Families come in many varieties. Some are huge, some are small, and some have more than one! But I'm sure we all have our share of silly things our family has done. My grandma walked off a pier, but that's a story for another time. What's your silliest family story?
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My grandmother passed away last week, and her funeral was on Friday, July 1. The funeral was well attended as she had lots of loving family. Here is the important part, I am one 33 grandchildren, and four of us are girls, and along those same lines, my grandmother's brother had 17 grandchildren and only two girls. I am close with all five of my girl-cousins.
We had a non-religious service and at one point, the pastor asked that anyone that wanted to say a few words to come forward. Since my grandmother was my best friend, I got up and told a few funny and touching stories about this lovely woman. I cried while speaking and so did most of the family while I was speaking. At one point I had to stop speaking and catch my breath because the tears were flowing so hard, but I finished and thanked everyone for coming and sat down with my mom and boyfriend. One of my cousins patted me on the back and said quietly, "that was lovely." Then the pastor asked if anyone else would to speak and one of the girls said, "Not really, but I do want to know where GirlFriday got that mascara. It isn't even streaking." This prompted the other girls to have me remove my sunglasses so they could see and then entire funeral just went completely off the rails for 15 minutes while all of the girls (sisters- and girl-cousins-in-law included) discussed mascara, make up, skin care, hair, and clothing. Finally, my grandmother's oldest son started laughing with his brother-in-law about us chattering away like hens. We decided that it was completely appropriate to stop a funeral to have this conversation because my grandmother loved all things glam and loved for us girls to come over and how her new clothes and discuss fashion and make up with her. As silly as it seemed (and within a few minute we were all laughing about a shaved eyebrow incident when we were young), it was one of the best ways to carry her with us. Just absolute side splitting laughter that she would have enjoyed so much.
At the funeral home, we were waiting for our turn for the showing of my husband's father's funerals. His aunt - my husband's - got us all laughing so hard that the man in charge had to tell us to be more quiet. I hadn't laughed and cried so much on the same day.
When I was a child, I was a very picky eater. Everybody in the family knew because I would always make a fuss about food whenever my family was invited to dinner at a relative's home.
One day while I was at my grandmother's house, she gave me a peach to eat. I love peaches but unfortunately I found a worm inside while eating this one. I showed the rest of the family the worm and everybody was also grossed out. But my uncle suddenly went "I'll give you $200 if you eat this worm" in front of the whole family. The look on his face when I instantly swallowed the worm as soon as he said those words was amazing. I asked for the money and he tried to avoid giving it to me and saying that he never expected me to do it because I was such a picky eater. Fortunately my grandma was there and she forced him to give me the $200.
I was a 10 year old with $200 and she gained a story that she still enjoys telling to visitors till this day.
I grew up in suburban Los Angeles (back in the day, there were actual suburbs). My father, who worked in manufacturing, would come home on Friday and he and my mother would sign his paycheck for deposit, and then he'd walk up to the strip mall where the bank was, deposit his check, pick up his weekly six pack of beer and walk home. One week, he was particularly tired. So he drove to the bank, deposited his check, hit the store for his beer, and came home. Late that evening, after visiting his best friend next door, my father walked up the driveway and "HOLY CATS! My car is GONE! Someone stole my car!" He immediately called LAPD to report the theft and then headed out in my mother's car to look for his (thinking some kids might have been joyriding and then dumped it). Meanwhile, his best friend and my mother did the same thing in the bestie's car. Within half an hour, the bestie pulled into his driveway, and my mother pulled into ours driving my dad's car.
My dad came home a little while later and was shocked to find his car in the driveway. "What the hell?" My mother explained they'd found it parked in the strip mall, at the bank.
My father was so tired that he'd forgotten he'd driven the car to the bank and, after the beer stop, walked home.
You should have SEEN LAPD when they showed up to take the report. My poor father was mortified.
