Kids Say The Darndest Things, Says Hugh Jackman

Carlos Costas/Pacific Coast News

Despite a well-earned reputation for drama, toddlers can be an endless source of humor as they begin to master their language skills. Hugh Jackman‘s 3-year-old daughter Ava Eliot is no exception!

During a recent appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Hugh revealed that Ava and her big brother Oscar Maximillian, 8 ½, are "not really into" taking a bath. As a result, Hugh and wife Deborra-Lee Furness have gotten creative with the build-up to the daily ritual, which they call "naked time." "I developed this idea that before the bath, we could have a pillow fight and muck around," the 40-year-old actor explains. "When they’re exhausted, I put them in the bath." Once everyone is safely situated in the tub, Oscar will sometimes ask Hugh to play a silly character that he calls ‘Bucky.’

"So I’ll go, ‘Here comes Bucky!’ My daughter Ava goes, ‘Here comes F-cky!’ With an ‘F.’ She’s not so good with a ‘B.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh no. No. Bucky, Bucky, Bucky, Bucky.’ And Oscar … just thought it was the funniest thing ever, and egged her on."

The private family joke went public the very next day, however. As Hugh tells host Jay Leno, he took his daughter to a park that was relatively crowded, and many of the onlookers appeared to notice that there was a celebrity in their midst. "I said to her, from a fair distance away, ‘Ava we’ve got five minutes and we’ve got to go,’" Hugh recalled. "And she calls back, ‘Oh great daddy! We’ll go home for naked time and F-cky!’ … It was not good."

Hugh’s new movie, Australia, is in theaters Wednesday.

Source: The Tonight Show with Jay Leno

Have your children said anything embarassing in public?

Comments

Oh my goodness – I had a big laugh at that one. Kids are so funny without meaning to be!

My little nieces and nephews keep us laughing for hours – sometimes at the expense of their parents who are mortified by what their child has said….

Ava’s a cutie.

- Hayley_B on November 25th, 2008

That’s far too cute! I have a friend whose little boy (then a toddler) once stood in his chair in a restaurant and shouted out very loudly what we thought was ‘for f–ks sake’. After we’d picked ourselves up off the floor, we realised what he was actually saying was ‘a milkshake’. We still laugh about it now, and I have a feeling the story will be told for years to come!

- phoebe on November 25th, 2008

Oh my gosh that is THE funniest thing I have heard in a long time. I’ll bet he just about died! I’m gonna giggle all day long now!

- madylane on November 25th, 2008

It wasn’t so much in public but shortly after I gave birth to my middle son my son accidentally called 911 and the police showed up to check on us and as they were leaving my oldest, 5 at the time, said ‘hey mister, this is my baby brother and my mom feeds him with her boob’

- Vanessa Paige on November 25th, 2008

OMG such a cute and funny story. I just e-mailed it to all of my co-workers. Gotta love the things that come out of kids’ mouths!!!

- Amber on November 25th, 2008

My 3 year old daughter loves putting on lip gloss lately. And we were heading towards dance class and she said ” Mommy, Emma forgot her pretty lips at home.” It was cute. She was just trying to tell me she forgot her lip gloss at home and that lip gloss makes her lips all pretty.

- Natasha on November 25th, 2008

LOL that was so funny.

My son and I went to Block Buster, he was like 2 1/2, and when I was paying for the movies he said out loud, pointing at the cashier, “Mommy look at that fat girl!”, and I told him, “Shhh, don´t say that”, and then he asked “Why not?, look at her, she is fat!”, I paid as quickly as I could and left, then in the car I couldn´t stop laughing, I am laughing right now just by remember it, ahahaha!

- angie on November 25th, 2008

when i was 3 my parents and i were eating at a restaurant. of course i wouldnt sit down and kept standing on the seat and feeding myself with a spoon. i subsequently dropped the spoon in the booth behind us and said “son of a b*tch”. not only did i say that, but it was a group of nuns sitting in the booth. my dad said he almost wet his pants he laughed so hard at their reaction. haha

- Liz on November 25th, 2008

When my son was younger, I wanted him to be able to speak French as well as English as we live in France and I wanted him to be bilingual so I taught him the word, ” Merci” which means thanks in French but of course he couldn’t quite pronounce it properly and instead said ” Merde!” which is french for S**t. A great mother(!)

