Library CareBear Crisis!

Claire likes to open and shut books. Then open and shut them some more. What a great pre-reading skill! If only all kids would open their books more!

Claire likes to look at books with babies in them. She ALSO likes to smack their faces really hard. I don't know what kind of pre-reading skill this is.

This is her Baby Strawberry book, which has a baby on every page. Notice her PINK BEAR. She carries it around all the time. ALL THE TIME. Takes it to bed, too.

She can even crawl with this thing. She is quite speedy, I must say. The poor bear is starting to show some wear, however, compared to her yellow counterpart, which she got at the same time.

Here she is again looking at a baby. If I need 10 minutes, I just give her a Parenting-type magazine, and she will flip through looking at all the ads with babies and go "BABY!" with every one. It's quite cute.

So late yesterday afternoon, we went to the library to get new books. I try to do this at least every week to week and a half. They have a big play area, so I let Claire play there for 15-30 minutes depending on how long I feel like watching her poke other kids in the eyes and try to pull their hair. I usually chat with some other moms and Claire enjoys crawling around and slobbering on some toys that aren't hers. Well, she usually brings her CareBear with her and apparently she left it somewhere and since there were other kids (as always) and other toys everywhere, I didn't notice it when we left to go get new books. Then on the way home I got gas. Still didn't notice missing Bear.



THEN when I got to the grocery store, which was my last stop by the way, I tried finding her bear on the car floor...that's when I got the sinking feeling in my stomach. NO BEAR. SO I thought about running in really fast to get the taco shells we needed. We were going to make fajitas from some extra steak from last night. That was all I stopped for. I thought about running in really fast but I didn't want to risk it. And besides, by the time it takes me to get her out of her carseat, I could already be back at the library. So we rush back to the library and the whole time I'm hoping it's still there and not stolen by some bigger, meaner kid. We go back to the play area and it is gone. There are no kids. The area is picked up. WHICH IT NEVER IS.



It is scary. I retrace our steps to the baby book area. No BEAR. My heart is pounding because I think Claire will really start to notice this bear is MIA at some point. I go to the reception desk, where one of her Story Time teachers is playing SCRABULOUS online and ask..."Um, you haven't seen a Pink Bear, have you?"



"You mean this one?" Miss Emily reaches under the desk into a wonderful treasure trove of lost goodies. Claire reaches out and grabs it from her. It was tooooooo cute.



Crisis averted. We must get a back up. I must ask my neighbor where she got it.