Kids say the darndest things

Austin is full of questions these days. I thought the why stage at age 3 was bad. This is even worse. He has a question for everything. What are these buttons for? Why is the road two different colours? Why are the street lights still on in the daytime? And so on and so on and so on.

But sometimes, he asks honest to goodness questions. Questions that don't drive me crazy.

The other day, he asked me about banks. We were in the car and I told the kids I had to stop at the bank,deposit a cheque and take out some money. The conversation went like this:

Austin: What's a cheque?

Me: It's money. When people pay me for writing, they use a cheque and then I put it in the bank.

Austin: But why do you put money in the bank, you're supposed to get money from the bank.(In the kids' eyes, you need money, you go to the bank machine, it gives you money. Easy as that.)

Me: (proceeding to explain how banks work by telling him that everyone at the bank has a different number and when I want to put money in, I put it into that number and when I need to take it out, I take it from that number. And I can only take out as much money as I have in the bank. So, I then said (because Austin knows basic math)....)Austin, if I had $10 in the bank and I want to buy something that's $20, can I do it?

Austin: No, you need 10 more dollars.

Me: That's right.

Austin: (Thinking for minute). Mommy, I think you need to work more so that we have more money.

Me: (Trying not to laugh out loud) Why?

Austin: So you can buy me more things.