"I Play My Dollhouse"

My office does not have air conditioning and the window only opens about 3 or 4 inches. Most days it has been hot, but tolerable. I have figured out 3 tricks for making it work: keep the blinds down and the lights off, never have the computer on for more than 10 minutes at a time, and buy a large decaf iced mocha on my way to work each morning to keep me cool almost to lunchtime. This does limit the types of work I can do effectively, but I have lots of reading to do, so it has been okay so far.

But this recent heat wave has just been too much. Today I didn't even go in at all. Yesterday I made it until 2 and then gave up and went shopping before taking Nicholas swimming.

On my errands I ran across a store that sells used kids' stuff and after lots and lots of walking the aisles and obsessing, I bought Nicholas a dollhouse and a zoo with keys to unlock each animal's cage. All my overthinking and debating paid off because he loves them both.

The zoo (or "farm keys," as he keeps calling it) is still a little too difficult for him and when he gets too frustrated I have to suggest that he play with something else for a bit. But he really likes the idea of it, since he is really into using keys right now and he is always drawn to toys that involve a challenge.

And he loves the dollhouse! I knew he would like all the pieces that you can push to make noise, because that was his favorite part of Alice's dollhouse. But my hope that having the dollhouse would encourage him to do more imaginative play (which he has been making steps towards, but isn't at a point yet where he can do it without ready-made props as starting points) has come true much more quickly than I hoped. According to his narrations, he has been putting the "baby" to bed, having the baby sit on the potty, and taking the babies outside the door because they like going outside.

From 2011 July

From 2011 July

This is definitely his new favorite toy.