Parenthood Jokes

Preparation for parenthood is not just a matter of reading books and decorating the nursery. Here are 12 simple tests for expectant parents to take to prepare themselves for the real-life experience of being a mother or father.

1. Women: to prepare for maternity, put on a dressing gown and stick a beanbag down the front. Leave it there for 9 months. After 9 months, take out 10% of the beans. Men: to prepare for paternity, go to the local drug store, tip the contents of your wallet on the counter, and tell the pharmacist to help himself. Then go to the supermarket. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office. Go home. Pick up the paper. Read it for the last time.
2. Before you finally go ahead and have children, find a couple who are already parents and berate them about their methods of discipline, lack of patience, appallingly low tolerance levels, and how they have allowed their children to run riot. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's sleeping habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behavior. Enjoy it -- it'll be the last time in your life that you will have all the answers.
3. To discover how the nights will feel, walk around the living room from 5pm to 10pm carrying a wet bag weighing approximately 8-12 lbs. At 10pm put the bag down, set the alarm for midnight, and go to sleep. Get up at 12 and walk around the living room again, with the bag, till 1am. Put the alarm on for 3am. As you can't get back to sleep get up at 2am and make a drink. Go to bed at 2:45am. Get up again at 3am when the alarm goes off. Sing songs in the dark until 4am. Put the alarm on for 5am. Get up. Make breakfast. Keep this up for 5 years. Look cheerful.
4. Can you stand the mess children make? To find out, smear peanut butter onto the sofa and jam onto the curtains. Hide a fish finger behind the stereo and leave it there all summer. Stick your fingers in the flower beds then rub them on the clean walls. Cover the stains with crayons. How does that look?
5. Dressing small children is not as easy as it seems: first buy an octopus and a string bag. Attempt to put the octopus into the string bag so that none of the arms hang out. Time allowed for this: all morning.
6. Take an egg carton. Using a pair of scissors and a pot of paint turn it into an alligator. Now take a toilet tube. Using only scotch tape and a piece of foil, turn it into a Christmas cracker. Last, take a milk container, a ping pong ball, and an empty packet of Coco Pops and make an exact replica of the Eiffel Tower. Congratulations. You have just qualified for a place on the play group committee.
7. Forget the Miata and buy a used Taurus. And don't think you can leave it out in the driveway spotless and shining. Family cars don't look like that. Buy a chocolate ice cream bar and put it in the glove compartment. Leave it there. Get a quarter. Stick it in the cassette player. Take a family-size packet of chocolate cookies. Mash them down the back seats. Run a garden rake along both sides of the car. There. Perfect.
8. Get ready to go out. Wait outside the toilet for half an hour. Go out the front door. Come in again. Go out. Come back in. Go out again. Walk down the front path. Walk back up it. Walk down it again. Walk very slowly down the road for 5 minutes. Stop to inspect minutely every cigarette end, piece of used chewing gum, dirty tissue and dead insect along the way. Retrace your steps. Scream that you've had as much as you can stand, until the neighbors come out and stare at you. Give up and go back into the house. You are now just about ready to try taking a small child for a walk.
9. Always repeat everything you say at least five times.
10. Go to your local supermarket. Take with you the nearest thing you can find to a pre-school child -- a fully grown goat is excellent. If you intend to have more than one child, take more than one goat. Buy your week's groceries without letting the goats out of your sight. Pay for everything the goats eat or destroy. Until you can easily accomplish this do not even contemplate having children.
11. Hollow out a melon. Make a small hole in the side. Suspend it from the ceiling and swing it from side to side. Now get a bowl of soggy Weetabix and attempt to spoon it into the swaying melon by pretending to be an airplane. Continue until half the Weetabix is gone. Tip the rest into your lap, making sure that a lot of it falls on the floor. You are now ready to feed a 12-month-old baby.
12. Learn the names of every character from Postman Pat, Fireman Sam and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. When you find yourself singing "Postman Pat" at work, you finally qualify as a parent.

Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray my sanity to keep.
For if some peace I do not find,
I'm pretty sure I'll lose my mind.
I pray I find a little quiet
Far from the daily family riot
May I lie back--not have to think
about what they're stuffing down the sink,
or who they're with, or where they're at
and what they're doing to the cat.
I pray for time all to myself
(did something just fall off a shelf?)
To cuddle in my nice, soft bed
(Oh no, another goldfish--dead!)
Some silent moments for goodness sake
(Did I just hear a window break?)
And that I need not cook or clean--
(well heck, I've got the right to dream)
Yes now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray my wits about me keep,
But as I look around I know--
I must have lost them long ago!

-- Author Unknown

One Sunday evening my four year old daughter, Ginger, was explaining the contents of each of a series of pictures she had received in her primary class that day. She came to a picture of Jesus surrounded by little children. One of the children sat on Jesus's knee. In a solemn and reverent tone, my daughter told us that this was a picture of Jesus asking the little children what they wanted for Christmas.

During a recent late-night trip from the South end of the Salt Lake Valley to Kaysville, my wife and I pointed out the Jordan River Temple to our six-year old who was riding in the back. After seeing the temple and admiring its illumination, Dylan asked about various family members who had gotten married in that temple.

A few minutes later, when we passed downtown Salt Lake City, we pointed out the Salt Lake Temple, and again, Dylan asked about people he knew had gotten married in that temple.

After a few more minutes, we reached Bountiful, and pointed out the Bountiful Temple on the hills. Again, Dylan marveled at the lights illuminating the temple, and asked who had gotten married in that temple.

Having just about exhausted the list of relatives, Dylan kept looking for more temples. After a few more minutes on the freeway and no more temples appearing, Dylan remembered his Aunt Laura who had gotten married in the huge barn at Wheeler Farm and asked, "Now when are we going to see that wooden temple?"

One Friday evening my 3-year old son said he was hungry. I explained to him that we were just getting ready to to go up to the church to eat (for a Ward dinner). "No," he wailed "I don't want bread and water!"

One busy Saturday as I was leaving for work and my husband was leaving for the temple, our 11-year-old asked who was going to fix breakfast. We told him that his 15-year-old brother would. He replied, "Would this be a good time to use my 72-hour kit?"

(A True Story) A little boy came home from Primary one day. His mother asked him what he learned. He replied, "My teacher told me that I used to be dust and I would be dust again. Is that true, Mommy?"

"Yes," the mother replied. "A scripture tells us so: 'For dust thou are, and unto dust shalt thou return.'"

This little boy was wide-eyed and amazed. The next morning, he was scurrying around getting ready for school, looking for his shoes. As he crawled under the bed, lo and behold, there he saw balls of dust. He ran to his mother in wonder, saying, "Oh, Mommy, somebody's under my bed, and they're either coming or going." (Contributed by Elder Russell M. Nelson in his book, The Gateway We Call Death.)

On the high expectations placed on mothers. One young mother "felt like the world expected her to teach her children reading, writing, interior design, Latin, calculus, and the Internet--all before the baby said something terribly ordinary, like 'goo goo.'" (Contributed by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland during General Conference on 4/5/97)