Girl and the real baby

In my direct family, there have been few girls born. My father was one of 4 boys, there is my brother and myself, and up until Baby Girl was born, there was just Boy and my brother's son. So when Girl was born it was quite a to do. She being born in October, Christmas soon followed. As my father said, leading up to the holiday, his house was a sea of pink with all of the gifts and clothes Grammy had purchased. It began the day after Girl was born. And continues today.

That Christmas, one of the gifts Girl received from my grandparents was a (you guessed it) doll. It was one of about 15 dolls in various shades of pink she received that day. But this one was to be different. Mommy and I didn't think much of its significance at the time, we just noticed that it was large. I believe there were even jokes made that the doll was the same size as Baby Girl at that time. It got put away until an appropriate later date when Girl was ready to play with such a doll.

Some time passed. We took it out of its packaging and introduced it into the toy rotation. It got played with a little. Boy liked to change the thing's diaper. Girl would carry (drag) it around or push it in her doll stroller. However, things have changed recently in that Girl has become a little more attached and she is now demanding it whenever we go out in public. So we leave the house and after I've strapped Girl into her car seat she asks for her baby. I have to run back into the house to get it. It's impossible to try to go anywhere without three trips into the house it seems. Just this past weekend, we parked the car at a little ice cream shop to go in. Girl starts crying for her baby. Great, now I have to take this thing into an ice cream shop. It's gonna get filthy. Needless to say, it's starting to become a member of the family.

Here's where everything comes together and I realize that the perception of my family with the doll differs from how people in the general public perceive it. Mommy is walking down the aisle of the grocery store. Girl is carrying this giant doll. Some random lady comes walking the other way down the aisle. Mommy hears the lady gasp, Ohhhh. Then a second panicked OHHH. Girl was carrying her doll awkwardly, probably by the leg or something. What we sometimes don't realize is that this doll really is the size of a real baby. This other lady had thought for split second that Mommy had let our 2-year old carry our newborn baby and it was falling. Mommy says to me later, great, now everywhere I go people are going to see me as a neglectful mother because Girl is going to be carrying this newborn sized doll everywhere she goes. I've seen other people give looks, but I didn't connect the dots, she said.

So now we're gonna try to get Girl to leave her doll at home whenever we go out. I've learned from experience that's how to make a toddler want something more. So we will be leaving a wake of parenting disdain in our trail. Maybe someone will call child services to protect Girl's doll.