I was accompanying my eight-year-old daughter who was selling cookies door-to-door for the Girl Scouts. After visiting several homes, she commented on the different styles of doorbells: some buzzed, some rang, some warbled. We made a game of guessing what the next bell would sound like.

At the precise moment she touched the doorbell at one house, the church tower began to chime. She wheeled around with a look of amazement on her face. "Now that's a doorbell!"

*Children's Attempts at Singing Well Known Hymns*

Sometimes kids get things a little......well, maybe these came from kids:

- Give us this day our deli bread!

- Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Whole East Coast.

- We shall come to Joyce's, bringing in the cheese.

- Gladly, the consecrated, cross-eyed bear.

- He carrots for you.

The other night, three-year-old Billy was showing the Terracotta nativity scene in his living room to his stuffed dragon.

"This is an activity scene," he said to the dragon.

"It's when they put breakable things out to watch the Baby Jesus sleep."

I didn't know if my granddaughter had learned her colors yet, so I decided to test her.

I would point out something and ask what color it was. She would tell me, and always she was correct. But it was fun for me, so I continued.

At last, she headed for the door, saying sagely,

"Grandma, I think you should try to figure out some of these yourself!"

When the power failed at the elementary school, the cook couldn't serve a hot meal in the cafeteria, so at the last minute she whipped up great stacks of peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches.

As one little boy filled his plate, he said, "It's about time. At last - a home-cooked meal!"

Nine year old Joey, was asked by his mother what he had learned in Sunday school.

"Well, Mom, our teacher told us how God sent Moses behind enemy lines on a rescue mission to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. When he got to the Red Sea, he had his engineers build a pontoon bridge and all the people walked across safely. Then he used his walkie-talkie to radio headquarters for reinforcements. They sent bombers to blow up the bridge and all the Israelites were saved."

"Now, Joey, is that really what your teacher taught you?" his mother asked.

"Well, no, Mom. But if I told it the way the teacher did, you'd never believe it!"

The kindergarten class had settled down to its coloring books.

Willie came up to the teacher's desk and said, "Miss Francis, I ain't got no crayons."

"Willie," Miss Francis said, "you mean, "I don't have any crayons. You don't have any crayons. We don't have any crayons. They don't have any crayons. Do you see what I'm getting at?"

"Not really," Willie said. "What happened to all them crayons?"

A father was at the beach with his children when his four-year-old son ran up to him, grabbed his hand, and led him to the shore, where a seagull lay dead in the sand.

"Daddy, what happened to him?" the son asked. 

"He died and went to Heaven," the dad replied.

The boy thought a moment and then said,

"Did God throw him back down?"

At one point during a game, the coach said to one of his young players, "Do you understand what cooperation is? What a team is?" The little boy nodded yes.

"Do you understand that what matters is whether we win together as a team?" The little boy nodded yes.

"So," the coach continued, "when a strike is called, or you are out at first, you don't argue or curse or attack the umpire. Do you understand all that?" Again, the boy nodded yes.

"Good," said the coach. "Now go over there and explain it to your mother."

The mother of a large family was explaining why she dresses her children alike, right down to the youngest baby.

"When we had just four children, I dressed them alike so we wouldn't lose any of them."

"Now," she added, looking around at her brood of nine, "I dress them alike so we won't pick up any that don't belong to us."

Because of an ear infection, my young son, Casey, had to go to the pediatrician.

I was impressed with the way the doctor directed his comments and questions to my son.

When he asked Casey, "Is there anything you are allergic to?" Casey nodded and whispered in his ear.

Smiling, the pediatrician wrote out a prescription and handed it to me.

Without looking at it, I tucked it into my purse.

