Baby Bluey & Binks' Belly Button

Forget saving for college; Bear and I really need to start saving for the therapy our future grandchildren are going to need...desperately.

It seems that our little Binks has what one might call "unique" taste in baby names, as evidence by the ever-changing names she gives to her dolls. One day, it's "Mommy, be quiet: Scolly and Lolly are sleeping!" and the next day, she's asking if she can bring Lippy and Sippy along in the car. Always with the rhyming names, too. God help us all if she ever does have twins someday--all those horrible twin name urban legends (Lemonjello and Orangejello, Male and Female) would pale in comparison to what she might inflict on those poor children.

The other day, while riding in the car, she asked, "Mommy, when I grow up to be a lady, can I grow a baby Ellie-Bug in my belly?" I told her we already have an Ellie-Bug, but she might grow a baby boy or girl someday. "I'm gonna grow a baby girl," she said, "and I'll name her...Bluey. She can drink milkies from my belly button--wait, Mom? Does my belly button make milkies yet? I want to have two milkies just like you do!"

The next day, while I was at work, Bear and I exchanged the following text messages:

Bear: "K has named her Barbies Twinkie, Linka, & Boz."

Me: "Elizabeth [my teaching partner] says her kids are going to have identity crises with names like that."

Bear: "Her kids are going to drink from her bellybutton. They'll have bigger problems than identity crises."

So, so true.

Here are some other recent Keira-isms:

• In the bathtub: "Hey, Dad? Can you go make me a sandwich in case I get hungry in here?"
• While holding my breast pump up to her belly button: "Mommy, I don't know how to work these milky-pumpers." (I collapse in giggles, so she goes to Bear instead.) "Hey, Dad? Can you show me how to work these milky-pumpers??"
• Playing doctor with Bear: "You have a very rare, Dad. You need to go to the hospital." (After this, she performed some sort of preschooler voodoo treatment that involved nearly scraping his face off with a Barbie hairbrush.)
• After putting her socks on wrong, half-crying: "Dad, my socks feel mysterious!!"
• "Mom, I'm so glad you growed that baby Ellie-Bug in your belly for me. I love that baby!"

She likes to draw pictures while she makes up stories at the kitchen table, so I took a video of one of her latest stories. As a bonus feature, I got Ellie to do that weird Hulk-face thing she keeps doing lately, which is reminiscent of Keira's Play-Doh spaghetti maker face from last year and cracks us up to no end. It's not quite as exaggerated here as she does it sometimes, when it looks like her eyes are going to pop right out, but worth a chuckle nonetheless:

I'm guessing Baby Bluey, for all her identity issues (and probably some serious nutritional deficiencies, if she's dependent on Keira's navel as a food source), will be quite a character, just like her mommy!