Well hello there, Little Miss Potty Mouth

And no, I'm not talking about the usual four letter words most parents are shocked to hear tumbling out of their precious, sweet lipped babies.

Because, let's be honest here. I'm prone to dropping a few of them myself. If Claire were to say, drop something on her foot & rip off a sh**, I'd probably snicker before I got on to her. We quickly broke her of her habit of saying "Oh, momma...das a dammit iddn't it?" whenever she did something she knew was wrong.

When the kids finally turn front facing in their carseats? I'm going to have to think of something constructive to do with my hands so they don't catch me flipping the proverbial bird when someone makes me mad in traffic. That's the last thing I need...Claire showing her teacher & all of the kids at school the new sign language she's learned.

The potty mouth I'm talking about is STUPID. Stupid, dumb, idiot, fool, retard...to me, those are worse than any curse word that Claire or Carter could utter. I have zero tolerance for name calling. Which is why I'm unsure of where she picked this up. TV? School? I don't know. I do not call Chase or the kids any name like that.

I've never had tolerance for people belittling another person's intelligence. Even more so after I was called stupid by a teacher, in front of the entire class. I couldn't tell you now what we were learning that day, just that it was math, which has always been a weak spot for me. I'd asked for help 3 or 4 times, trying to solve the problem in each way she explained it. Finally, after my last plea for help, the teacher loudly announced: "Are you stupid or something? This is not a hard problem!" The entire class heard, the entire class snickered.

That was, quite possibly, the most humiliating moment I'd ever experienced in school. Worse than the time I puked all over the lunchroom table. Worse than finding out a teacher had purposely not been grading my papers, which resulted in her & my mom getting in an argument & me being pulled from her class. Worse than any time I tripped over my own two clumsy feet & crashed in front of large groups.

If it was that humiliating & upsetting to me, try imagining how hurtful words like that are to someone who is trying their hardest yet they know that they aren't the smartest-whether it be book smart or every day smarts.

That is why, today, as I was getting dressed & the kids were at the table eating lunch, when I heard "stoooo stoooo ahahhaa Cahwah, you stoooo" my blood started to boil. I tried to keep my cool & asked Claire: "What did you just say?" She responded: "I tell Cahwah he stooopid hahahahaa." I pulled out the sternest voice I could find & firmly told her: "You do not, DO NOT call people names like that. That is a naughty word & I don't want you to ever say it again. That word hurts Carter's feelings & it hurts Mommy's, too." I felt bad, speaking to her so sternly, but that is one behavior I will not tolerate from my kids. Once she apologized to Carter, I told her if I ever heard that word again, she would be getting soap in her mouth. I've never done that to her before, but from the look on her face, it was as if she was conjuring up memories of which soap tasted the worst.

Having said that, I'll go ahead & apologize in advance now for the times you might hear my kids slip up with a curse word while our kids are playing together. But at least I won't have to make them apologize for calling your kid a name & hurting their feelings.