Probably not the silliest, but the first I came up with. My dad tells scary campfire stories, and he was telling this one, his voice was getting quieter and quieter, until we were all leaning in. Keep in mind we were on unstable camp chairs, he ended with a loud noise, and my brother screamed and fell out of his chair backwards, and couldn’t get up. It was super funny at the time even of it doesn’t seem like it on here.
My sister had scoliosis. One day we were sitting in the doc’s office waiting for some kinda result. My dad and I made the joke from one of the MIB movies: “this coffee tastes like dirt” “that’s because it was just GROUND this morning” we have a chuckle. The conversation moved on and about two minutes later, my sister with the most “I’m in deep thought and yet I feel dumb” look on here face exclaims loud and proud: “OH I GET THAT JOKE NOW!!!” All of us look at her for a split second of complete silence as she has the biggest grin on her face. Just welling up with pride! And then we couldn’t contain our laughter after that! It was so so so so so funny. We still make fun of her for it (it’s how we show we care in our fam). And we still get a kick out of it and it was like 6 years ago!
I could be that sister easily. I never understand jokes or it takes me a while. Edit: Worse if I try to repeat them, especially the punch line.
I think this has to be right up there with the 'out of the mouths of babes' top ten of all time. We were driving to a nice place for a day out with my 4 year old daughter in the back seat, listening to the radio.
The Paloma Faith song "I'm having trouble with my baby" came on (with the chorus basically repeating that line over and over) and then a tiny voice chirped up from the back seat.
"What's wrong with her baby? Is it not coming out?"
I had to pull over the car as I could see for ugly cry-laughing (my wife was the same). Daughter was entirely innocently wondering why mummy and daddy were in hysterics. Of course, now she's 14 and if that song ever comes on the radio we feel it is our parental duty to remind her of this incident, as dutiful parents would / should
My whole family, including several aunts, uncles, and cousins went to dinner at a fancy restaurant to celebrate my grandma's birthday. My aunt accidentally mixed up her chapstick with bright red lipstick. She put it all over her lips and under her nose. We thought it was hilarious and didn't tell her. When we got to the restaurant our large party was told they didn't have a table ready even though we made reservations weeks ago. She marched up to the hostess and demanded to know why it wasn't ready. The lady was so shocked to see a crazy lady with basically clown lips talking to her. They quickly sat us. Mostly to get her out of the waiting area. That's when we told her what happened. She was so embarrassed.
My mom wasn't the best listener. I'm like 13 and awkwardly uncomfortable with menstruation. We're out running errands and I mention we need Stayfree (tm), a feminine hygiene product. Mom looks me straight in the eye and says "can't you just use Right Guard(tm)", an underarm antiperspirant. No. No, mom. No, I can't. It's been 45 years and it still cracks me up.
Well, why were you being so difficult? Would it have killed you to catch the flow with Right Guard? It did promise to keep us dry, after all. 🙃🙃🙃
Silly happens even in the darkest moments. Two from when my mom was really ill and in hospice care.
1). We're in the hospital room with her discussing hospice with an administrator and mom says she's "tired of looking into the light" and asked for the overhead lights to be turned off. My brothers and I exchanged glances in appreciation of mom's unintentional super dark humor.
2). Brother was concerned a new brand of chicken wouldn't be good. Several days after the purchase I arrived for my care shift and he excitedly tells me "the Perdue chicken is ok". Mom, thinking the university, not chicken brand says "oh, I'm so glad. What happened to it?"
When I was little, my family used to go out to eat a lot and I was never very into it. I'd eat a little bit of food and then be impatient to go home, while the adults took their time enjoying their meal.
One day, we were at a Harvey's (a fast food chain here in Canada). I was being my usual bratty self, complaining that I was done and I wanted to go and trying to amuse myself as best I could by sticking my head in and out of the back of their chairs. (Their chairs were designed with these bars at the back that were curved in a sort of circular shape, and I had discovered my head could fit through.) Well, it turns out the chairs aren't really meant to be children's playground equipment, and my head got stuck.
