Q: What did the Daddy Scissors say to his children when they acted up?
A: Cut it out!

Explanation: Of course, the scissors would say, “Cut it out!”

“To act up” means to behave badly, like students who sometimes act up at school and get in trouble with their teacher or the principal.

“Cut it out” has two meanings: First, is the literal meaning that you can cut something out, like cutting a coupon out of the newspaper; second is the idiom where “cut it out” means to stop doing something.  If someone tells you to “cut it out,” that person wants you to stop doing whatever you are doing.

This joke is funny because it plays with two meanings of “cut it out.”  Check out these two art projects you can do with paper and scissors. (The first one we can all do; the second one takes more skill!)