Zip it .com

One of the wonderful things about pre-schoolers, is that they tell it like it is. One of the worst thing about pre-schoolers, is that they tell it at the top of their lungs at the most inopportune moments. The girls and I were in the gym locker room. I was gathering up our bags, when I notice Ella staring a a lady changing her clothes. I asked Ella to come close to me and help me, so she would stop staring. She enthusiastically yelled, "OK Mommy!! That lady looks like Strega Nona, she has an angry face." I was mortified, I turned to apologize to the woman and low and behold it really was a spiting image of the book character Strega Nona. I murmured an apology and yanked the girls out of the room. Ella kept insisting in a spectacularly loud voice, "She is Strega Nona Mommy, she has lots of wrinkles too!" I whisked her over to a corner and told her that it is not nice to talk about people. She looked at me, wrinkling her little forehead and said, "I was OBSERVING Mommy, just like Sid the science kid." What the heck am I suppose to say to that? So I just told her it is fine to observe but next time whisper her observations into my ear, like a secret. I was feeling pretty good about my parenting skills, when not a minute later Claire my two year old, yells "That man is picking his nose, that is nasty and dirty!" Really??? I then attempt to march the kiddos to the car as fast as I can, but every few steps Ella says, "I need to whisper to you". I bend down and she says, "The grass is green. There is a brown ant on the ground." Two more steps..."Stop Mommy I have a secret....the wind is blowing my hair." So much for my "brilliant" parenting skills.