I started panicking when I found myself unable to get out. I don't remember much except the sight of the ceiling blurred through my tears and the sound of my own screams.
After a while, my mother started urging me to move my head downward. I didn't want to do it because I knew the bars got narrower there, but eventually I did and was surprised to find myself free. My grandpa had pried the bars open wider and saved us a call to emergency services.
Thankfully, this was in the '80s, before camera phones and the internet.
A family friend got his head stuck in a chair back at church. Took a while but we somehow managed to get it out without call 000. He has grown into his head now and it isn't as unusually large compared to his body :)
My mom never let me or my siblings have Barbies because we could undress them and she didn't want them around the house with no clothes on. Once she walked in on me and my little sister playing with our dolls. We were in the middle of changing their dresses so they were both completely undressed. My mom got mad and yelled "Put their clothes on, we don't want naked dolls running around the house!" There was a moment of silence and then as we realized what she said both of us burst out laughing. Yes kinda creepy but hilarious. We still quote her to this day and she hates it.
My sister has a Barbie Ken doll that is missing a leg and all his clothes. Her solution? Make him a thong. 🤦
my grandmother passes away in 1997. she was what my mom called a 'proper bostonian lady'. that meant that she was very disciplined in just about all of her actions and behavior and expected the same from her children and grandchildren. unfortunately for her, my mom raised us with a sense of humor which we developed into some twisted pranks and sarcastic moments.
now, nannie (that's what we called her) lived through WW2 and those that followed. she was very political and very patriotic. which is why she boycotted anything from japan as she never forgave the attack on pearl harbor. didn't matter that we had gotten over that as a nation; she just wasn't having it. after one thanksgiving dinner she laid back in the recliner and dozed off. we, the grandkids, put a 'made in japan' sticker on the sole of her shoe. it's a favorite pic of ours. she was not amused.
We had a summer kitchen in our yard, which my brother and I used as a playhouse. My brother, being thirteen, would kick the door open rather than use the k**b. One afternoon, he kicked the door down. We looked at that door, looked at each other, and said, "Dad's going to kill us." My brother had me, his ten year old sister, hold the door while he moved the hinges. He didn't know he'd have to move the hinges on the frame as well. So he goes to hang the door back up, and we were both shocked that it wouldn't go. My contribution was "well, it fit BEFORE." Not knowing what else to do, my brother sawed six inches off the bottom of the door. He rehung it. Everything was fine, except for the six inch gap at the top. When our parents got home from work, we were standing outside waiting for them, arms at our sides, trying to grin like (innocent) lunatics. Dad had known the wood in the door was rotted, and we didn't even get into trouble. For the rest of his life, we would tease my brother that if he ever had a problem and didn't know what to do, he should saw six inches off the bottom of it.
k**b? Really? You do know that k**b is a real word with a very innocent meaning?
We were at a revolving sushi bar when my mom's bf said " look, the solution to all our problems!" and I looked down the revolving thingie and went " SquID"
When my niece was about 3 or 4 years old, she was visiting her grandparents’ house and told them she wanted 2 pieces of bologna.
“Why,” they asked. “You just ate dinner a little while ago.”
Her answer? “To slap them against my cheeks!”
I've told this before, but don't know if it was here. So, when I was about 2 1/2 yrs old, my mom and me and my gramma were grocery shopping (this was around 1967). After, we were hungry and my mom wanted to go to the A&W. It's a drive in, for those of you too young to have been to one. My grandma was driving (mistake #1), so she was the one to order. She was a bit tipsy (don't know why mom let her drive), and apparently hadn't been to a drive thru, or hadn't been driving when the family went on other occasions. So when the person taking the order on the speaker came on, my grandma, for some reason, thought it would be a good idea to get out of the car, grab the pole, and talk loudly, swaying as she held on so it looked like she was trying to dance with it. Needless to say, that didn't go well, and my grandma (amidst my mom whispering frantically to her to get back in) started saying I can't hear you, he won't listen to me (meaning the pole, I guess, because the person on the intercom was female). The girl was really nice about it and came out to the car to take our order. Meanwhile, my mom stuffed grandma into the backseat of our car, and as soon as our order came, we left. Mom hated being embarrassed, and having grandma yelling at a pole was as bad as it could get.
