Froggy

I have to confess that in my past I've prided myself in the fact that my kids have not been attached to any type of blankie or stuffed animal or binky or anything else. When Stephen was an infant, I tried to do the baby thing and offer him a pacifier. He reluctantly took it until about four months and then totally refused to touch it after that. I offered him Grandma's special blanket, but he just didn't want to cuddle with it ... ever. (Sorry, Mom. I tried!) I knew how one of my nephews was extremely attached to a certain stuffed bunny, and the trauma my sister had to deal with when it was lost or washed or misplaced or lost it's tag or whatever, was quite an occassion. For that reason, I tried to rotate Stephen's stuffed animals so that there was no attachment to any certain one. Success for child #1! No attachments!

Timothy, Mr. Colic, would not even TOUCH a pacifier, even though we desperately tried to shove it in his mouth from the time he was a few days old! My sister-in-law was constantly trying to cuddle his face with blankets of all textures, but that only made him scream worse. We tried blankets, animals, toys, cloth diapers (another nephew's "blankie"), etc, etc. NOTHING!!! We wanted him to have something sooo badly so that we could have some reprieve from his screaming. That kid wanted nothing, and no one. Success for child #2! No attachments (although we WANTED him to have one)!

Christopher is Mr. Cuddly, though. He will snuggle up with anything soft. He doesn't need a certain animal or blanket or object. He just loves to snuggle and hug. We love it! He does get all excited when he sees his Beanie Baby moose "Twacks", but he'll hug and carry around any animal that is available, and yet he has no problem going to sleep without anything. Success for child #3! No real attachments!

Last night, my pride was dissolved when we had a little issue going to bed. Stephen's Froggy Webkinz was missing!! Now, since he received Froggy for Christmas and Timothy received Cheeky Monkey for his birthday from Laurel, those animals have definitely gotten dragged around. They go just about everywhere with the boys, even into the bathroom where they perch on the counter facing the boys on the toilet! I try to discourage that one, but they seem to think it's important that their animals are with them at all times.

Sigh. Here's where I realized we have NOT had success with this attachment thing! Stephen couldn't find Froggy last night. We tore the house apart looking for that silly little green and yellow frog! We looked in the front load washing machine, where Christopher puts everything these days. We looked in the waste baskets thinking maybe someone played a joke and forgot. The boys were even looking in the refrigerator! We could not find Froggy! Stephen was eventually convinced that he could go to bed and if we found Froggy before WE went to bed, we had promised to take him in to Stephen. He woke up twice overnight, coming in to ask me if I had found him yet because he noticed Froggy was still missing.

I didn't know what to do. In the morning we still couldn't find him, so I even asked my friend who had been here yesterday if she could ask her kids where they remembered seeing him last. We tried to get Christopher to confess where he'd dragged that little guy and dropped him. Christopher just said, "Bah!!" and ran off.

The boys were going to go to the library this morning with Fred and before they left, Stephen decided to do one last search in the basement. Within moments, he came hollering up the stairs waving Froggy by the foot! He'd found him! What joy!! When asked where he found him, he hesitated to tell me. He had been climbing on some shelves where he wasn't supposed to be and it looked like Froggy dropped between the shelf and the little play house next to it. The only way it could have gotten behind there was if Stephen had been climbing on that shelf, and he was afraid to admit it!

So, my pride is crushed. My children ARE attached to stuffed animals after all. The good news is that we made it to three and four years of age before that attachment started! The other good news is that they learned a huge lesson yesterday and today and the new rule is that Froggy and Cheeky Monkey are only allowed in the living room and the bedrooms from now on so that they don't get lost again. I can handle that. We welcome back Froggy! Even I missed him last night, for my own reasons.