Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year! One of my favorite parts of the Christmas season is receiving Christmas cards, photos, and letters from family and friends. To return the joy, we have made it a tradition to send out a family newsletter each Christmas, in which we include the amusing things our kids have said during the year. Kids can be so hilarious. Here are some of the Cooney and Clement Family Funnies:

The Clement Kids:

The Laid Back One (6): There is a police car across the street.  The Capitalist (10): Do you think the neighbors are going to get arrested because of the color they are painting their house?

Mom: Can you put away the silverware?   Miniature Me (4 years old): I’m not the maid.

Miniature Me (lying on the steps after throwing a fit) to Dad: Stop being so dramatic!

Eye Doctor: Hello Miniature Me.  It is so nice to meet you.  I know your brothers Max and Gus. Miniature Me: Yeah, well I am the cutest. Eye Doctor: BA HA HA HA HA! Miniature Me:  Dr. C, I have an evil laugh too. Eye Doctor: BA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!! Miniature Me: Do you want to know what my dad did this morning? Unfortunately, we have to skip that part of the story.  Eye Doctor (At the end of the appointment): This is the most fun I have ever had at an appointment, and I look forward to seeing you again next year.

Visiting Priest to Mom: Your son The Capitalist is a good server.  Mom (brimming with pride): Thank you, Father.  Priest: Yeah, last week he served a funeral for me and he told me, ‘I got you covered Father. Just follow my lead.’

Miniature Me (at the grocery store): Can I have a balloon?  Mom: No.  Miniature Me: Please?   Mom: No.  Miniature Me: Pretty Please?   Mom: No.  Five minutes later, Miniature Me: Sometimes nice mothers buy their children balloons.

Watching the Olympics Cycling competition.  Two guys bump into each other on their bikes and fall. The Laid Back One: Ok, who bumped into that guy so he would fall? The Musician (13): No one, he just fell. The Laid Back One (after several minutes): I know what happened. Someone was lying on the race course, shooting arrows from the trees to take him out.

Mom: Miniature Me, go clean up your room.  Get The Laid Back One to help you, but ask him nicely.  Miniature Me: Well I’ll ask him nicely first, but if he won’t help me, I’ll have to ask him hard.

The Laid Back One: You get what you get.  Miniature Me: No, I get what I want.

Miniature Me: I have a game today.  Mom: You are not in soccer.  Miniature Me: Mom, coach said I have to be there on time. So let’s go!  Mom: You are not in soccer, you don’t have a coach, and it is time to do your school work. Miniature Me: Mom, coach is going to be really mad at me. So let’s get going!  Mom: Why do I feel like I am talking to the wall? Miniature Me: Mom, come on! Mom: Go ask Dad.

Three older kids telling Dad all the naughty things Miniature Me did that day. Mom: Well she did a few good things.   She did a great job with her cello.  Miniature Me: Check!     Mom: She  worked hard on math.   Miniature Me: Check! Plus I did a GREAT job on handwriting and cutting.  CHECK! CHECK!  Mom: She also did a good job playing while the big kids were working.  Miniature Me: Another check!  Mom: Then there was reading. Miniature Me: Let’s not talk about reading.  I have 5 checks!  Good enough for today!

Miniature Me (first cello concert, she had already played the two pieces that were on the program.  Her teacher leans over and asks her if she wants to get off the stage): I am going to play another one.  I think you should sit back down.

Isn’t that Miniature-Me a riot? Watch out for her… she might be running the country one day!

 

And here’s The Cooney Gang:

Rascal (7): It’s kind of silly how Mommy always says, ‘Don’t push my buttons.’ I mean, where are her buttons?

Mom, reading about the Blessed Mother: Once there was a little girl who was very loving and generous and kind to everyone. She always obeyed her parents right away, and she prayed very often. God and his angels loved to look down on her from Heaven because she was so good and pleasing to them. Can you guess who she was?   Princess (5): ME! ME! Princess!

Rascal, wearing a backwards black baseball hat and a plaid, unbuttoned Sunday shirt with a white t-shirt underneath, climbs into the van and says in a deep, funny voice: C’mon man, I’m a teenager and I have to sit in  a booster seat?

Mom: Never put anything in your ear.  Feisty (9): But sometimes I see old men at church with things in their ears.  Dad: Those are hearing aids.  Rascal: Hearing aids? I thought they were pieces of cookies. Dad: Why would they have pieces of cookies in their ears? Rascal: Got stuck in there.

Rascal: (Sigh.) I don’t know if I should use my money to help Feisty get that dirt bike or to go to college.

Rascal: If you like mustard, you’re awesome.  Princess: I don’t like mustard.  All-Star (11): If you don’t care about mustard, you’re perfectly fine.  Princess: I can’t stand mustard!

Mom: You better not be hurting each other down there.  Feisty: On, not really. Just punching each other in the guts, sword fighting with sticks, pushing eachother around, smashing eachother, you know. It’s very educational.

Princess: Mommy, I got pink goldfish crackers!  Mom: Yeah?  Princess: (looking crestfallen) Yeah, and I was trying to save some for you, but guess what?  Mom: What? Princess: (with a charming smile) I ate them all.

Feisty: Rascal, you do all the cleaning up and Peter and I will organize, because yesterday you didn’t do any of the cleaning up.  Rascal: Hmm… let me think about that. You clean up while I think about that.

Rascal: Daddy! I can’t sleep! I can’t shut my action off!

Rascal: What’s this called again? A punkett? Or a cuppin? No, a compitt.  Big-Sis: It’s a compass.

Princess: This is so funny! It’s going to crack Mommy up! Into pieces!

Well, here’s hoping these funnies brought out a chuckle, a guffaw, or at least a smile! Our kids really do crack us up, and we hope your kids make you laugh, too. May God bless you and your families abundantly this coming New Year, and may it be filled with lots and lots of laughter.