She can deal with reality. When it agrees with her.

Anna is a clothes horse. She loves dressing up. She loves clothes, and, though it will be some while before she knows the word, she loves “accessories”. She is, as I’ve written before, the true tomboy girly-girl.

One of the many reasons I love her. I have told her parents that she’s one of the kids I’d happily adopt if need be, one of the (few) kids who makes it totally, completely, into my heart. This is true of about one child every two or three years. And this is true of Anna even though neither of my girls are, or ever were, girly-girls. She’s just one of those kids.

You know this is all emotions, right? That my feelings for one child or another do not affect the way I treat them? If the thought that a caregiver can have a particular fondness for one child over another bothers you, if you think that makes me a poorer caregiver, you’d best stop reading now.

(Though I will tell you that of the eight or ten or so children you’ve read about so far, one other has been in this elite group. If you have no idea who it is, then you can be pretty sure neither their parents nor the child has/had any idea, because I leave more hints lying about in this blog, I am more open about how I feel, personally, about the children here in this blog than I ever am in real life.)

Okay. So Anna. She came into my home on Friday dressed in this:

(Is that not the cutest thing you’ve ever SEEN?? It would be even cuter if I could show you her FACE.)

A neighbour had given it to her, you see, the night before. And she had loved it SO MUCH that she had worn it full-time from Thursday evening till Friday morning. Yes, she wore it to bed! Because she was a HORSIE!!

Actually, she was a UNICORN. Well, given the rear view, she was also a PEGASUS. Because those in the costume business, they frequently mix their mythologies. If it makes for good sales. Iridescent wings make for good sales.

(AGH! Even MORE CUTENESS! I am drowning in the cute!!!)

As far as Anna was concerned, though, she was a HORSIE! With a HORN! And WINGS!!! (Does it GET any BETTER???)

Well, it WOULD be better if the costume weren’t so damned HOT. Because on Friday it was 29 degrees here in Ottawa. (Celcius, because we are part of the rest of the world.) 29 Celcius is HOT. Particularly if you are wearing a full-body, one-piece suit made of ARCTIC FLEECE.

(With a HORN! And WINGS! Irisdescent wings!!!)

So after about 45 minutes of her own personal sauna, Anna decided that maybe she could dispense with the horned-winged-horsie. Thankfully, mummy had provided a very pretty little flowered sundress, knowing (hoping? praying???) that the girl would succumb to common sense before heat exhaustion set in.

Too bad she didn’t want to wear it.

Though, given the sweat levels inside that suit, it’s hardly surprising. Maybe what the girl needed was to chill out a bit, and THEN she’d be ready for the dress. Chill out in her Big-Girl Panties (aka training Pants).

And sure enough, in another hour or so, the Training Pants Princess did indeed decide that she needed more clothing.

Except what she wanted was NOT the pretty pink-flowered sundress mummy had provided. What she wanted was a sarong. Made of a pillowcase. This one. Cute, no?

She did finally get into the pretty dress. Twenty minutes before mummy showed up.

Because, we will have you know, Anna is quite capable of compromising with reality.

On her own terms.

LOVE that kid!