My husband and I were having dinner at home and wanted to give thanks before we ate. Both of our cell phones were off so imagine our surprise after saying "Thank you, GOD" a few times, Siri? GOD? Whomever? answered "You're welcome, you are welcome." We both thought it was hilarious but also a little terrifying.
In the 80’s we had the camper that fit in the back of a pickup. We, mom, stepdad, sister and stepbrother, we’re on our way to see our grandparents in Colorado. We stopped for the night in NM. My dad, whom was VERY vain and easily embarrassed, which made him furious if we laughed, locked the truck keys in the truck. It was summer, but dark, so I’m guessing 9-10pm-ish. He goes in the camper to get a wire clothes hanger to hopefully use to get the door to the truck unlocked. So he’s feeding it through the top of the window and at some point starts yelling, loudly, and screaming for mom to help him. Well, in the process of pushing the hanger through, I guess it was turning. The opposite end of the hanger was somehow becoming twisted in the zipper area of his shorts, unbeknownst to him, until everything was all twisted up with the hanger. He was dancing around on his top toes hollering. The rest of us were laughing so hard it was difficult to even understand what the problem was initially. I don’t remember how everything was resolved, but we continue to somehow find a way to bring up the story periodically.
We were driving down the street in a rough part of town, when my sister noticed a lady standing on the corner wearing a mini-skirt and a laced-up top that left nothing to the imagination. My sister said, "Look at that prostitute standing on the corner", in her most disgusting voice. I looked over and it was a mannequin standing in front of an adult book store. I busted out laughing, and we never let her live that one down!
This is gonna be long. And, this was a few years ago.
1. Ok, so my dad has a boat that’s big to tube with and my cousins came over. So, my older male cousin, I’ll call R and my younger female cousin, who’s a bit older than me, I’ll call J. I’ll call my little brother E too. So, my dad put R on the tube my himself and my dad went wild. Waves were all over the place and the tube was flinging R around. Me, E and J were sitting in the back and laughing, cause R looked so silly and stupid. Then, my dad went super fast and got the waves to over lap five times. So, the tube went 6 feet in the air, flipped over (still in the air) and R was still clinging on. Then, the tube did three spins (still in the air) and R fell into the water, the tube upside down and still the air. R wasn’t hurt, but it was so funny. My aunt and mom lost it though. They pushed my dad off the boat when it was stopped, in a joking-but-kinda-mad way.
2. Same day as the story above. All the kids, me (11, skinny and 100 pounds at the time), E (9, skinny, and 80 pounds), J (12, kinda skinny, and 105 pounds) and R (16, skinny, and 150 pounds) went on the tube. That’s a total of 380 pounds, no including the weight of our wet life jackets. Our tube can only hold 350. Guess what happened. We sunk. Like, the first half of the tube went completely under water and we flipped over. We were barely moving. It was so dang funny, we all popped out of the water, soaking wet, kinda cold, and laughing our heads off.
My sister. Never wanted to sleep as a baby/toddler. Mom would rock her for hours on end and then lower her into the crib sloowly sloowly, only for her to jump awake and continue crying, as if she was lowered into a deep fryer. This went on for years. As a toddler, mum would go to put her to sleep and dad would put on some movie to watch. Just like clockwork, she'd be out of the room in no time saying "daddy daddy, mommy's asleep, could you cook us some popcorn?" (She thought it was "cook" because we used to make it in a pot on the stove, old school style)
I would always do that, and ask my mom to pop popcorn, whenever we had guests over. She really hated it when I did that, because back then (1960s), having a child get out of bed and come into the living room and ask for something when guests were being entertained was considered to be the height of disobedience, and an indicator of how well my mom was raising me. (Think of January Jones character, mother of 'Sally', on 'Mad Men'.)