No one can fracture a Christmas carol better than a kid.  Sing along with these new takes on old favorites:

* Deck the Halls with Buddy Holly
* We three kings of porridge and tar
* On the first day of Christmas my tulip gave to me
* Later on we'll perspire, as we dream by the fire.
* He's makin' a list, chicken and rice.
* Noel, noel, noel, noel; Barney's the king of Israel.
* With the jelly toast proclaim
* Olive, the other reindeer.
* Frosty the Snowman is a ferret elf, I say
* Sleep in heavenly peas
* In the meadow we can build a snowman, Then pretend that he is sparse and brown
* You'll go down in listerine
* Oh, what fun it is to ride with one horse, soap and hay
* Come, froggy faithful
* You'll tell Carol, "Be a skunk, I require"
* Good tidings we bring to you and your kid

A salesman telephoned a household and a young boy answered.

"May I speak to your mother?" the salesman asked.

The boy replied, "She's not here right now."

The salesman then asked, "Is there anyone else there?"

The boy replied, "My sister."

The salesman asked, "May I speak to her"?

The boy replied, "I guess so."

At this point there was a long period of silence on the phone.

"My dad is a doctor. I can get sick for nothing," bragged one little boy.

"Big deal," said his friend. "My dad is a minister, and I can be good for nothing." 

One day a young boy ran crying to his mother and rubbing his behind.

His mother said, "Bobby, why are you crying?"

"Because daddy hit his thumb with the hammer!" little Bobby wailed.

"Why, that's not something to cry over," his mother told him. "That should make you laugh."

Bobby rubbed his behind and said tearfully, "I DID laugh!"

A boy was assigned a paper on childbirth and asked his parents, "How was I born?"

"Well, Honey..." said the slightly prudish parent, "the stork brought you to us."

"Oh," said the boy. "Well, how did you and daddy get born?" he asked.

"Oh, the stork brought us too."

"Well how were grandpa and grandma born?" he persisted.

"Well darling, the stork brought them too!" said the parent, by now starting to squirm a little in the Lazy Boy recliner.

Several days later, the boy handed in his paper to the teacher who read with confusion the opening sentence:

"This report has been very difficult to write because there hasn't been a natural childbirth in my family for three generations."

The Sunday school teacher was carefully explaining the story of Elijah the Prophet and the false prophets of Baal.

She explained how Elijah built the altar, put wood upon it, cut the steer in pieces and laid it upon the altar.

And then Elijah commanded the people of God to fill four barrels of water and pour it over the altar. He had them do this four times.

"Now, said the teacher, "can anyone in the class tell me why the Lord would have Elijah pour water over the steer on the altar?"

A little girl in the back of the room raised her hand with great enthusiasm. "To make the gravy," came her enthusiastic reply.

Image credit: www.coolskies.net/holyland 

"Everyone has feelings, except for snakes and principals."
- Donna Maria G, age 9

"Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and the world laughs at you."
- Rob P, age 8

"If life gives you nothing but lemons, make up a better shopping list for it."
- Steven B, age 8

"Moses came down with the Ten Amendments, which were God's Bill of Wrongs."
- Susie F., age 7

"Doctors automatically know what's wrong with you. They have a sick sense."
- Beau M., age 10

"All I Need to Know about Life I Learned From a Snowman.... "

--It's okay if you're a little bottom heavy.

--Hold your ground, even when the heat is on.

--Wearing white is always appropriate.

--Winter is the best of the four seasons.

"All I Need to Know about Life I Learned From a Snowman.... "

It's okay if you're a little bottom heavy.

Hold your ground, even when the heat is on.

Wearing white is always appropriate.

Winter is the best of the four seasons.

It takes a few extra rolls to make a good midsection.

There's nothing better than a foul weather friend.

The key to life is to be a jolly, happy soul.

We're all made up of mostly water.

You know you've made it when they write a song about you.

Accessorize! Accessorize! Accessorize!

Avoid yellow snow. Don't get too much sun.

It's embarrassing when you can't look down and see your feet.

It's fun to hang out in your front yard.

Always put your best foot forward.

