More Pretending

Today's pretend play did not involve Little People, but Julia was equally invested in her game of "baby-sitter" with her Bitty Twins and several of our baby dolls.  This game didn't have any new hit songs like "I Have Bangs," but it was still full of vibrant imagination.  Julia and Madeleine were baby-sitter friends, caring for May and Elina (Julia's Bitty Twins), as well as Babies Lily, Dashiell, Julia, and Gaga.  Julia was quite the baby-sitter, taking her charges out to the playground, to run errands, and for a ride on the bus.  To fill her role as authentically as possible, she not only donned an over-the arm purse and dress shoes,:

but even made herself some pretend money to use while running her errands:

I find it interesting that she managed to secure a $2 bill.  They're pretty hard to come by, after all.  I especially appreciate her attempt at drawing a presidential face in the center of the bill (albeit vertically rather than horizontally.)  I mean, compared with the actual $2 bill, her copy is pretty authentic, don't you think?:

Or at least it would be if her Thomas Jefferson was stoic and unsmiling...

First stop on the baby-sitting circuit, as I mentioned above, was the playground, constructed out of kid-sized chairs.  After a brief time-out due to whacking her sister over wanting to add a big-sized chair to the playground, Madeleine was able to rejoin the game and take her babies on the playground equipment.  The girls took their kids on various playground equipment, including the swings, slide, and monkey bars.  "Mom!"  Julia shouted boastfully from the living room.  "Are we acting like REAL GROWN-UPS with our babies?  We're, like, HELPING them get across the monkey bars by holding on to them!" 

Well-acted, Julia.  You TOTALLY seem like a real grown-up.

Madeleine had her own purse and dress-shoes as well, securing her own grown-up image:

While the baby-sitters ran errands, I got the privilege of a cameo role in their game, as that of the parking garage attendant.  How exciting! - I even got to have a hands-on role in the whole game, collecting the $2 bill and then handing back the $2 bill, as Julia had not made pretend-money change for me to hand over instead.  After paying for her parking, Julia made a contradictory move and decided to take May and Elina on the bus.  I don't know what happened to her car during this period, as she had paid and exited the parking garage at that point, and my acting role was over with, but she sure was excited to ride the bus with her little baby-sitting clients:

I asked her why she needed to take the bus after having used her car for errands.  Her answer shed pure clarity on the whole issue: "Because...once we drove home, it makes it a TEENY BIT closer to our house." 

Ah.  Okay I see.  Actually, no I don't.  I'm still lost.

At any rate, Julia has proven her love and delight of caring for real children as well as doll children today, as she lovingly caressed and kissed her sister during Madeleine's impromptu car-ride nap.  "She's just SO cute!"  Julia cooed, petting her sister's face and kissing her cheeks.  Madeleine, deeply conked out, remained oblivious to her sister's affections.

I guess an afternoon of sitting for Babies Julia, Dashiell and Gaga wore Madeleine clean out!