My youngest son broke his thumb while playing baseball. Going at the beach was already planned so we went to a specialized place to get a cover for his cast (up to his elbow). The lady shows us some options, we check one out, then she adds "this one is great in a shower too" "that's fine, he doesn't take showers" "BUT I do take baths!" The lady laughed "don't let me think you don't wash at all, yes?". I apologized but it was funny.
Same son but younger. "Mom, how come you're so weird and funny at the same time?" "Didn't you meet my mother? She's worse than me" "You have a mother???? How come we don't know about her?" "My mother is Granmama G." "What?" That was before he fully understood the family tree. Next time we saw her, he asked her directly, just to be sure.
To prevent future arguments, my children had their own seat in the car - meaning always the same side or the middle - One time, we get in the car and the children are teenagers and my daughter has a BF that's coming with us. Mind you, we've been doing this seating thing for the last 8-9 years so it was like breathing. The BF goes on the driver's side in the back, opens the door and let my daughter pass (to go in the middle, the other one was already seated on his side). She refuses. He says he wants to sit by the window, she explains that's her place. He starts saying that's stupid, etc. I just got out of the house with my husband and ask what's the problem; they explain so I say "CJ if you really want to eat in the next hour you'd better get in the middle or we're not going anywhere" Grumbling ensued, still saying it was stupid. They had other problems, they didn't last long.
I have a few stories that stand out, but I'll only tell 2, you people probably have lives to get to.
Looking back it's funny, but then it was most certainly not funny at all. My Grandma, Aunt, sister and I were at the park and we had to eat lunch before we could go play. My sister had already finished eating and was playing on the awesome jungle gym. Well I hated the grape juice that had been packed for me. I kept saying that I wouldn't drink the juice, and my Grandma kept saying that she would pour it on my head. I thought she was just making empty threats. She was not. The day ended with my hair sticky and me not getting to play. I still haven't drank juice, I'm a stubborn girl.
My next story also displays my stubborness. I used to be really why about singing, but one day my Grandma made homemade caramel 😋. But, she wanted me to sing to get some, I don't know why. She wanted me to sing that Hanging Tree song. I didn't sing, not a peep, thus I didn't get and caramel while the rest of the family feasted. It had been maybe 6 years. Six years since Grandma made caramel and 6 years since I refuse to sing that song and hush my sister whenever she teasingly sings it.
In case you can't tell, I'm slightly bitter about it. 😒
Anything I did my mother had to put down. (Think Emily Gilmore.) When my then fiancé and I put in an offer on our first home I was buzzing with excitement, telling my parents about it at dinner. I wanted to draw the floor plan to show them and grabbed the only scrap paper around - an envelope - and started drawing. "Oh, well!" says my mother, "It's such a small house!"
I remember the one time when on my Uncle's wedding, there was this little ceremony that they had to do at his house and when everybody reached there, the keys weren't to be found ANYWHERE. They looked up and down and all around but the keys weren't found! (rhyme intended) So finally they broke off the tradition and returned to my Grandparents' house. Four days later, after a duplicate set of keys was made, the keys were discovered in me Uncle's wedding suit.
