...a couple of those said too cute kiddos would be my sister's kiddos.

The other night my 1 y/o niece insisted the my skeins of Fun-Fur (for gnome beards) are actually little doggies... apparently I just hadn't realized this yet... I had one skein very excitedly brought over to me, she was waving it and saying "Doggy! Doggy!" when I tried to tell her it was just yarn the only reply was a very insistent "Doggy!".

Later the same night I had out a bag of 'poly-pellets' (bean bag stuff) to fill some of those gnomes with. My 3 y/o nephew decided that they were eggs, and not just any eggs, they're bug eggs. This lent a particularly cool destinction to them in little-boy-world, and he asked very sweetly if he could touch them. Since I keep these 'bug eggs' in a big gallon zip-lock I can re-seal, and - by this point - some had already been spilt (much to his and his little sister's enjoyment), I didn't see any harm in letting him check them out. I even enjoy sticking my hand in the bag and letting the pellets fall through my fingers. I opened the bag and held them out for him to touch... he very cautiously lowers his hand into the bag, all the time I'm thinking how nice it is that he's being so careful not to spill this messy and somewhat expensive stuff. And as his fingers are about 1/2 way into the pellets he lets out the most hilarious SHRIEK something between genuine terror and giddy excitement as he yanked his hand out of the bag. My sister and I had never heard such a noise, and once the surprise passed we were double over laughing. That's when we realized that he truly thought they were bug eggs and in little boy world he had just done a very brave and exciting thing.