- babyboopie on November 25th, 2008

My french teacher once told a story about when her and her son visited the zoo. In french a seal (I think..) is a phoque, which is a similar sound to the word f**k, and her son’s going on and on

“Mama, les phoques! Mama Phoque, le Papa Phoque”

Meanwhile everyone there is giving them the weirdest looks ever!

- Natasha on November 25th, 2008

When I was 10 years old, my friend and I were playing with her 2 year old cousin. When I asked her if she went to school her response was, “No but F*cklin goes to school”. Apparently she meant Franklin the turtle!

- Dela on November 25th, 2008

Oh I forgot to mention also that I live in Ontario, which is mainly english speaking but she raises her son as a french speaker.

- natasha on November 25th, 2008

LOL. That must have been the funniest story…I can just picture Hugh’s look when his daughter shouted that out!

My son is 1 1/2 and misprounounces words all the time, I can just imagine the stuff that will be coming out of his mouth pretty soon! He already says SIT with an extra H .

- D on November 25th, 2008

My nearly two year old neice says clock without an L.

And a couple of weeks back while she was playing with her toy pram, she dropped it on her toe and loudly procalaimed “OH DAMN!”.

Needless to say, I was in hysterics.

- Cate on November 25th, 2008

I know a little kid, Garret and he hears his dad say “hell’s bells” all the time, and then one day the tv wasn’t workin’
Garret tried and tried to get it on, then gave up and said “hells bells!”

- paloma on November 25th, 2008

When my brother was little, he had a really hard time with the “tr” sound. One Christmas he was proclaiming loudly and proudly to everyone that he got a “f*ck”…when he was meaning to say truck. My mum still laughs at that to this day and he’s 24 now!

- Devon on November 25th, 2008

When my now 10 yr old son was 2, he called all seafood “crabs”. When we would go to the grocery store he always wanted to look at the crab (lobster) tank, and get crabs (shrimp) to eat. One day I picked up some shrimp and he got so excited that he yelled to the cute guy walking by us “Hey, hey! My mom gots CRABS!!!”. I just about died!

- Melanie on November 25th, 2008

My brother was around 5 or 6 at the time and we had gone out to dinner one night at a local TGI Friday’s and he’d come back from the bathroom with his shirt untucked and his belt not done, so my mom pulled him close to her at the table and was tucking his shirt in without pulling his pants down and all of a sudden, when she’d gotten to the front of his pants and was tucking in the shirt, he jumped back from her and he goes “MOM, DON’T TOUCH MY D*CK” at the top of his lungs. The whole area around us went silent and my poor mom was MORTIFIED. She had no idea where he’d learned that word from!

Further investigation revealed that it was a little neighborhood friend of his who’d told him the word.

- Cait on November 25th, 2008

My friends two year old has some lovely sayings,

kitty is known as titty

and clock is cock.

At her 2nd birthday she was showing everyone around their new home, and stopped by her dads office where he has a grandfather clock and said, “Daddy has a big cock!”

which was fun since her grandfather is a priest….

the astonished look was hilarious!

- gmn on November 25th, 2008

Cate, I had the exact same clock problem with my daughter when she was small. She just could not get the ‘l’ out and it would be c-ck instead (which, by the way, would come out perfectly of course). For some reason, I hadn’t explained this particular quirk to my mother which I probably should’ve done. On one particular occasion, I had taken my daughter to the hospital with me (I’d broken my wrist weeks earlier and was having the cast taken off) and took my mum along to watch her while I was in with the doctor. Of course, the inevitable happened, the minute Ava spotted the clock on the wall, she started shouting about it. My poor mum was trying to hush her while she shouted out at a packed waiting room about ‘the c-ck’. It wasn’t until I came back and explained it to her that she finally understood I hadn’t been teaching Ava bad words! I explained it to the rest of the people still there in case they were horrified, but they apparently found it very funny!

- phoebe on November 25th, 2008

I have to say, this entire thread reminds me of a story that Paula Yates (late British tv presenter) told about one of her daughters. Apparently, the child was obsessed with The Sound Of Music, so her nanny had taken her to see a group of nuns she knew. After serenading the group with songs from the musical, the little girl turned to her nanny and asked ‘what does massive mean?’. Hearing the answer ‘it means very big’, the child replied ‘I thought so, because mummy always says massive p-nis’. Can you imagine recovering from that?! In front of nuns?! It’s in Paula’s autobiography and I’ve never forgotten that story, it still makes me laugh every time I think of it.

