In her book, Operating Instructions, author Anne Lamott says, "It's so expensive and time-consuming to have a baby, you might as well keep hothouse orchids. At least you can sell them." Lamott may be right, but orchids can't make you laugh. Kids can.

One woman, for example, told me that when her son was in the first grade all he could talk about was getting a horse. "One day," she said, "when I was taking him to school he started bugging me again about buying him a horse. I explained to him that a horse cost a lot of money. He looked up at me and said, ' but Momma, I don't want a new one. I want a used one like the cheap used car you bought!'"

Steve Allen, the late great comedian, used to tell a story about a little girl who just came home from Sunday School and asked her father when her recently born baby brother would be able to talk.

And finally, a colleague of mine named Ruth, told me about the time she was painting the trim in her den. Her two young sons were boisterously playing at the bottom of the ladder. Ruth was precariously perched at the top. When she came down to calm the boys, the ladder shook and the bucket of blue paint spattered the new white carpet.
Ruth was too distraught for words but her three-year-old son wasn't. He asked, "Mom, shouldn't we say Damn?"