And that’s – that’s Virginia on her iPad.

(At the end of every show, ever; usually just as the credits roll, but sometimes earlier if it’s clear the show is coming to an end, Claire says…)
Claire: Can we watch another one?


Daddy: Did you have fun today?
Claire: Yeah.
Daddy: What did you do?
Claire: We went to the place where the, the plaything was in the… the big building.


(Today was Picture Day at school.)

Claire: We got to hold a bunny rabbit!

Claire: I like bunnies! I like real bunnies.


(dinner)

Claire (petting Grommie with her feet): Grommie feels like a bunny rabbit.
Alex: He’s soft and fluffy.
Claire: Yeah that’s why a bunny rabbit’s like that.

Claire: Daddy?
Daddy: Yeah.
Claire: When I was a baby, I called you “Dada”.
Daddy: That’s right.

Alex: When I was a baby, I said “Mama, buwah, Dada.”
Daddy: What does that mean?
Alex: It means “Mommy belongs to Daddy.”

(Claire and Alex are talking about raising their hands at school.)
Claire (raising her hand): You have to do this to raise your hand.
Alex: You don’t go “Hey! Gimme! Gimme a turn!”
Claire: No. You wait – you wait until the teacher looks at you, and then go, “What?” Right?
Alex: Yeah, they’ll say “Okay, it’s your turn, you can tell me your question.”
Claire: Yeah.

(Alex has a picture from school. It’s divided into four quadrants, labeled “baby”, “child”, “teenager”, and “adult”, and Alex drew a different picture in each quadrant.)

Mommy: Tell me about this picture.
Alex: That’s a baby, a daddy, a teenager, and grown-up.

Alex (talking about the “adult” quadrant): That’s Daddy, putting dishes in the dishwasher, and that’s the knife one, and the spoon one – no that’s the fork one, and that’s the knife one, and that’s the spoon one.
Mommy (pointing to the “child” quadrant): And what’s that one?
Alex: That’s – that’s a playset, and that’s me and Claire kicking a ball. We’re children.
Daddy: What’s the baby doing?
Alex: That’s a baby crawling toward her rattle.
Mommy (pointing to the teenager quadrant): And what’s that one?
Alex: And that’s – that’s Virginia on her iPad.


Alex: How do butterflies get their yummy nectar? Then.
Alex: How do they get the nectar? ‘Cause they don’t have a tongue to suck it up.
Alex: How do they get the nectar?
Daddy: Who are you asking?
Alex: You.
Daddy: Oh. Um… maybe Mommy knows.
(Mommy explains, and even shows Alex a picture on her computer.)

Claire: Daddy? How do you make the rain when it’s straight coming down?
Daddy: What do you mean, Claire?
Claire: How do you – you know how to make the rain? That is straight? You know how to make the rain?

Claire (holding dried apple chips): Mommy? How do you make this? How do you make what I’m holding?
Mommy: Um, you dry out apples.
Claire: How do you dry out apples?
Claire: How do you dry out the apples?
Claire: Mommy?
Mommy: I don’t know.
Claire: Oh.
(Pause.)
Claire: Daddy, isn’t it hard work to make a big house?
Daddy: It sure is.
Claire: There’s a lot of things to make a big house, isn’t it?
Daddy: A lot of things.
Claire: Mm-hm. Daddy, Santa comes through the fireplace, but how can he get out of the fireplace?
Alex: Well, I’m sorry Claire, but Santa doesn’t come through the fireplace, ‘cause we don’t have a chimney. We don’t have a chimney, right Daddy?
Daddy: That’s right.
Alex: So he doesn’t go through the roof, he goes through the door. We give him the keys on Christmas Eve. Right, Daddy?
Daddy: That’s right.
Claire: But where is a fun thing?
Alex: What?
Alex: What is Claire talking about? Do you know, Daddy?
Daddy: I don’t know.
Claire (firmly): Yes. I’m telling you that when is a fun thing, where we can go?

Claire: You just went to a party. You just went to a party. But I didn’t go there, because you just got to go there. But you’ll be sad – you’ll be sad for my birthday, because –
Alex: It’s not your birthday, it’s someone else’s.
Claire: I said, I said, it’s not my birthday because, because, I’m gonna go to Blake’s birthday.
Alex: Can I stay home with Daddy? I like my Daddy.
Daddy: Yes.
Alex: Can I stay home with Daddy, Claire? Can you go with Mommy, because I want to stay home with Daddy.
Claire: But I love Daddy, I want to go with Daddy!

(Blake’s birthday party is in March.)
Claire: But when is it March? It’s taking a long time for March to come.
Alex (in a reprimanding tone): Claire. I think you might be complaining about a different birthday now.
Claire: I’m complaining about…
Alex: …someone else’s birthday.
Claire: I’m complaining about Blake’s birthday.

(Alex answers Claire’s earlier question about rain.)
Alex: There’s a river, and it comes up in the air, but you can’t see it come up in the air, it’s invisible when it comes up in the air, and then it gets to a cloud, and then, when it’s too much water, it rains!
Claire: Yeah but then when he doesn’t want more water, and then he, he drops it!
Mommy: Who’s he? The cloud?
Claire: Yeah. He drops it.