- phoebe on November 25th, 2008

That was so funny about “Bucky” but let’s just hope their version of children’s services doesn’t hear about it and “naked time”; they don’t have a sense of humour…

- Pogue Mahone on November 25th, 2008

my first word was actually the F word, it’s on film too.

we had a pond outside our house, and i loved the ducks. i was two (i know i did start talking very late) and my 12 year old brother was filming when i pointed to a duck and said ‘ f—.’ he proceeded to say ‘ where the f did she learn that?!’

it still comes up at family dinners, and it was 19 years ago!

- morgyn on November 25th, 2008

Reading all these stories makes me smile. I can’t wait for my daughter to start talking!

- Jessica on November 25th, 2008

Been there. My son is 2 and loves SpongeBob. Unfortunately, he cannot pronounce Patrick very well. He used to call him “Puck it” but has evolved into calling him “F*ck it.” When he says it, I always say, “Oh Patrick” so that other people know too. Well, one morning when we went into the gym, he looked at one of the staff and said, “Hey look. F*ck it.” I was so mortified. The worker looked stunned and started cracking up. I told her what he was saying and said, “We’re working on it.” She thought it was hilarious.

On a separate story, my son calls my mom “Homo.” She will always be known as that now, lol. When my mom called one day, my husband joked and said, “What up homie?” Aiden took it as “Homo” and has called her that every since.

- Melissa on November 25th, 2008

that last bit sounds so made up !!

- zub on November 25th, 2008

These are all making me laugh so much!!!

Apparently when i was 2 i was in my highchair and my dad put a bowl of strawberries down in front of me and instead of saying “thank you daddy” it came out as “f— you daddy”. my mum was in hysterics!!

- Alice on November 25th, 2008

When my sister and I – her 4 and me 2 were out shopping with Mum one day we stumbled across a little person at the checkout – of course i couldnt help looking. My sister blurted out very loudly “Jessica stop looking at the dwarf” She thought it was one of the dwarfs from Snow White haha.

- Jessica on November 25th, 2008

When i was pregnant with my second child, my first daughter was 2 years old – she was a real mummys girl and would follow me everywhere and wanted to do everything i did. I brought her a toy vacuum cleaner. I was in the bathroom when my waters broke – of course i was in a panic and kept saying “oh no!” my daughter preceded to go and get her vacuum cleaner and said very reassuringly “Dont worry Mum, ill clean it up!” haha.

- Mia on November 25th, 2008

Oh my god! That is such a funny story! I love listening to toddlers talk, there is always something hysterical coming out of their mouth. Once when I was three my aunt took me to the store. While standing in line behind a somewhat large woman, I turned to my aunt and whispered, you know the way that toddlers “whisper” and said “She’s a big girl!”. Yeah, she totally heard me and she was not happy. My aunt was mortified.

Another funny story is that years ago when my aunt (same one) and uncle were living in South Africa they took their kids to a nature park. The youngest was only 3 at the time. As they rounded one of the bends in their car they came upon some sort of bone sanctuary. All of a sudden my cousin shouted “Sh*t I hate the d*mn bones!”. They have no idea where she picked it up but that is still one of my favorite stories ever.

- Ekaterina on November 25th, 2008

hilarious!

- Terri on November 25th, 2008

Apparently my first phrase was “keep the change you filthy animal”, a line I recited from the Home Alone movies (I think the first one), as my parents and I were passing a toll booth on the highway. I think I was about 2 lol.

My mother thought it was hilarious.

- Mia on November 25th, 2008

when my daughter was about one,almost two, she already had a large vocabulary. she also was a regular shopping buddy of my mom and myself. one day we were in lane bryant (the stylish plus woman store for those who may not know) and she was sitting in her stroller quietly watching us shop. finally she spoke up,loudly, and said “mommy when i grow up i want to be fat like you so i can go shopping all the time!” i was so ashamed! i could have crawled under the table.all the women who were stand around the undergarments table laughed. i was so embarrassed because i thought she would offend someone.she had equated shopping and being plus size because that seemed like the only places she would go with us i guess. it wasnt the only store but it must be the one she remembered. till this day i think its one of the cutest things she’s ever said, even though i was embarrassed.

