Pal

My nieces were visiting for a few days and the three year old is this adorable little girl with quite the imagination. One day I'm in my room and she comes in and starts playing with my dog's toy. A little confused I watch her for a few minutes as she throws the toy a few feet away then runs to pick it up and throws it again.

Finally I say, "What are you doing E?"

"I playing with the doggie!"

Now I'm a little confused because my dog isn't in the room. "The doggie's on the porch honey."

"No Auntie," she says, "My doggie!"

"What doggie E?" I finally ask, still having no idea what on earth this child is talking about.

"Pal!"

"Who's Pal?"

"My doggie!"

It took a while but I finally figured out that Pal is her imaginary dog that she was playing with, tossing the toy for and then having to go pick it up herself because obviously the pretend do isn't very good at playing catch.

So encourage your kids imagination because you'll be the one who gets the rewards of watching how they use it.