Honesty and innocence are two of the things we love most about our kids, but sometimes I can't help but wish that my daughter Queenie could choose her words more carefully.

Phrases like 'why have you got such a big bottom?' or 'I don't think that dress is very pretty' have a tendency to knock the wind out of you, but at the end of the day you laugh them off and - through gritted teeth - say: 'Oh, aren't four-year-olds just so precious!'

Last week, however, my husband Jimmy was on the receiving end of a Queenie-style reality check when she was looking through a magazine and pointed to a picture of a rather dashing male model.

'Look at this man, Dad,' she said to Jimmy. 'He's so much, much fancier than you are.'

We all had a giggle, but it seems Queenie wasn't quite done.

'Mum, I think you should marry this daddy in the magazine instead,' she said. 'Why don't you ring him and ask him to marry you? You can have a big wedding!'

She finished it off with a triumphant: 'Yeah! Dump Daddy!'

Hmmm, what was that about four-year-olds being precious?!