A Mother's Dictionary

Bottle feeding: An opportunity for Daddy to get up at 2 am too.
Defense: What you'd better have around de yard if you're going to let the children play outside.

Drooling: How teething babies wash their chins.


Dumbwaiter: One who asks if the kids would care to order dessert.


Family planning: The art of spacing your children the proper distance apart to keep you on the edge of financial disaster


Feedback: The inevitable result when the baby doesn't appreciate the strained carrots.


Full name: What you call your child when you're mad at him.


Grandparents: The people who think your children are wonderful even though they're sure you're not raising them right.


Hearsay: What toddlers do when anyone mutters a dirty word.


Impregnable: A woman whose memory of labor is still vivid.


Independent: How we want our children to be as long as they do everything we say.


Look out: What it's too late for your child to do by the time you scream it.


Prenatal: When your life was still somewhat your own.


Preprared childbirth: A contradiction in terms.


Puddle: A small body of water that draws other small bodies wearing dry shoes into it.


Show off: A child who is more talented than yours.


Sterilize: What you do to your first baby's pacifier by boiling it and to your last baby's pacifier by blowing on it.


Storeroom: The distance required between the supermarket aisles so that children in shopping carts can't quite reach anything.


Temper tantrums: What you should keep to a minimum so as to not upset the children.


Top bunk: Where you should never put a child wearing Superman jammies.


Two-minute warning: When the baby's face turns red and she begins to make those familiar grunting noises.


Verbal: Able to whine in words


Whodunit: None of the kids that live in your house.


Whoops: An exclamation that translates roughly into "get a sponge."