This morning in an attempt to keep my children from driving my mother crazy, I started a game of Simon Says with my girls.

“Simon says, ‘Act like a chicken!”

Commence squawking and pecking of the ground.

“Simon says, ‘Act like dog!'”

Cue barking and sniffing.

This went on until the girls got tired of it and started getting restless. My mother had built them a fort so I said, “Simon says, ‘Pretend you are sisters on a camping trip. Aubrey is Victoria, and Emma is Hannah Ontana…” (These are their alter egos of choice when playing pretend.)

Aubrey lost her every loving mind. She started screaming, “Noooooo! She is NOT Hannah Ontana!”

“Why?” I asked. “Emma who do you want to be?”

“Hannah Ontana.”

Aubrey, “UGGGGGGHH!” (I normally don’t type ‘ugh’ because nobody actually SAYS ‘ugh’, but she definitely said ‘ugh.’)

“WHY?” I asked again.

“BECAUSE SHE IS NOT EVEN THAT POPULAR!!!”

I fell out of my chair I was laughing so hard.

“AND DON’T YOU DARE PUT THIS ON FACEBOOK! I SWEAR MOMMA”

I laughed harder, “Why?”

“BECAUSE! That is called getting into my business!!!”

Oh, crap. There goes mommy’s writing career.

Aubrey: Momma, know how much I love you?
Me: As much as Moo? (Her very favorite stuffed animal she has had since her first birthday.)
Aubrey: Welllllll….I love you both the same.

I am in the kitchen getting a few things ready for dinner, when Aubrey walked in, hugged my leg and said, “Know how much I love you Momma?”

Me: Enough to help me clean?

Aubrey: Um. No.

Me: Oh.

Aubrey: Well, I do really love you.

Mm-hmm.

This morning while Aubrey and Emma were eating breakfast Aubrey asked, “Momma, is the tooth fairy real?”

I paused. “Honey, the tooth fairy is like Santa Claus. We just pretend because it’s fun, but it’s not real.” (Click here to read why I tell my children Santa is pretend.)

“But Momma, the kids at school think Santa is real.”

“That’s okay, Aubrey. Santa was real, but Mommy and Daddy just think at Christmas time it’s more important for us to think about Jesus.”

“Oh,” she said as she took a big bite of Cheerios.

“Momma,” Emma piped in, “is Jesus still a baby?”

Aubrey began laughing hysterically, “Oh Emma! He is bigger than you think!!”

We got a wii yesterday. Aubrey (5) and I got really into making miis for everybody in the family, including Baby Sadie (18mos). (A mii is an avatar, or image you make of yourself. You can choose different face shapes, eye color, etc. It is hilarious how much you can make a mii look like someone.)

At any rate, we were working on my mii, and I made myself super tall and skinny. Aubrey looked at me and said while laughing hysterically, “Momma, I think you need to be a little fluffier!”

I’m introducing “Back in the Day…” as a way to blog about stuff that happened B.B. (before the blog.)

This morning I was feeding Sadie breakfast and she burped, then giggled. I laughed with her and said, “Sadie say ‘Excuse me.'” She attempted to say it but not before I remembered how when Aubrey was around the same age, she used to say, “bacon,” every single time she burped.

I have zero idea where Aubrey got the idea that you were supposed to say “bacon” after you burped but my sister and I found it so hysterically funny we started saying it too.

When Aubrey was a little over two years old, Zeb’s brother graduated from Marine Corps boot camp. We drove to Paris Island, S.C. from Savannah, Ga. for the day to celebrate and cook out with his family. We ate hot dogs and hamburgers and spent time with Zeb’s siblings before loading up and heading home.

On the drive back, Aubrey and Emma were in the back seat with my niece, Faith, watching The Little Mermaid. All of a sudden the car windows rattled as Aubrey burped like a full grown man. I was waiting for her to say, “bacon,” but instead I heard, “Mmmmm! Nummy hot dog!”

It’s okay to throw up in your mouth a little bit, I’m pretty sure that’s what Aubrey did.

Today Aubrey and Emma went to their first day of dance camp. As soon as I walked into the gym to pick them up, Aubrey ran up to me yelled, “Check out my moves!” then showed me her jazz hands whilst simultaneously shaking her hips. Then screamed, “MOMMA! Did you know there is a girl here who looks just like a boy?!”

I grabbed them and ran.