Tamara-isms

Both of my daughters are very intelligent and quick witted. I've always said they get their wittiness from their dad.
Some of the latest from Tamara:

Lately the girls have been arguing more than usual. So Adam and I have laid down some ground rules. #1 They are not to argue and #2 We will give them one warning before consequences are given (Because as Tamara mentioned, what if I don't know that I'm arguing). So a warning is given until they understand completely what does and does not consitute as arguing. (By the way, I think they have a good concept of this but whatever... benefit of the doubt.)

So Tamara and I are walking through a party store with MaKayla and Tammie. Tamara sees these Elvis Presley playing cards that she just has to have. Tamara loves Elvis. She gets this from her mom. In fact when Tamara lists her boyfriends... Elvis is known as her dead boyfriend. Not sure if that is healthy. Anyway, she asks for them and I tell her that she doesn't need them... then the arguing begins. I tell her calmly that this is her one warning that she is arguing with me. After this comment she lets out a very exaggereated sigh and her face turns from lawyer to imprisoned abandoned puppy at a shelter. She's crushed that the conquest for the Elvis Presley cards has just officially come to an end. So I walk toward the check out counter stopping to browse at a display and Tamara comes up to me and says, "Mom, what exactly would be the consequences." You can tell that she really wants these stinkin' Elvis cards and that she would like to weigh in on the pros and cons because it just might be worth the consequences to argue her point a little further in the hopes that I just might give in. I reply a spankin'. To which she say "Or grounding?" and I say maybe. At this point we are leaving the store and she chooses not to continue our previous discussion. I guess she didn't think the cards were worth. But what she doesn't know is that Nana Santa has already purchased some for her. She is too smart. I don't know what I'm going to do with her when she is a teenager.


When I asked her to clean her room the other day and was going through the house handing her stuff that belonged in her room she began to get very upset. She said that she was the only one that had to clean, that MaKayla didn't. (MaKayla's room just happenend to look decent on this particular day.) Tamara proceeded to tell me that she felt like a pack-mule. A pack-mule! Where the heck does she get this stuff from?