Well, it’s official.  Lo has an imaginary friend.  She would be the one.  I’m not all that suprised.  In fact, I’ve been on to her for a while now.  About to turn 3 this summer, she’s named every doll and precious anything that she’s carried around with her “Honey.”  Well, I shouldn’t say everything all the time.  Sometimes she’ll throw a random nickname out for Honey.

“What’s baby’s name, Lo?” I’ll ask.

“Um….Honey’s name is Choo-Cha,” she’ll reply.

Never makes a like of sense, or remotely resembles an existing word.  So, you ask, how do know for certain she has one particular ‘Honey” that serves as her imaginary friend.  In her comical genius, she has revealed some pretty marked clues.

First came the tattles.  “Mom,”  she’d say in her ‘matter of fact,’ more serious, tone…”Honey’s bad.  She’s in time out.”

The look on her face matched her serious tone.  Honey must have been in some serious hot water.

“What did she do, Lo?” I asked.  I can’t help myself but to participate fully in her world.  It’s the most fun EVER.

“She hit me.  Then she kicked me,” Lo reported.

“Oh, my goodness gracious.  I’m so sorry, Lo.  You’re right.  She does  need a time out,” I reinforced.

“Yeah,” Lo agreed.

Since then, there have been multiple reports of Honey behaving inappropriately.  In fact, if Honey’s not sleeping or napping, she’s most likely causing a ruckus for poor little Lo.  She’s “being bad,” or “she’s in trouble,”or  “she needs a crack on ‘da butt.”

I don’t ever get to meet Honey, or join in with them when they are playing…so if I want in on the action I have to eavesdrop.  They have tea together, play dolls together, read books, set up the dollhouse, play in the big sister’s room when she’s at pre-school.

Both of my girls have been way into Barbie lately.  So much so that we even own a few of the movies.  DO NOT include them in your DVD collection until you are fully committed as a parent to have them on continuously for weeks at a time.  Yes, I can just turn the TV off.  But listen…it’s been rainy, my yard is a pile of mud right now…they watch TV sometimes.  And it’s a lot easier to let them watch something they want to watch then to negotiate a treaty.  Barbie is a highly sought after commodity in the land of little girls.  Nothing’s changed, there.

Anyway, to return the point at hand, Brianne and Lauren re-enact all of the movies and then some.  Brianne, being the older one, always claims Barbie as her character.  Then, she spends the next 20 minutes selling Lo on why she ‘wants’ to be Ken and not Barbie.  When I hear it happening, I intervene and make them switch off…or insert one of Barbies many friends into the picture as possible choices for Lo.  Lo, not thrilled at all about having to be the boy, one morning eventually got a girl character to play…Brianne assigned her the evil Mermaid.

“Brianne!” I intervened….

“What Mom,” an annoyed voice trailed down the stairs.

“Stop making Lo be the boys and the evil characters…” I instruct.

“OK, fine….”

That’s what busted sounds like.

I think this whole repeated situation threw Lo over to the ‘for sure’ category in the imaginary friend department.  It’s

really quite logical.  When Brianne is not around, she is Barbie, and Honey is Ken.  Lo gets to play her way every time.  Having a big sister can be suffocating at times.  I know this first hand, because I still want to suffocate my little sister and she’s about to be 30 years old.

I’m not sure how long it’ll last, because everyone wants Lo to introduce Honey to them…and it seems as though she’s less than thrilled to share her BFF with other people.  Honey is always unavailable for introduction.  She’s only for Lo.  Just when I think I’m sure, she’ll call another doll ‘Honey,” or when I cross examine her she’ll say that Honey’s name is “Audrey Ann” (her American Girl Doll.)  It makes me wonder if I’m misinterpreting the situation.  Until Honey has another situation…like when Lo woke up one morning and flew down the stairs yelling,

“Mom!  Honey is barfing!  She needs the bucket!”

And so, I rushed upstairs with her to give her the bucket, so that she could tend to “Honey.”

I’ll play along with it as long as she is playing.  My mom tells me I had an imaginary friend when I was little, and I believe it!  In the four years it took for my sister to arrive, I probably had a whole clique full of them.  I’ve always wanted to be friends with everyone.  That’s how my little Lo is, too.  After playing with one of the neighbors today…first time ever they played, she hugged me and said,

“I love her, Mom.  She’s the best ever.”

No, Lo, you are the best ever.

Happy Imagining 🙂

Megs