There's no stopping you once you're on a roll.

Little Billy took his girlfriend downtown to get married.

The marriage license clerk smiled and explained that they were both much too young.

Little Billy asked, "Could you give us a learners permit then?"

A mother was telling her little girl what her own childhood was like.

She said, "We used to skate outside on a pond. I had a swing made from a tire; it hung from a tree in our front yard. We rode our pony. We picked wild raspberries in the woods."

The little girl was wide-eyed, taking this in.

At last she said, "I sure wish I'd gotten to know you sooner!"

I overheard two children discussing their selection in the video area of a store.

One boy took Disney's CINDERELLA off the shelf, pointed to the drawing of the title character on the cover, and said, "Oh, she's really good. I saw her in ALICE IN WONDERLAND."

When Diane found out she was pregnant, she told the good news to anyone who would listen.

Her 4-year-old son overheard some of his parents' private conversations.

One day, when Diane and her 4-year-old were shopping, a woman asked the little boy if he was excited about the new baby.

"Yes!" the 4-year-old said, "and I know what we are going to name it, too. If it's a girl we're going to call her Christina, and if it's another boy we're going to call it quits!!"

No matter how kind you are, German children are always kinder.

If Mom says "No," ask Nana;

if Nana says "No,"... who are we kidding?? Nana never says "No!"

Our three year-old granddaughter, Audrey, had just been through an episode of potty training by her Mom, who expressed concerns about her slow progress.

Audrey, somewhat tired of the process, turned to her Mother and asked:

"Can't we forget the potty training and just be friends?"

Two young boys were spending the night at their grandparents.

At bedtime, the two boys knelt beside their beds to say their prayers when the youngest one began praying at the top of his lungs, "I PRAY FOR A NEW BICYCLE. I PRAY FOR A NEW NINTENDO. I PRAY FOR A NEW PVR..."

His older brother leaned over and nudged the younger brother and said, "Why are you shouting your prayers? God isn't deaf."

To which the little brother replied, "No, but Grandma is!"

My son Zachary, 4, came screaming out of the bathroom to tell me he'd dropped his toothbrush in the toilet.

So I fished it out and threw it in the garbage.

Zachary stood there thinking for a moment, then ran to my bathroom and came out with my toothbrush.

He held it up and said with a charming little smile, "We better throw this one out too then, 'cause it fell in the toilet a few days ago."

That SpongeBob: so self-absorbed.

Late one Saturday evening, I was awakened by the ringing of my phone.

In a sleepy grumpy voice I said hello. The party on the other end of the line paused for a moment before rushing breathlessly into a lengthy speech.

"Mom, this is Susan and I'm sorry I woke you up, but I had to call because I'm going to be a little late getting home. See, Dad's car has a flat but it's not my fault. Honest! I don't know what happened. The tire just went flat while we were inside the theater. Please don't be mad, okay?"

Since I don't have any daughters, I knew the person had dialed my number by mistake.

"I'm sorry dear," I replied, "but you've reached the wrong number. I don't have a daughter named Susan."

"Wow, Mom," the young woman's voice replied. "I didn't think you'd be this mad."

Although we had recently moved into a new neighborhood, our young son had already made many new friends, ten of whom were invited to his birthday party. When the happy day arrived and he opened his presents, I was amazed to see that eight guests had presented him with sweaters.

Later I visited the mother of one of the boys to explain about the multiplicity of sweaters in the hope that an exchange might be arranged.

She said coolly, "Well, after all, you were the one who wrote on the invitation what you wanted me to buy."

 Moms work their buns off all day and yet somehow nothing is done at the end of the day...this is why.

One day I found Morris, my five-year-old son, with the telephone, which he quickly hung up when he saw me.

"What were you doing?" I asked him.

"Calling Aunt Sarah."

"How could you have called Aunt Sarah?" I asked. "You don't even know her number."

"Yes, I do and I did call her," little Morris replied.