An Imagination is a Terrible Thing to Waste

The Limelets all have outrageously fertile imaginations. I LOVE some of the crazy stuff they come up with. Here are a few of my favorites from over the years.

1. The two girls, at ages 3 and 5, playing with a pencil and a blob of Play-doh pretending to dissect a squirrel.
Uh-oh, the eyeball fell out!
Put it back in!
Ok, the eyeball is in, let's pull out the intestines and vertebrains (sic)!

2. The boy, at age 4, bounding down the stairs on all fours, naked and barking.
Son, where are your clothes? It's January.
Mom, I'm Balto, the sled dog. Dogs don't wear clothes!

3. I am in the kitchen and hear jungle yells. I walk out to the living room to find Limelet #3, then 5, wearing his Batman cape, holding a golf club like a sword, grasping a drape while perched on one foot on the back of the sofa, ready to launch out into the center of the living room.

4. Limelette #2 from the ages of 2-4 wore a ratty, sleeveless nylon practice jersey by joining the two armholes together and looping them around her neck. This was her 'ball-gown.' Wearing it made her the most glamorous princess on the planet. She wore it EVERYWHERE.

5. Limelet #3, at age 6 invented various animals. His favorite was the 'speed-cat.' In his own words, speed cats are nocturnal omnivores with prehensile tails. They also have nictitating eyelids since they are unlike most cats and enjoy a good swim. They run faster than cheetahs and have a body like cheetahs with stripes like a tiger. He drew me a herd, pride....um, what is the collective noun for a group of speedcats?.....of speedcats that I had on my wall for years until we moved. And yes, he could define all those fancy words for you in case you don't know what they mean.

6. Limelette #2 would only wear dresses and skirts that had good 'twirl factor.' She put them on and turned in circles. If the skirt did not flare out sufficiently during the spinning process it was unworthy of ever being worn. No princess could wear dresses and skirts that lacked good twirl factor.

7. Limelette #1 informed me in kindergarten that she was no longer a girl. She wore only jeans and t-shirts with sneakers and a backwards baseball hat. I was now to refer to her as JT instead of her given name.

8. Limelet #3 at the tender age of 3 years and 9 months, and STILL refusing to be potty trained
WHY WON'T YOU USE THE POTTY??!!!
her looking calmly at me, 'God doesn't want me to.'
(Ok, I admit, I dunno if that is imagination, delusion, or if I have the next Joan of Arc)

9. Limelet #3 has written a couple of stories about a boy superhero who rides around in his 'nuclear powered Ford.' Also, when his extremely dull, spirit-crushing teacher last year could only manage to make comments about his handwriting on any creative writing assignment, the boy started a series of stories about 'the very stupid teacher.' I have to admit, I enjoyed reading them and seeing how the class constantly outwitted her.....AND I told him so!

10. Ever the realist, Limelette #1 sometimes gets annoyed with my own imagination. When I was reading a story to a friend's child and using a different voice for each character, the 8 year old child looked at me and intoned, "Mother, please use the voice God gave you."