Boyfriends and cavemen

Jason: Did you have any boyfriends before Daddy?

Me: Why do you ask, Jason?

Jason: Because I just want to know. Come on, tell me! What were their names?

Sydney: How did the first person come? Was it a baby that was just there alone, or was it an adult, and did God make that first person?

Me: Well, we don't really know. The Bible says God created a man and a woman...

Sydney: Oh, so then they had babies, and those babies had babies, and it just went on and on...

Me: That's what the Bible says, but we think maybe tiny creatures in water evolved over time into things like fish, and some of them evolved into things that could breathe in water and on land, so they left the water. Then all kinds of other animals evolved into things like apes, and some of those apes evolved into early people kind of like cavemen, which had bigger foreheads and smaller brains than people today. But we think they evolved into the earliest people.

Sydney: Oh yeah, those were the guys that drew on cave walls!

Zombies and tongues

Jason: Can you dream or even think when you're dead?
Me: We don't know because...
Jason: [interrupting] That's right, because we're alive so we don't know what happens when you die. Babies know but when they get older they forget before they can tell anybody.
Me: Well, we...
Jason: [interrupting] But how would I tell you that I died? How would I talk to you [getting frustrated]
Me: Well, we...
Jason: [interrupting excitedly] That's right, we become undead zombies and then we rise up and talk. [maniacal laughter lasting awhile]
Me: No, that's definitely not what happens...

Sydney: How can we taste and talk with our tongues at the same time??
Me: Because our tongues have taste buds on them that work together with smell to let us taste foods. But the tongue is also a muscle, and the tongue touches different parts inside of your mouth when you make different sounds.
Sydney: Oh yeah! Like when I make a "T" sounds my tongue touches up here, cool!

Growing and breathing

Jason: How did the first tree grow, without a seed?
Me: We don't know. It is a mystery if the seed existed first, or the tree existed first. Some people ask that question about chickens: "What came first, the chicken or the egg?"
Jason: I wish I could have been there to see the first tree grow - then I would know the answer.

Sydney: How do people get the wind knocked out of them?
Me: If someone gets hit in their stomach very hard by something, then the air gets pushed up and squeezed up out of their lungs. It makes it hard to breathe for a minute or two.
Sydney: Yeah, it happened to me three times: in the summer when I fell 6 feet onto my belly at the park near Aunt Erin's house, once at school on the playground, and today when I banged my belly into the corner of the table at the Pizza place. It was really scary. What if I got the wind knocked out of me forever, and the air never came back?
Me: That's not what happens. The air always fills up your lungs again pretty quickly.

Coffee and canyons

Jason: Why did all the airplanes they tried to make in the old days not work? They were really bad designs.
Me: Because it took a long time for someone to design a plane that could actually fly safely.
Jason: Yeah, those brothers really couldn't make a good plane. What was the name of those brothers -- oh yeah, the Dutch Brothers.
Me: It is the Wright brothers who you are talking about, and they did build the first plane that actually worked. The Dutch Brothers is the name of the drive-through coffee place around the corner!

Sydney: You know that huge giant that stomped around and made the canyons and lakes and everything high up - way back back a long time ago?
Me: No, what giant are you talking about? Giants aren't real...
Sydney: No, Mommy, you are wrong - we learned all about it in social studies. It was a giant that existed before the dinosaurs. I saw a picture of it and I want to know how it was made.
Me: (silent, totally confused)

Everything and the old days

Jason: How did God make the grass grow and everything?
Me: I'm not sure. There was nothing, and then God made everything.
Jason: But why do we not see God, is it because he is inside of us?
Me: Kind of, it's like love. I love you, but I can't see it. I just know it.
Jason: Well I know I love you because you're my mom and I'm your kid. That's how I know.

Sydney: How do things change, like how Grandma and Grandpa were talking about how things were different in the old days?
Me: Because people learn more and more things as time passes, so they can make things better and easier. Do you think things are better now than in the old days, or worse?
Sydney: Things are better now. Kids used to have to go outside and carry back water from a well when they were thirsty in the old days, now we just turn the tap in the sink. I would also never want to live in the old days of George Washington because of the really bad teeth...

Dogs and Gods

Jason: How did the first dog come?
Me: Dogs are related to wolves, just like cats are related to lions and tigers. So a long time ago there were wolves and people started bringing some of them in their houses to live. Little by little those dogs liked people and weren't wild anymore, and they became the earliest domestic dogs - dogs that live with people.
Jason: But how did the first wolf and wild dogs come?
Me: Good question...

