Mum Diary: Kids say the most excruciating things

Bit of a toe-curling moment this week. We’d stopped in a supermarket café for a cup of tea after the big shop, and I was busy wrestling Baby Olly into a high chair. My toddler Harry slipped down from his chair and approached the table next to us, but it was a group of friendly women who smiled at him, so I didn’t immediately call him back.

Then I heard his loud, clear voice sadly announce: “I don’t know who my Daddy is.”

Friendly smiles turned to pitying stares. One woman’s mouth actually fell open in horrified sympathy. Blushing furiously, I tried to explain that my confused toddler DOES know who his daddy is but gets ‘who’ and ‘where’ mixed up. Their father was working away from home for a few days and this had confused Harry no end. But my excuses sounded pretty lame; especially when Harry was responding to the sympathy by doing his best impression of a Dickensian urchin – loud sighs and a saintly, tragic demeanour. After all, you never know who might give you cake if you just look sad enough.

Red-faced, I enticed Harry back to our table with a cake of our own. The women began a hushed conversation, which I like to think wasn’t necessarily about me and my brood, although I did find myself wishing that Harry and Olly looked more alike (Harry looks like my sister while Olly looks like my husband’s).

[Mum Diary: Why can’t I say I want a baby girl?]
[Mum Diary: Why are we so critical of other mums?]

This is just the latest in a long line of devastatingly embarrassing things Harry has taken to sharing with adults. Last week Olly pulled my phone off the table and onto his head, which made him cry. He wasn’t really hurt and a few hours later he had his regular afternoon nap.

Yet when a friend came round for coffee during his naptime, Harry told her that “Mummy dropped something on Olly and now he’s asleep.” You’ve got to admit that doesn’t sound great.

Of course, it’s not always what he says, but where he says it. At a wedding last summer the vows were interrupted by Harry demanding the string quartet play Nirvana (we have unashamedly supervised his musical taste so that he’s never heard of One Direction but regularly asks for The Clash).

At a christening earlier this month, during a quiet moment, he loudly proclaimed: “Superman is good, isn’t he?” Later on in the ceremony, as the proud father carried his daughter up to the font, Harry spotted him and began to yell: “Hey, it’s Dave! Hello Dave! Dave? DAVE!”

[Mum Diary: When motherhood goes wrong]
[Mum Diary: Why do toddlers ask so many questions?]

It’s not a question of discipline; a two-year old might just about understand that there are times when we want him to be quiet, but if a really urgent thought pops into his head then he will just forget the need to be quiet and simply shout it out.

On top of these dialogue disasters, when he was learning to talk he seemed to stumble on obscenity far too often. He’d pronounce ‘socks’ with a c instead of an s and once he abbreviated ‘funny rocket’ to ‘fuh-ket’ and then went running down the street chanting it. And even though these verbal misadventures don’t happen as often now, this is all still to come with Olly.

Fortunately, this kind of thing seems to happen to other parents too. One friend’s little boy has taken to shouting: “Stop!” and: “Help me!” in the supermarket, leading to quite a few questions. Another asked his grandmother “what the dinosaurs were like”.

[Mum Diary: A toddler’s sugar detox]
[Mum Diary: I've lost my brain-to-mouth filter!]

One friend’s mother likes to tell the story of how her daughter once loudly read out the obscene graffiti in a crowded swimming pool changing room. She laughs now, but it’s taken 30-odd years.

I’m pretty sure that all toddlers embarrass their parents and, as I’ve said before, I’ll have my revenge when I embarrass them when then are teenagers. But in the meantime, if you hear my children say something dreadful then please remember that their innocent utterings are not to be trusted!

What’s the worst thing your children have said in public? Share your truly embarrassing moments in the comments below and make me feel better about mine!