Imagination at work

As evidenced by her new-found love of dress up, Bella's imagination is really blossoming. I should probably say exploding, but I prefer to pretend she's a sweet flower than a hurricane with gale-force winds.

Ehem. Anyway, she has gone from a child who renacts real-life scenarios to one that lives in a world inhabited by unseen creatures and surreal rules. For instance, she still loves to play "pic pic" (picnic) and "make-a yo coffee" in the bath tube (you know, filling up her toys with water for us to pretend to drink ... that's how you make coffee, right?). But now she also must talk to people on her banana "phone" before she'll allow me to peel it so that she can eat. And she also likes to text on the remote control. When I ask her what she's doing, she shoots me an annoyed look and says, "I stec you, Mama."

But her burgeoning imagination isn't all sunshine and rainbows. Surprisingly, the child with a mean streak is also the child with a creepy little brain. She sees Swiper the Fox everywhere. He was sneaking into the bed with us this morning and then hiding in the fan this evening. He tiptoes up behind me when I'm changing her diaper and sometimes hangs out in the fridge. I thought Swiper was okay to play around with, so yesterday I said to her, "Here comes Swiper! He's gonna get you!" and my sweet girl about lost her ever-lovin' mind. It took me more than a half-hour to calm her down.

Then there are the snakes and spiders. Bella sees them lurking in the strangest places, like in her drum set and on her toothbrush. When she sees them, she must grab them up and then stomp them to death. When I was playing with her in her room, I told her I spotted one and needed her to stomp it. She ran right over and began Riverdancing on it. Just when I thought I was safe, she saw another one and exterminated it as well.



But I took it too far by taking her to see real snakes. She was cool until I took her too close -- and she tried to climb inside my eyeball ... fingernails first. We won't be doing any more of that real stuff any time soon!

Despite the creepy factor, this imagination thing is pretty fun. I'm really enjoying watching her brain flex and grow. However, I hope the next step isn't monsters underneath her bed -- who knows how she'll decide to slay them!