cartoon pitfalls

Because somebody in our house loves cartoons, Kiddo has been getting a pretty steady diet of Disney greats. She's a fan of Dumbo and The Aristocats and Jungle Book and 101 Dalmatians. She also enjoys the Silly Symphonies collection we were gifted by a dear friend.

Anyway, Kiddo got it into her head the other day that she wanted a lollipop (I promise I will tie these two things together, stay with me). I blame (unfairly) her cousin Ric for this – he being the giver of the "lollipop the size of her face" that I mentioned in an earlier post. Though I have a sweet tooth that would kill most men, so I'm sure genetics plays a small part.

Where was I? Right, lollipops. We happened to have a bag of those small Dum Dum lollipops from an earlier attack so I gave her one after dinner. After a few rounds of "what color is my tongue now?" she put the lollipop in her mouth, reached into her pocket, pulled out an imaginary pack of matches, struck an imaginary match, and "lit" the end of her lollipop stick. Then she looked at me and said, "I put fire on it." Then she shook the imaginary match to extinguish the imaginary flame, "threw" the imaginary matchstick on the ground, put the imaginary matchbook back in her pocket, took the lollipop out of her mouth, and exhaled audibly. Then she looked at me and said, "Like in Dalmatians."

Yes, my daughter is Cruela De Vil.

Despite being mildy disturbed that she was pretending to smoke, I looked at Mimi and said, "She's a really good mime."

In other, less harbinger-of-terrible-habits-but-possibly-a-career-in-theater news, we bought Kiddo her first set of LEGOs (do not correct me on the plural of Lego, I know I'm wrong and I don't care). She sometimes has a she-didn't-get-it-from-me laser focus on finely detailed tasks, so we thought we'd get her a set of them blocks what you snap together, and see what happens.

And it's not just any set. It's a very pink girly set complete with a horse and flowers. Maybe she'll be an engineer, but all of her designs will be adorable. Anyway, here she is with a house she built.

She may not be quite ready for architecture school but I like her free-form approach.

And if you needed any (further) proof that she is the luckiest kid in the whole wide world, here is a short video of her at "work" with Mimi. This was taken on a lunch break. Mimi's camera-phone couldn't quite keep up with the manic dance stylings of our little dervish, but you'll get the idea. Also in the scene are Mimi's co-workers, Nikki and Amanda who are kind beyond measure to our little peanut.

In a couple of weeks, Kiddo will actually be taking a class with Amanda which will either be hilarious or a total nightmare for Amanda, since she has always been the noisy, fun auntie to the kid but now has to be a teacher. We'll see if Kiddo can make the adjustment.

We are just thrilled that she is taking the class because one of the requirements for taking a class at Youth Theatre Northwest is that kids have to be completely potty-trained. We didn't think we'd ever get there, but we seem to have re-overcome the resistance to poopins. Yes, "poopins."

And with that, we are off to pack for a trip to Grandma and Grandpa's in California. If you're in Turdtown the sunny Central Coast, come on over and say "hello."