Things Kids Say: Judah's Words Of Wisdom

The coveted green light saber

Judah is our resident 4-year-old who is as extroverted as a Sabo kid comes. He loves people, loves to interact and loves to talk. And he says the funniest things sometimes.

The other morning I was here on the couch starting the morning off right -- reading my Bible and enjoying some coffee. The house is quiet, the kids are still sleeping and I'm in the word with a cup o' joe. Doesn't get much better in the morning.

For some reason Judah had migrated to the couch across from me during the night and was in a heavy state of slumber. As I'm reading I notice him stirring. Then he opens his eyes, starts to sit up and looks right at me. He blinks a couple of times and then says, "The green light saber is longer than the blue one."

Was he dreaming about the green light saber? Was it some sort of prophetic vision involving a light saber duel? I can't be sure. All I know is that the green light saber is longer than the blue one. What else would I need to know?

The other day Seth sat at the table enjoying a yogurt. It was one of those generic little store brand containers of yogurt he was plowing through. It looked pretty tasty to Judah as he sauntered in from the other room where he took a brief pause from watching TV so he asked MerriGrace for one. She dutifully brought him one and while she was still within earshot he opened it and came to a rather devastating revelation: "Holy smokes," he said somewhat under his breath. "I'm going to spill this all over the place."

But he quickly recovered and came to his senses with a request. "MerriGrace," he said, looking over her way in the kitchen. "Can I take this into the family room. I promise I won't spill it."

Needless to say, he ate the yogurt with Seth at the table. I will point out that Judah polished off about half of the container of his yogurt. Seth devoured off two of them.

Another time we were driving home from Taylor's wedding and Judah was in one of the back seats next to Ethan. He and Ethan had a very lively conversation on the way home and we all got lots of laughs. We were in West Virginia somewhere and talking about stopping for a snack at a convenience store. We talked about picking up cans of black beans and corn to snack on. "Who eats black beans and corn?" Ethan said.

Judah had a quick answer: "Seagulls do!"

We have no idea where that came from but you just never know what will go through his mind. And usually what goes through his mind comes out of his mouth. As we proceeded through West Virginia the kids were trying to agree on a movie to watch on the portable DVD players in the van. Ethan suggested "The Santa Clause" starring Tim Allen. But Judah objected. Rather vociferously.

"Oh man!" he said. "That's the worstest movie ever!"

I have a sneaking suspicion Judah was holding out to watch one of the Star Wars movies. After all, he's apparently a kid who dreams about light sabers.

Things Kids Say, And Sing, Are Simply The Best

Judah deep in thought on where to find faith.

To me, age 3 is right about the golden age of childhood. At least from a parent's perspective. The child's vocabulary is expanding by leaps and bounds, they've cleared the diapers stage, there's an uninhibited glee they often express over the seemingly littlest things and their personality blossoms. Judah is our resident 3-year-old and he has a way of putting things that is just so, well, Judah.

For example, one evening a while back he came to me with a very serious question. "Dad," he said, "can you keep an eye on me?"

After suppressing a laugh, because he was quite earnest, I told him I sure could. Then I asked why he wanted me to keep an eye on him.

"I might be up to something," he said.

I told him I appreciated the heads up and then went and kept an eye on him.

The other morning after getting up and playing for a while he came to me while I was in the kitchen. He had some news he wanted to share with me.

"My tummy tells me I'm hungry," he said.

I told him it's good to listen to our tummies when they tell us they are hungry.*

Another thing about Judah is that he loves music. He loves to sing and is always busting out in song. His current favorite is King and Country's "Fix My Eyes." Part of the chorus goes, "Fight for the weak ones, speak out for freedom, find faith in the battle, stand tall but above it all..."

The other night Judah was singing at the top of his lungs his own version of "Fix My Eyes." The chorus went like this: "Fight for the freak ones, find faith in the bathtub."

I love it. I actually like his version better than the original.


*Unless you're like me and have listened to your tummy tell you it's hungry way too much. There are times you shouldn't listen to your tummy when it tells you that it's hungry.

Out Of The Mouth Of Ezra: His Best Quotes

In a family of 14 kids, it takes something to distinguish yourself. Each of our kids has their giftings in  various endeavors such as music, athletics, bug catching, eating, or even eyelashes (see Judah). But hands down the Sabo who has come up with the best quotes is Ezra, now 8 years old. We can sit around as a family and laugh about his humdingers, which roll off his tongue very naturally. Here's the list of our top Ezraisms, in no particular order. What's your favorite?

1) Ezra isn't a fan of thunderstorms, particularly when he was younger. He really didn't like it when someone would leave the door open while watching the show. One time he had enough and ordered the front door shut, barking: "Don't let the thunder in!"

2) The kids -- even our older ones -- all really enjoy playing the game "Town." It entails everyone having a profession and basically operating a town. There's a banker, a sheriff, a thief (it's always Ethan), a baker and a doctor and other professionals comprising Saboville. One time Ezra was apparently under the weather so he went to go see Dr. Claire. He walked into her office and announced, "I'm here to get fixed!"

3) We were at missions training at Serving In Mission when Ezra was just 4 years old. During one of his classes the teacher asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up. Ezra thought about it briefly. "I don't know," he said. "A man or something."

4) Ezra and his brothers were running around the house with their shirts off. Julie wanted to know what was up with that and why they didn't have their shirts on. Ezra was incredulous. What kind of question was that? "Because boys just do dat stuff," he said.

5) There was a certain finality to the way Ezra went about things when he was 3 or 4. There wasn't much gray area, no wiggle room, nothing to be misconstrued. He explained it best this way: "That's just how it be's!"

6) Olivia was newly potty trained and happened to be taking care of business with the bathroom door open. Ezra happened to be running by and saw her in there going potty. As he zoomed by he hollered out, "Keep pushing Olivia!"

7) Ezra was very particular about how he liked his peanut butter and jelly sandwiches back in the day. It had to be just so or it got sent back to the kitchen. But the details could get a little fuzzy and something could get lost in translation if you didn't know what Ezra's instructions entailed, such as whether he liked it cut up in halves or quarters. Taylor was making him a p.b. & j sandwich and was trying to get the particulars. An exasperated Ezra finally announced, "I want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with no jelly, crust off and I want it in halvits and pennies."

8) Ezra and other kids were arguing over who would get the first brownie of the batch Claire was baking. Claire wasn't going to stand for it and asked what they would say if she sent them to bed with no brownies. Ezra responded, "I would call you the unhappiness maker."

9) Ezra and his brothers and sisters were outside riding bikes after a thunderstorm. Something didn't feel right to Ezra, however, and he hopped off his trike. Lo and behold the seat was wet. He ran around a bit and then suddenly scrunched up his face. "Hey," he said, "who peed my pants?"