A Dog is A Dog

I'm not good at make-believe. Never have been. The most creative I got as a little girl (that I can remember) was making houses for My Little Pony's out of random things. Oh, and I liked to play pretend school. I remember me being the teacher and making my sister and her friends be my students. But even that wasn't much of a stretch. So I am struggling with the fact that my 3 1/2 year-old lives in a world of make believe. Every day she puts on her "wedding dress" and either talks about her wedding day, or getting ready for the ball, or "Mom, can you play babies with me?" Today she wanted to knit blankets using raw spaghetti noodles as her knitting needles. Being the literal person that I am, my first thought with the noodles was, "Those are for spaghetti, silly." But in her mind they were absolutely not. I try my best not to stifle her imagination, but rather play along with whatever scenario or item she is envisioning. But it is so not natural for me. Ask me to play Candyland or blocks and I'm on it like Blue Bonnet. Hide and seek? You bet- I get it! But princess/fairy/wedding girl getting ready for her wedding in the temple to her dad? Oh boy. I guess I will continue to laugh and be sooooo grateful for the very very vivid imagination she has because heaven knows it didn't come from me!

This is "Baby Jesus" in his manger (aka Halloween curly wig).

Pretending Ivy's head was a bouquet of flowers.