Once Upon a Time.....

Miss Madeline is a brilliant story teller. Alright, I can't lie, she's not Dostoevsky, but she sure is funny. The last few weeks, at bed time, she has been requesting not just songs and reading but made up stories as well. I usually tell her a few stories about Princess Madeline and Prince Wesley. Then she requests a made up story. Sometimes about Taiyo and Grace, other times about birds or cats or squirrels... She's got quite an imagination. Then after I'm done I ask her to tell me one. Tonight the story went like this, "Once upon a time there was a big bunny rabbit that scared us. And we said don't scare us bunny. And a little bunny was so sweet and ate some carrots. And then the mommy protected us from the red monster and we were so happy. THE END." This is said with a lot of cute pauses, and sighs and ums and some serious thinking on her part. Either that or she has already learned to make dramatic pauses for affect. Another story went like so, "Once upon a time there was a cute little birdie. The birdie ate some bird seed but he couldn't find it and was hungry so the mommy helped. and the little birdie ate all the bird seed and flew away in the sky with the clouds. THE END". I really love listening to her make up stories and work on her imagination, and she's just a hoot when she tells them. I'm working to get some video clips so you can all hear about the birdie and the bunny, the ghost, the dinosaur and the monster. I'm not loving the ghost and monster stories because she's scared, or pretending to be scared. I think her new fear phase is coming from daycare and the make belive games she plays with the older kids, because lately she's been coming home saying we have to hurry to get a way from the scary monster or the big dinosaur. I always tell her that mommy will protect her from anything!