this baby could tell you how the birdies fly and what the kitty says.

All mothers who have had really wonderful children--and this takes us
all in--will understand how hard it is to set these things down in
cold print or even to tell them; for even our best friends are
sometimes dull of heart and slow of understanding when we tell them
perfectly wonderful things that our children did or said. We all know
that horrible moment of suspense when we have told something real
funny that our baby said, and our friends look at us with a dull
is-that-all expression in their faces, and we are forced to supplement
our recital by saying that it was not so much what he said as the way
he said it!

Soon I lost the blue-eyed baby, and there came in his place a sturdy
little freckle-faced chap, with a distinct dislike for water as a
cleansing agent, who stoutly declared that washing his hands was a
great waste of time, for they were sure to get dirty again; which
seems to be reasonable, and it is a wonder that people have not taken
this fact into account more when dealing with the griminess of youth.
Who objected to going to church twice a day on the ground that he
"might get too fond of it." Who, having once received five cents as
recompense for finding his wayward sister, who had a certain
proclivity for getting lost, afterwards deliberately mislaid the same
sister and claimed the usual rates for finding her, and in this manner
did a thriving "Lost and Found" business for days, until his
unsuspecting parent overheard him giving his sister full directions
for losing herself--he had grown tired of having to go with her each
time, and claimed that as she always got half of the treat she should
do her share of the work. Who once thrashed a boy who said that his
sister had a dirty face,--which was quite true, but people do not need