This one is both sad and funny. My mother was a very bossy but also very humane person. She had end stage cancer and requested euthanasia to ensure her suffering would end soon. Of course we fully supported her, but she did not want us there, so we begged her to let us at least be there until the last moment. She relented. During her time in the cancer ward, she typically befriended many of the staff and volunteers. So, fast forward to the early hours of the day she planned: I am with her as she draws her last breath, a full four hours before the planned time. As the rest of my family arrived, one of us mentioned that on typical fashion, she had things go exactly as she wanted, and when we started to laugh, someone else chimed in that it was good she did not have to smell the dreadful garlic breath of my sibling (she hated that and would get very vocal). Of course, this made us laugh harder. Suddenly, one of the orderlies comes in, sees us all in a fit of laughter beside my mother. A look of horror and disbelief as she takes in the scene, then tears. We all gathered around to console her and thank her for making my mother's end of life as comfortable as possible. It always makes me both sad and smile that my mother could still touch people even in her last days and hours. How I miss her.
My husbands parent was against giving their children toy guns to play with and everybody knew this.
But an uncle gave him a toy riffle on his 7th birthday. His parent wasn't happy but the uncle thought their anger was funny and started to pretend that he was a crocodile and started hunting this 7 year old. I guess because he (the kid/my husband) never had a toy riffle before he didn't try to shoot the "crocodile" but wacked him over the head with the riffle so it broke....
A good example of instant karma.
Another "fun" story from his family is about his little sister. They always suspected her vision was impaired because her pupils are deformed. At about 2-3 years old she started petting and saying "kitty", eeeh, but it wasn't a kitty she was petting. It was a fur hat. They checked her eyesight pretty soon after that.
I went swimming with my family and I noticed my sister’s hands were dry.
“Sis, your hands are dry.”
“No they’re not”
“Yes they are, look!”
“We’re underwater!”
“Not that kind of dry!”
“Then what?!?”
“Your hands need more moisture.”
“But they’re wet!”
“I MEAN LOTION!”
“But my hands are under water.”
And so on. We all probably feel dumb.
Also my swim teacher’s dog once coached my sister and I instead of the teacher
When my daughter was 13 she asked what was for lunch, I told her "invisible rolls". She went hunting for a good half hour for these rolls. Another time she asked what to clean the bath with with, I said "elbow grease" and yep, you guessed it, she spent half an hour under the sink looking for Elbow grease.
I was a teen in the 80's and your clothes mattered. I didn't have any friends but I did everything I could not to look any more poor than I was.
My grandmother bought me a pair of rust coloured corduroy pants from the thrift store. About a week after me, her, my mom and my cat are sitting in the living room and grandma asks, "did you try on those pants?"
Yes
My cat Henry says "lier"
We all look at the cat and of course I say, "I did so." To which my grandma asks me again, "did you try on the pants?"
Yes I did!
Henry once again, "lier"
I Did!
My grandmother "Go try on those pants Now and come out here and let me see."
(I had in fact not tried those ugly pants on and have no idea why he ousted me)
I'm assuming your cat conveniently meowed after you lied. Or your cat isn't really a cat.
We visited my grandma, who, as usually, packed up us with all things good she could muster. Cookies, homegrown vegetables, dried mushrooms, homemade jam, etc.
At home, we left everything on the kitchen counter, "we can pack them away after showering and having dinner", as we were very tired. When my father came out of the shower, his feet were smelling so badly, that we have sent him back immediately. He was quite upset and hurt as he used to be a very clean and hygienic person in his whole life, but went back to wash his feet.
Then he came again, and the smell was even worse, so we told him to wash his feet again, but specifically with soap this time (yes, we were being sarcastic). He was very upset by this time, but went to wash his feet again, while we kept on complaining how the smell still lingers.
Dad comes back, his feet washed 3 times by now, he used soap, foot spray, whatever... and we STILL FEEL the smell. We wanted to send him again, but this time he stood his ground and said no. (Actually, it was something like that "stop f*****g with me, will ya?!") and began to look for the source of the stench himself.
There it was. On the kitchen counter, sitting in an open paper bag, there were the dried mushrooms we got from my grandma.
Ever since then, we can't eat mushroom soup without remembering that incident. My dad died half a year ago, I miss him so much, but just the other day, this story surfaced again and my mother and I had a good laugh about it, again.