- coco on November 25th, 2008

My sister, her husband, my husband, and I have never been particularly careful with our language around my niece, never realizing of course that at 18 months she would turn into a parrot overnight. Hilarity has ensued around our family during the last few weeks, and in particular, yesterday, when my adorable, doe-eyed niece walked up to a complete stranger in the grocery and said, “Dirty hippie!” My sister was beyond mortified, and I had to turn completely around to keep her from seeing the tears of laughter rolling down my face!

- Stephanie on November 25th, 2008

Oh My Goodness! That has to be so embarassing. But it is SO funny! Haha! OMG it’s so funny what kids can say sometimes.
I love Hugh, he is so sexy and seems like a great father and husband.

- Stéph on November 25th, 2008

About the time I was three, I learned that “fridge” was short for “refrigerator”. I had also used my parents use the word “bitch” and I assumed that it was short for “garbage”. So one day, my mom and I are in the supermarket and we walked by a spill or something that smelled just awful and very loudly I turn to my mom and go “SMELLS LIKE A BITCH!”

- a k on November 25th, 2008

Our son loved the movie Lady and the Tramp when he was a toddler.

Tramp calls Lady “Pidge”, so Matt would toddle around saying Pidge all the time.

One of our neighbors thought he was saying b*tch, and when she told me about it, we had a good laugh when I told her what he was really saying.

- DiamondGirl on November 26th, 2008

That was hilarious, both Hugh’s stories and all the other ones! Seriously, I’m in tears of laughter!
I was in a store the other day, and I heard a wee boy (looked about 3)say to his nana is an exasperated tone. ‘Oh, Nana,’he then paused dramatically to sigh deeply, before continuing with ‘f-ck you Nana.’

I was shocked, the parents looked at me and shushed the boy, then carried on. I then collapsed into tears of laughter.

I’m bookmarking this page, this is pure gold for when I need a pick me up! Thanks guys!

- Maddie on November 26th, 2008

These stories are so funny! My son is not quite two and he’s starting to talk. He loves rocks, but he can’t pronounce “r” yet. He uses either “c” or “f”. One day he got frustrated and said “b*tch!” He was trying to say “Fix it!”

- Mandy on November 26th, 2008

A long long long time ago when we were gathered at a thanksgiving feast at my aunts house i would say about 15 people crowded around a table. My cousin who was 5 at the time was sitting patiently waiting for the mashed potatos. It was so noisy that after asking nicely 4 times for someone to pass the mashed potatoes he gets on his chair and screams “PASS THE F-CKING MASHED POTATOS…PLEASE”. To see this kid so young calmy ask and then get mad and really ask everyones jaws dropped. It was by far one of the funniest family moments.

- Jackie on November 26th, 2008

This is one of my most vivid memories. My mother went to law school when I was a toddler, around 3 or 4. The library doors were huge and carved with big brass handles. I was tugging on them one day, trying to get in when someone graciously helped me pull it open. When I looked up at her, I remember being very confused because… she had a mustache! My mom arrived just then and I turned to her, still totally in awe and said, “That lady has a mustache!” Mom tried to get me to be quiet, but I just couldn’t get over it, so I continued, “But… but… SHE HAS A MUSTACHE!” The poor lady, she just smiled, leaned down and said, “Yes, I do,” and walked into the library with her head held high. Mom studied at home that night.

- Jen DC on November 26th, 2008

I love reading all these stories!

When our oldest was 2, she used to call belts and ties “snakes.” Whenever she was around and my husband was getting ready, she would squeal and ask to play with the snake. One day, we were getting ready to go out to meet my mother-in-law for dinner. As my husband was getting ready, our daughter came into the bedroom and got excited about the “snake.” We indulged her and let her play. When we get to dinner, we apologized for being late. As my husband was trying to put our daughter in her high chair, she stood up and proudly proclaimed, “Sorry we were late. I was playing with the snake between Daddy’s legs.” I have never been so mortified in my entire life. The whole restaurant turned to us. My husband acted like nothing had happened. I loudly explained to my mother-in-law that our daughter calls belts and ties snakes, but I don’t think anyone paid much attention to me.

