mental workout

Ada is a different little girl when she gets enough sleep - she is energetic and talkative and totally wonderful. Last night Ada fell asleep while we were running and transitioned to bed easily so she again got enough sleep.

Fast forward to this morning - Ada was a delightful bundle of energy. As we were driving into day care her imagination took over and among several other activities Ada decided that it was time to go skating. She "walked" into the rink, and told me it was cold so she put on her jacket. Then she was still cold so she put on warm pants. Then she walked out on the ice but her shoes were too slippery so she walked off the ice to put on her skates. Then once she got her skates on she started to skate. Now you have to picture Ada, in her blue butterfly dress, strapped into her car seat, no shoes on (except her imaginary skates) kicking her legs up and down as fast as she can - that was her imaginary skating. I was going to tell her it was more of a push out motion than a running motion but that is really Elliot's job so I let her start her bad skating habits.

Then after skating at a vigorous pace for about 30 seconds she stopped and started talking about how sweaty she was. She then skated off the ice and took off her skates, drove home and took a shower (including washing her hair).

I know this because she talked herself through the whole thing. Her imagination is so vivid that I almost felt the cool air of the ice rink on my face while I was driving in.

Now if we could only get her reality to move this fast and have real life Ada clean up so nicely as imagination Ada. Maybe we should start adding props to her imaginary life so she actually DOES do all of the things she talks about.