Sydney: Why is God in our bellies?
Me: Why do you think God is in our bellies?
Sydney: Well, then what part of our body is God in?
Me: God is everywhere.
Sydney: Oh right, even in the air.

First people and Valentine's Day

Jason: The first person who came to this planet, how were they alive?
Me: Well, you know what Apes are right? Well there were apes, and then a group of them moved away and over a long time they learned how to cook and make fire and make sounds and pictures to let others know what they were thinking - they were cavemen. Those cavemen over time learned to speak and write and make more inventions and they became people.
Jason: Oh yeah, that makes sense! There was no first person, just cavemen!

Sydney: Why on Valentine's Day do we give out candies and other sweets?
Me: Because Valentine's day makes us think of our sweethearts and we want to give sweets and treats to our sweethearts.

Reincarnation and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Jason: I am sad that Grandpa Sol died - really sad. I still want to know if people come back again. If they come back a baby.
Me: I know, you've asked that before but we don't know. We don't know what happens when you die because we are still alive.
Jason: But Mommy, I just want to know what happens - that's all. You are not telling me the truth.
Me: I am telling you the truth, Jason. We don't know the answer. You only know the answer once you die.
Jason [exasperated]: But, then people WON'T remember once they are born new babies. They WON'T be able to tell us!

Sydney: Mommy, why in the old days did they have signs that said "Black" or "White" for where people with different color skin should go? I mean, in the days of Martin Luther King?
Me: I don't know, but it was wrong. It was wrong because we are all people and nobody should be treated better than anyone else.
Sydney: I know - I learned all about it in school. Did you know there was a lady who didn't know that people with brown skin had to sit in the back of the bus, so she sat where the white people sat. And the police came and took her away?!
Me: Yes, her name was Rosa Parks.
Sydney: Yeah, that was really sad. If I had white skin and you had brown skin we wouldn't have been able to sit together. But then Martin Luther King came and fixed it all.

In the old days...

Jason: In the old times, why couldn't people makes clocks, how did they tell time?
Me: What do you think they used?
Jason: The sun - they knew what time it was by whether the sun was up or down. They also used sundials to tell time. But they didn't have calendars, right?
Me: They used the moon as a calendar - when the moon was whole again, they knew that a new month had started.
Jason: Good thing we didn't live back then, because we don't know how to tell time by the sun and days by the moon!

Sydney: In the old times of the Pilgrims, kids had to work all of the days – cooking, cleaning, planting, everything. They didn’t just get to play. But we can, we have freedom.
Me: What is freedom?
Sydney: It means that you can play if you want to, or go to school. You can do anything you want – like play or do video games -- if your mom says it’s okay.

[Note: Right before bed I was reading the kids a Magic Tree House book about Thanksgiving with the Pilgrims, that is what sparked them to ask me independently about the "old times"]

Pain and movies

Jason: Do you know what? My ear was hurting so bad that I just couldn’t stand it. I asked God to help me feel better, but he didn’t want to help me. Why?
Me: I don’t know, Jason. Sometimes things just hurt. But you did finally get better, right?
Jason: Yes, I feel better now. But I am afraid I am going to have a nightmare from that movie at Lucas’ birthday party – Underdog. It was scary in parts, and I just can’t get it out of my brain. I know I am going to have nightmares about it.
[Jason suddenly developed a bad internal ear infection that was misdiagnosed as "swimmer's ear", and his eardrum burst before he got the right medicine - oral antibiotics]

Sydney: Why do they make scary movies? I don’t like it. Underdog had bad guys in it that scared me. I don't want to have bad dreams. I like nice girl movies with happy endings. Movies about nice things – why don’t they make more of those? Why don’t they make only those kinds of nice movies?
Me: Well, they think the scary parts make a movie more exciting. Even princess movies, like Snow White and Cinderella, have bad guys. But they usually do have a happy ending…

Chicken and babies

Jason: Do you know that when you eat chicken, you are eating a real chicken?
Me: Yes
Jason: But we're not supposed to hurt animals! I don't like that...


Sydney: How do babies come?
Me: Well, the most important thing is that there's a mommy to carry the baby in her tummy. But to make a baby you need cells from a man and cells from a women, then you put them together and that grows in the mommy's belly into a baby...

The new year!

Jason: What will we do in this new year?
Me: I don't know - all kinds of adventures I'm sure. What would you like to do in 2011?
Jason: Well, I am afraid to go camping, because there are bears. But I'd like to do fun things as a family - like maybe some hiking or skiing. I was going to say play lots of video games, but I didn't think you'd like that...

Sydney: You know what? I think 2011 will be even better than this year. I think we will be gooder than we were in 2010. We will listen better and concentrate better. And we won't talk rudely.