Mum's The Word - March 8, 2016

Even when you don’t think they’re listening.

Take the other day when William was at his Grandma and Grandad’s house.

The little chap’s Grandma was telling her neighbour Olive – or “Oliohhh” as William calls her – that she needed to put a colour on her hair at the weekend.

(Sorry Grandma, I’m giving your secrets away here!)

William seemed too busy playing with Postman Pat and his van to have heard the conversation, never mind take any interest in hair dyeing chats.

Nonetheless, he must have had one ear on what was being said, as the next moment he picked up some felt tips, walked behind his Grandma and started colouring her hair! It wasn’t her normal look; but the purple and blue streaks actually looked rather fetching.

Then the other day William took a new pencil out of a pencil case and said “not working”. I explained we needed a sharpener and went to get one out if the drawer.

When I came back, he’d found one in the pencil case and even started using it. I didn’t realise he knew what a sharpener was – never mind how to use one!

And take William’s supermarket trip with his other Grandma last week... She was putting a couple of bottles of wine in the trolley and said to the little chap: “We’ll get a couple more of the one Grandpa likes”.

(It was coming up to the weekend, after all!)

But William made his opinion known loud and clear, by shouting: “Noooooo, no more!”

It just shows we’re going to have to be more careful what we say when little ears are around.