"You just take some raw meat, and plop some jam on it and smush it up. Then it’s perfect."

(Sighing): "Mommy, if I could have three wishes, one of them would be for you to have keener ears."

Mommy, how much imagination do we have?

Do you know what cave cats eat? (Bugs, it turns out.)

Did you know Blackie [her stuffed kitty] is the only cave cat in the world?

Where does the word ‘fir tree’ come from?

Can washing your face be one of the dailiest things in the day?

Beanie: "When I grow up, I’m going to have a canary. And several parakeets. And a parrot. And a cocktail."

Beanie: "Whew! I’m tired and thirsty! I think I’ll have a nice, refreshing milk mustache."

The six-year-old, overheard: "Smushilo, smushilari, smushilavi, smushilatum! I smush, to smush, I smushed, smushed!"

(Funny, I don’t recall that track on the Latin for Children chants CD.)

A request from Beanie, uttered with the earnestness only a six-year-old can express: "Mommy, I would like to hear about my past."

Beanie: "Mama, what’s the answer to the question you asked Rose?"

It is 7 a.m. Rose is still in bed. This question, whatever it was, must
have been asked yesterday. Or who knows when. I ask Beanie what
question she means.

Beanie: "Remember? The one you asked."

Me: "Um. No. What question did I ask?"

Bean: "I can’t remember. But I really want to know the answer."

Flipping through Rose’s Latin book, I saw a snippet of vocabulary: "Mea
culpa—my fault." Underneath them, Rose has penciled in: "But what about
it’s NOT my fault?"

Rose: "Mommy, are we a happy tohubohu?"

That we are indeed, my dear!