All Her Children

Kelly has developed a real "mommy" side to her. She has over the past year received some baby dolls as gifts, but never played with them much until recently. Now every one of them has a name and distinct personalities (that she has created for them). They have their own little dramas going on inside her room which she now calls the "baby room". There they all have their own sleeping spot and special things they like to do. Let me introduce her pack (from left to right):Most of us already know Kelly's first dolly, "Baby", who Kelly has now renamed "Laura" (sometime after binky left us). Next to her is "Lucy" (I sort of gave her that name when she got her and the blue twin who I told her was Liam - she kept the name Lucy, but renamed the blue twin), Then we have "Kare" and that IS with a K she'll tell you, then the blue twin she first called "Wergie", but now has settled on the name "Morgan", then the other "Baby" who she now calls "the other Laura", then the smallest baby she calls "Mertzel" (whom she flip-flops on calling he or she, so not sure of the gender of this one), and finally the BIG baby she named, "Go".

Some interesting facts about Kelly's brood... Morgan is definitely a boy, and the rest are all girls (with the occasionaly Mertzel flip-flop), and he is ALWAYS in trouble! He hits, and yells, and misbehaves, and she is always having to put him in time out! She goes thru lengthy explanations of his behavior to me and makes sure I know that he is being punished. Lucy & Kare are in competition for being her favorites. They get special treatment, and she usually takes one or both to bed w/her now. Mertzel is just a little baby and can't seem to do anything for him/herself, and he/she usually gets lost in the corner of the room face down for days at a time, although less so since I pointed that out to Kelly one day. The Lauras are still special too, especially when she has a boo-boo or needs comforting, but they have definitely taken a back seat to Lucy & Kare. GO is also sort of left out because, as Kelly says, "she's is too HEAVY to carry!". Boy do I know that feeling!

Here she is teaching some of them how to brush their teeth! (this is a strategy I learned from one of the many potty training books, to get them to teach their babies how to do it... it didn't work with the potty training, but I found another good use for it!)

Our every move involves some concern over one or all of them - if we are leaving the house she decides who is coming and who is staying. When we eat, she makes sure they have all been fed too. I think she sometimes uses them as delay tactics when I'm trying to get her to do something she doesn't want to like, "Kelly its time to get in the bath!", "But mommy, Morgan is hitting Kare again and I have to put him in time-out and and and Kare is hungry and and Go is cold and and..." you get the idea. But I can't help but encourage these new traits of compassionate, caring, loving teacher/mother. She feeds them, walks them in her little baby stroller, changes them, talks to and cuddles them. Taking care of and keeping track of the goings-on of this many babies is admirable! All I have to say is Angelina Jolie's got NOTHING on Kelly!