Kids go through phases. All parents know this and accept it. They know that an annoying habit will fade eventually, but they also know that it can work in the opposite direction; something cute or funny a child does will almost certainly end one day. Having said that, Cam is going through a very interesting phase right now, and I’m sure I’ll have mixed feelings when it’s over.
His current phase: Cam is constantly pretending he’s a girl.
It seems to have started a few months ago. Cam began pretending he was the characters on Calliou: first he was Calliou, and then Leo and then Andre. Then suddenly he was Sarah more often than not, and then Rosie and Clementine, and then I don’t remember the last time he wanted to be any of the boys.
Now he wants to be any girl in any book we read or any TV show we watch. Whenever we’re reading a book, he’ll point to every single girl and ask their name, so he can add them to his list of characters.
Off the top of my head, he has recently been:
- D.W. (from the Arthur books)
- Betsy (from a Curious George story)
- Emily Elizabeth (from Clifford)
- Martha (one of Emily Elizabeth’s friends)
- Sallie (from the Cat in the Hat. He really likes her bow).
- Little Girl Going Potty Who Wants Privacy (from his potty training book).
- Daffodil (the girl bunny from Clifford’s Puppy Days. He keeps forgetting her name, and we have to remind him.)
- Little Girl Who’s Afraid of Monsters and Whose Pony Tail Goes Flying Up (????)
And most recently:
- Cindy Lou Who (How the Grinch Stole Christmas)
Our absolute favorite, however, has got to be “Different Mary”. One episode of Calliou had a little girl on named Mary, and later that day Cam said, “I’m Mary”. And we said, “Like Mary had a little lamb? That Mary?”. And Cam replied, “No, different Mary”. And the name stuck.
Cam takes his acting quite seriously. When he is in character, you must address him correctly. One day I was driving in the car with him, and a song came on that he had heard before. As I was turning it up, I said, “Hey Cammy, you like this song!”, and Cam quickly corrected me: “Different Mary likes this song”. He also likes to establish his character early. One morning when he woke up, I walked into his room, and Cam was struggling to pull himself up to a stand, wiping the sleep out of his eyes, and the first thing he said to me was, “I’m Different Mary”.
Like I said, I’ll have mixed feelings when this phase is over. On one hand, it’s freaking hysterical. On the other hand, we have all these boy’s clothes that are just going to go to waste.
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3 comments:
So funny, Mike! Jack is into the character thing, too, but without the gender component. In fact, I'm not sure he's realized that there's a difference yet between the sexes (I'm just as often called "Daddy" as I am "Mama"). This doesn't mean, however, that he can't play the part of every baby animal on the living planet. When we go to get him in the morning, before we even have the doorknob fully turned, he's screaming out, "SAY, GOOD MORNING BABY HIPPO!" or whatever animal he fancies that day. It pretty much rocks.
I like the fact that it's always baby animals instead of adult ones. That's really funny.
this post made me laugh so hard because naomi did (and still does) exactly the same thing with all the characters. as she's gotten older, the characters have tunred into imaginary friends.
she went through a boy phase. she was always dash, or the kid from iron giant, and there were others, but i can't remember. the boy thing went on long enough to worry my mother a little. then one by one the boys got replaced by girls as she started identifying with different characterstics. but she still does dash every now and then.
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