Growing Babies

This is how Zoe and Ella woke up earlier this week:

The night before, after I had tucked them in but before they fell asleep, they put all of the 'babies' they wanted to grow (stuffed animals)

into their pajamas. Then they fell asleep.

I found this to be so funny. They love babies and playing 'mommy', or 'grama' or their newest version, 'babysitter' -- and they've put little animals or dolls under their shirts for quite a while (and it was always two, maybe three -- four tops). But they've never done it with their sleepers on. Or stuffed so many in.

A few nights later this is how I found Ella when I went in to make sure she and Zoe still had their covers on

(which she did not, but Zoe did):

The picture doesn't show quite how funny it looked, but I was laughing out loud -- loudly. And because she had stuffed animals not only in the front, but the sides and back as well

(I'm thinking this was her helper . . . ),

I decided to take almost all of them out so she would sleep more comfortably. I felt like a magician pulling one scarf after another out of a magic wand. Or like a surgeon delivering the octomom's babies : ) Somehow Ella managed to tuck in 14 little stuffed animals

and then fall in a deep sleep herself.

The next morning Ella told us she was going to grow some more babies, and kept Tom and me entertained for quite a while.

She soon found that carrying all that extra weight is tiring though . . .

. . . so this is where she ended up.

And then her skinny little sister

(who was not growing babies) joined her,

which made just laying on the sofa a good time.

Big tummy or not.