G came home from school the other day, looking a little crestfallen. Upon asking him what was wrong, he informed me that another student had been awarded the coveted "Student of the Month" title. I was a little surprised that he was upset about it, considering he had earned the award a few months ago, and a repeat performance was unlikely.

He proceeded to explain that he is the tallest kid in their class and the lucky recipient was only the second tallest. I was a little confused as to what this had to do with anything, and then he finally said that the award had been based on demonstrating "tolerance." Or, I guess as he was spelling it, "Taller-ance."That got me wandering down memory lane to a few of the kids' more memorable malapropisms.One of our favorites was when A declared that the dinosaurs are no longer around because their "eggs stink."We also went through a phase where we took our "maggot finding glasses" with us everywhere, and we saw a lot of cool stuff, really close up, but sadly no maggots. Also, never found the "A-vomit-able" Snowman.G's toddler years were a real trip. He spent a year or so only saying the first syllable or first half of a lot of words. Unfortunately, three of his favorites at this time were PEE(zza), CRACK(ers), and HORS(es). His older brother delighted in telling everyone that his little brother wanted to eat pee. There was also one particular library episode where an irritated G wanted to put more glue and glitter on his craft project so he started screaming at me "MORE ON!!! MORE ON!!! MORE ON!!!!"Just a few weeks ago, on a shopping trip, A picked up a T-shirt that he thought defined him very well. He thought it said, "It's Time for a Genius!" What it really said was, "It's Time for a Guinness." I could have used one after arguing with him that that shirt was really NOT appropriate for a 9-year-old.Once, A asked me what "lisp" meant. I gave him an example, using his name. He responded by saying, "So instead of Daddy, if I lisped, I would say Fatty?"E asked me if Daddy and I are called "groan-in ups" because when you get old you groan a lot.The boys were rambunctiously wrestling on the bed. One of them suddenly yelled that he "hated" the other one. I immediately launched into a rant about how it's not nice to hate. A tearful G told me that he loved his brother, he only "ated" him because they were playing dinosaurs and that's what dinosaurs do.Our whole house loves to read, and the kids get very excited when they make movies based on our favorite books. G couldn't wait for "Diarrhea of a Wimpy Kid" to hit the theaters.Hopefully, the boys never become weather forecasters. "Tarantula" downpours are even scarier than torrential ones.Speaking of creepy crawlies, we did that whole caterpillar to butterfly experiment, which just happened to be another wonderful Christmas gift from my grandmother. Nothing will get you out of bed faster in the morning than your kids screaming at the top of their lungs that the caterpillars have turned into "raccoons."Last winter, G informed me that Dad had told him it was going to be so cold out, it would be like minus 100 degrees F. I told him that his father was prone to hyperbole. Later, I overheard him ask the wonderful husband why Mom thought he was so "purple-y.""Is it because you're so cold, Dad?"Finally, all of my kids have done the cute little thing where they switch sounds around in words. We love to hear about E's trip to "Yew Nork City" to see the Rockettes. All three of them still eat "breafkist" every morning, but thankfully, E has stopped requesting "Cop Porn" when we go to the movie theater.Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.