Somehow in the past few weeks, gradually without my really noticing, Bella has become attached to her dolly. More, she’s started parenting it. At first it was holding a sippy cup to dolly’s lips. And then washing the dolly with a tissue or a blanket or her hat.
Then I started to realize that when Bella was pulling clothes out of her dresser, she was often trying to put them on dolly. She’d either press a shirt on top of dolly or put a dress under dolly and try to wrap it around her.
Then yesterday it was diapers. I found her with an unfolded diaper, pressing it over dolly. Took me a minute to figure out she was trying to put the diaper on the dolly. So I took pity on her and wrapped the diaper properly, fastening the tabs. Of course it reaches up to dolly’s armpits and down to her ankles; but it makes Bella happy.
But this morning she surprised me. After watching a mother holding her baby’s hands and helping him “walk” around the pediatrician’s waiting room yesterday morning, Bella is now holding her dolly by the hands and walking her around the house. “Walk, walk,” she says. And then she tries to sit dolly on the floor, saying, “Sit, sit,” as she sits down next to her.
And of course, there are all the kisses and hugs and cuddles that dolly gets now too. sometimes poor mommy and daddy feel quite left out of the love fest.
