When a four year old THINKS she's funny...

Ellie thinks she a riot. Sometimes she is, but a lot of the times she's not. Take her practice of calling people a peanut. For one, the way my lovely child says peanut while laughing at herself, doesn't always sound like peanut. Her delivery of "You're a peanut! [insert Ellie's cackle here] catches just about everyone off guard except her four year old friends. I daresay this is probably worse than potty humor. It's really awkward to explain to parents of her classmates or strangers that my child called him (it's usually a man or boy) a peanut. I suppose if her delivery was articulated a bit better I wouldn't have shocked looking people all around me every time she does this. It's been several months now that I've been telling Ellie that it's not funny and it's not nice to call people peanuts. It's not a constant thing, but when it happens I really want to crawl under a rock or say that I'm just babysitting her.

Last night was one of those nights that left me wanting to run and hide. I took the girls to the vigil Mass (today's a Holy Day of obligation). On our way out, a couple that looked very familiar to me stopped me outside the church to ask me if I had a flat tire 6 months ago over by Rowan University. Of course, when he said that to me I immediately thought about my incident of flipping out on someone who tried to commandeer the air hose at Wawa 6 weeks ago when our tire was totally flat. So while I'm thinking to myself "Dear God, please never let me run into those people from the tire incident again in my life.", (And yes, I conducted myself that badly that stressful night when I was very hungry, cranky and tired.) Ellie decides to shout at the bald man "You're a peanut!". Oh I could have died. The couple looking confused and perplexed asked me what she just said. So I told them she called him a peanut and that she herself it a bit nutty and to pay no mind to her. So the wife, I guess trying to help me out agrees with Ellie and says I guess he does look like Mr. Peanut, to which the husband assumed the Mr. Peanut pose. Yep, so now I'm the mother of the peanut insulting child and I'm now hoping I don't run into them at Mass again. It wasn't until I was in the car and battling Mass and CCD traffic to get out of the parking lot that I realized why I looked familiar to them and they looked very familiar to me. I'm pretty sure they're the couple that are tag team teaching a 7th or 8th grade CCD class this year. I sat near them at a catechist meeting.

On the ride home I had another discussion with Ellie about not calling people peanuts. If it didn't always sound like she was saying penis, I probably wouldn't make such a big deal about it. I hope this phase passes soon. If I never hear her say "You're a peanut!" or "You look like a peanut!" again I'll be one happy mom.