- Dana on November 26th, 2008

wow these stories are so funny! when I was really small… this is so not politically correct, so I’m sorry, lol… but we were in a mall and there’s was a little african american boy in the elevator and i pointed at him and said, “Mommy! Daddy! Look at the little monkey!” lol

- patty on November 26th, 2008

@Jackie.

i smiled reading some of the comments, buts yours made me laugh for ages! so cute!

this is not so much a cute words story but…

last year in church one sunday, the little kids from the sunday school (all about 3) got up to sing for the rest of us on the stage. there was this one little boy, who was known to be fidgety. he was standing at the front of the group and when he started singing (loudly and didnt know all the words!) he was singing right into the mic. about 600 people (my church is big!) were cracking up the whole time. he had no idea, the poor soul!

- jade on November 26th, 2008

Oh my gosh, I’ve got tears from laughing so hard. Not only is Hugh’s story funny, but the comments on here are hilarious too!

Our 2yrs old son says “c*ock” instead of “sock” so that can be bad in public.

My step-son was about 8yrs old when we were getting gas and he saw a lady standing by her car. He said, “she’s really fat!” with the window rolled down. I couldn’t sink low enough into my seat! I rolled up the window as quickly as possible as I explained to him that as obvious as something like that may be, it’s not polite to point it out lol

- Marie on November 26th, 2008

Hmm, nothing as embarrassing as some of the tales already told, but my nephew has no inside speaking voice. He doesn’t know the meaning of whispering, so if he ever has a question to ask when you’re in a public place, he’ll just ask it in a loud, almost shouting tone…even if it means the entire store or people in the area can hear him, and it could have been a question about them, nice, rude or otherwise. He’s one that needs an answer to every question, and he also asks why and what for, et cetera.

I can’t even begin to give examples. Too many to recount.

One time he’d asked my mother right off the bat, “Grandma, why is that [man/woman] doing that?” She’ll shush him and give him a short answer. Then he’ll just ask why and point at them! I know sometimes the people he’s talking about look at him and smile or laugh or both, but not all of them do…

Things like that. If I’m there, I just try to ignore it and divert his attention and keep him quiet.

But I think I would die off from embarrasment from Ava’s little “Bucky” moment. That is embarrassing, but hilarious as well.

- FC on November 26th, 2008

My cousin met a beautiful woman in Rwanda and they married and had two children; the youngest of whom I met for the first time this Thanksgiving (I am from MA but have been living in and out of NY for four years, they live in DC). My grandfather decided to spice up the conversation by putting all adults at the “kids” table and putting the six and eight year old with us. The little boy was cranky…we kept asking him if he was OK. He wouldn’t respond. Finally, halfway through the meal, he turns to my grandfather’s girlfriend and says “You know, I’m in a bad mood because I didn’t sleep on the ride up here. I didn’t sleep on the ride up here because I had A BIG WEDGIE.”

- P on November 29th, 2008

Very funny!
Bc it was Hugh (a celeb) Im sure the crowd just laughed. If it were a regular man they woulda called the police thinking he was molestig or letting his girl Ava be molested.

- fae on November 30th, 2008

Years ago my nephew would watch the “Power Puff Girls”. He couldn’t pronounce it so he would say the Power F*** Girls are on.lol

- Callen +3 on December 1st, 2008

I guess I’m the stick-in-the-mud. I don’t find a child cursing purposely hilarious, and as our family doesn’t swear, I would be shocked and appalled. How sad that parents think their negative habits rubbing off on impressionable children is a laughing matter.

- Micky on December 1st, 2008

Many years ago my sister and my nephew Trace were in a Duncan Donuts and there was a little person in there also up at the counter and my sister said Trace got this big-eyed look on his face and was squirming and tugging on his mom’s pants and pointing at the little person. My sister was trying to shush from saying anything out loud about the little person’s small stature, but Trace finally called out loudly by saying “is that a boy or a girl?” He hadn’t even noticed the person was small, he just couldn’t figure out if it was a man or a woman!

- Alice on December 2nd, 2008

I started talking early, when I was about 14 months old (and my family claims I haven’t shut up since). I picked up on everything I heard, and my mom caught me saying, “Damn!” as a curse when something went wrong. My mom explained that “damn” was a bad word, and it wasn’t something I should be saying. She said, “You can say something else instead, like ‘Aw, nuts!’ or ‘Rats!’.” About a week later, my parents took my little sister and I with them to a restaurant. During the meal, I knocked something over (my mom can’t remember what) and I yelled out “Oh, rats’ nuts!” She said that she and my dad started laughing so hard that they couldn’t finish their meal and had to leave!

- GodivaEyes on December 5th, 2008