Clancy and The Babysitter

Clara has always had a hard time naming things. She gets a little squirrel-y when you ask her and I am more convinced it is because she is embarrassed to say something rather than not having an idea of what to say. I often ask her when she has a doll, or more likely for her, some sort of stuffed animal what she would name him and often I end up helping. So her menagerie of cats have names like, Kitty (the obvious favorite), Snowball, Calico, and Whiskers. Often, she will have her own twist on the names I have given her cats so Snowball became Snowball Snowball and Calico became Calico Snowball. Recently, she did start assisting with the naming but it started simply. For example, we now have a Mommy Kitty, Daddy Kitty, Kitty (aka Clara :)) and a Baby Kitty.

Her current obsessions (besides the cat family) are mermaids. She is constantly talking about how she wishes she had a tail. She just loves Ariel more because of her swimming power rather than her princess power. Put a dress on her, OK, that is fine. Put a tail on her, and she will play with her for hours. When we were on vacation with Maddie, Clara discovered two rather colorful mermaids in their pool toy bucket. She was obsessed with them and, lucky for her, Maddie allowed Clara to clutch one in each hand as she swam. Of course, when I saw that at Target, I picked them up for her. So each pool trip that followed started with Clara clutching a purple haired and turquoise haired mermaid in each hand. She actually named one of them all on her own. Surprise, surprise... her name was Ariel! Tonight, I let her play with them because I bummed her out when I forgot them for our pool trip today. She was swimming them all around and I asked her what their names were. She quickly volunteered, "Clancy", as she quickly covered her head. I tried NOT to laugh out loud because I felt like that was part of the reason why she isn't always willing to volunteer information like this. I stifled it as best I could and asked again, just to be sure she said what I thought she did. She did not say anything and was squirming away from me but she eventually confirmed that the purple haired mermaid was named "Clancy" and she quickly labeled the other one, "The Babysitter". So, she named her first toys ALL on her own: Clancy and The Babysitter.