Catherine Connors is a mother, writer and recovering academic who traded the lecture hall for the playroom and discovered that university students and preschoolers have much the same attention span. She still dips her toes into academic waters by writing the occasional scholarly article about the place of motherhood in Western philosophy, but mostly now she changes diapers and wipes noses and indulges in long reflections on whether Yo Gabba Gabba is a harbinger of the decline of western civilization. Oh, and she blogs: in addition to Bad Mother blogging at BeliefNet, she is, among other things, the author of HerBadMother.com, Managing Editor of MamaPop, moderator of Her Bad Mother’s Basement, co-founder and co-editor of WeCovet, Contributing Editor at BlogHer, and (deep breath) founder of and contributor to Canada Moms Blog. And in her spare time… oh, wait. She doesn’t have spare time. But she’s okay with that.
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What happens when you try to really explain to a precocious, dinosaur-obsessed three-year old about Moses and the Ten Commandments:
Emilia: Moses was this man and God gave him the Demandments on some rocks?
Me: Stone tablets, which are like rocks, only they look like paper, sort of.
Emilia: Paper rocks?
Me: Well…
Emilia: Did God send them in the mail?
Me: No, he sent them down from the sky.
Emilia: Where he lives.
Me: Basically.
Emilia: Did he throw them?
Me: Well, not really…
Emilia: How did he get them down?
Me: He, um, reached…
Emilia: Does he have really long arms?
Me: No…
Emilia: Did he drop them?
Me: Well…
Emilia: Was it like when the rock came out of the sky and killed the dinosaurs?
Me: Well, no…
Emilia: Maybe God killed the dinosaurs!
Me: Well…
Emilia: WITH HIS ROCKS.
Me: Well…
Emilia: Does Barney know about this?
Ten bucks says Barney doesn’t.
















posted October 14, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Oh my gosh–i’m laughing out LOUD! It’s those precious, confusing conversations that really make motherhood so much FUN.
posted October 14, 2009 at 8:17 pm
I love conversations with 3-year-olds.
I told mine that they went extinct because they didn’t listen to their mommy. I *tried* using the scientific explanations but those didn’t work. They haven’t asked since. (They also still don’t listen to me.)
posted November 3, 2009 at 1:15 pm
again, awesomeness.