Uh oh! She will be hitting you up for money any day now. ;)

And an adorable dress it is! And what's the deal with babies preferring things like wallets and eye glasses and sharpie markers to toys, huh? And the old cell phone w/o the battery does NOT fool Maddie for one second.

"Hey Dad, let's get nilla wafers and apple juice. After that we can catch a matinee!"

Maddie's Mom:

I'm disappointed to hear that the cell phone trick doesn't cut it. I was hoping Trixie would play with our old ones when we upgraded. BTW, thanks for the poll idea!

Thanks for putting her in a dress! I love it.

The fake cell phone thing might not work, but an old wallet filled with those fake cards (like the ones that come with those "pre-approved" credit cards) and green paper probably will. When I bought Charlie a new wallet, we gave Henry the old one. Henry loves it and it makes him feel like a big guy instead of a little kid. He has those fake credit cards and his money from his grandparents in there.

Great idea. thanks!

Jackson (6 months) wants pop bottles and remote controls. We gave him an empty water bottle and our old garage remote without the battery and he was the happiest baby in the world.

She is getting big, but you still see how "small" she is because that wallet looks like a healthy sized book in her hands.

Colum plays with our old cell phones and loves them. So I think it must vary from baby to baby. He also plays with a dead remote and a dead Walkman.
Sometimes, if we're in a carpeted room, I'll let him play with a working version of something after I've taken the batteries out. But he's begun banging things on the floor, so that may end.

Pretty soon, she'll be asking for the car keys.

Hey Ben, doesn't Trixie have a birthday coming up soon?

Oh dear, she's headed in the direction of being a little money-grubber. Watch out what you breed . . . yesterday I was trying to explain the politics of the proposed Orange Co/Chapel Hill school district merger to Sophie and was saying Orange Co had bad schools - why she asked - b/c they don't have enuf $, I said. Why she asked - b/c the people who live around there don't have much $. Her response: we have lots of money!!! No, I said, we don't. But we have lots of cash, she said. No, unfortunately, we don't, I told her. But we have lots of cards, she said!!!! Yes, that's true Sophie. And we can buy money with the cards, she cried!!!!! God help us I said.

Maddie *did* like the old cell phone and old remotes w/o batteries for a couple of days. When she realized, however, that *my* cell phone and remote had lights that lit up when buttons were pushed or buttons that actually beeped, it was out with the old and in with the new. All I can say is thank goodness for the command that locks the key pad on my phone.

Our Trixie (8 months old) looked at the wireless phone last night with naked longing while I made a quick call. My husband, gadget-boy, is already making plans to get her a fake one.

trixie hasn't yet taken a bite out of the wallet, has she? maybe it's my pet-rabbit experiences, but there's a glint in her eye there that reminds me of the chewed-paper experience. . . but i'm glad to see trixie prefers the functional style to the "pocketbook" version.