It has some pixelation in the corner of the screen, but I think we'll just have to live with that.

Benjamin asked if he could use some of the rice to make a map (since Andrew decided we probably shouldn't eat it), so I told him that he could. His siblings thought it was such an interesting idea that they all joined in and had a great time designing their worlds together. I'll have to show you the finished product sometime, but here are some pictures of the process:

You basically just dump rice on a paper, shake it around a bit to form "continents" and then trace around all the rice. The tiny grains make for some wonderful borders between land and sea and you end up with some really fun geological features. Then you can place cities and things (Miriam used dice rolls to decide where to place things on her map). They all turned out pretty cool!

For Phoebe I put together a quick sensory puzzle for her to do. I traced some of her alphabet magnets onto a paper, buried them in the rice, and asked her to find them and match them with their outline.