EMMIE BOO...HORSES... AND THE GOATS TOO...

There can't be much in life 'sweeter' than watching a little one interact with pets and/or farm animals...especially when they get old enough to stop 'bonking' them on the head, pulling ears or poking them in the eye out of curiousity. They talk to them nicely, and try to pet them in the right places. It's a home show worth watching whenever possible, I believe. Perhaps it is the Grandparent's 'enjoyment' of such sites that make the 'petting zoos' so popular. lol

I do believe I have a true 'Cowgirl' in the family now...as Emmie is obsessed with and absolutely loves horses! She spent a few hours the other day with Grammie, and all she wanted from the store was to find a horse. Finally, we found a horse (in fact three of them) in the Dollar Store...which is right next door to the 'high dollar' Craft store which is loaded with delicate and expensive items for home decor....and where I stopped first to peruse these creatively designed, unique and often handmade items... for the Log Home 'Country Style' with class idea I am in the midst of now.

Shopping with Emily in this environment is not a good idea. I dusted off my old saying that has been used with my own kids and grandkids that came before her ( and worked with them too)...

"Look with your eyes and not your hands."...but with Emmie Boo...'LOOKING WITHOUT TOUCHING IS IMPOSSIBLE.

It went sort of like this:

GRAMMIE: Emmie, look with your eyes and not your hands please.

EMMIE: I like this Grammie. Ohhh...pretty! EMMIE WANTS HORSEY...

GRAMMIE: Emmie, you are touching it with your hands. If you want a surprise from Grammie today, you will stop touching things in this store, OK? We'll look for a horsey in a little while."

EMMIE: I am not touching GRAMMIE, EMMIE wants a treat. Ohhhh...look at flowers! Pretty flowers...

GRAMMIE: I hear you saying that you are not touching Emmie, but look where your hands are, they are holding something that you are not supposed to touch. Holding is touching Emmie.

EMMIE; I am being good, I won't touch, Emmie wants a prize Grammie. Emmie puts back, Emmie doesn't want to touch it. Emmie doesn't like touching.

GRAMMIE: I want to give you a prize Emmie, but you are making it hard because you are already touching things again and I can't give you a prize or a treat when you are 'touching' again. Please put the blown glass doggy back honey...very carefully...Grammie will help.

EMMIE: ( as she grabs something else...) I like this, it is pretty. This is a fish GRAMMIE! Emmie not touching GRAMMIE. *I want a treat. I'm being good. Emmie doesn't want to touch!

GRAMMIE; Emmie, please give the fish to Grammie so I can put it back...(she hands me the hand blown multi colored heavy solid glass fish with the extremely delicate glass feathered fins to me as if it were a rag doll... completely clueless of how close I am to paying $88.00 for a broken glass fish!)

(two seconds later, immediately after I replace the glass fish to it's precarious perch in the middle of several other breakable items thinking...why do they put this delicate stuff at a kids eye level anyway...dumb dumbs...(or maybe very smart)...who knows?)

GRAMMIE: EMILY, that is very breakable, please put it back carefully. Here, let Grammie help you. Picking up things is 'touching' and you are not going to get a prize or treat if you keep touching things and picking them up. OK?

(We then go downstairs where there are lots of antique and junk booths around and I am looking for some new...old...country cannisters for flour, sugar etc. It doesn't take long for Emmie to spot a 'horsey' and she wants it....bad. I look at the old 50's style plastic horse with the tangeled mane and half the paint gone...and would designate that 'antique' to the 'junk category', but if it makes Emmie focused on that instead of all the other things...I'll look at the price tag. WHAT THE ??...the price tag reads $38.00!

NO WAY IN HELL I am going to pay that much money for a beat up old piece of junk...even for Emmie boo who is now obsessed with getting THAT PRIZE. So, I promise her that Grammie will find a NEWER PRETTY HORSE INSTEAD...and point out all the 'character defects' of the junky horse to disuade her from the 'THIS IS THE ONE" desire! We move on and go back upstairs to 'break me please land'...and Emmie proceeds to pick up something else...and I simply say

EMMIE!?

EMMIE (Now putting back a beautiful hand made candle holder) EMMIE DOESN'T WANT TO TOUCH...Emmie wants treat, OK Grammie? Emmie is being good. EMMIE wants to buy candle for Mommie. EMMIE IS NOT TOUCHING. EMMIE WANTS HORSEY...

GRAMMIE: Emmie, I think you are TRYING... NOT to touch, but it is JUST TOO HARD for you. So, we need to leave this store now and try to find a different store where you can touch things, and maybe we can find a treat and a prize there...OK?

Emmie thought this was a good idea too. EMMIE WANTS HORSEY, she says as she gazes up at me with her best 'begging look'....(Hmmm, I note...she's got a lot of her mother in her...).

THANKFULLY, the Dollar Store was next door, and I had no concern for the continual touching and picking up everything in THAT store. SURELY TO GOD this store has a HORSEY SOMEWHERE IN IT FOR EMILY.

After much searching of every bin, nook and cranny in the toy section, and with a growing fear that there won't be a damned 'horsey' to be found today....I finally start stalking each and ever section of the whole store in a desperate bid to keep my promise without serious problems as the time for Newport to roll up it's streets is near...and options to find a horsey are diminishing with ever second that is passing.

FINALLY...SUCCESS! I found some plastic/rubbery type of horses in the section for 'knick knacks' for adults that I think are supposed to sit on a shelf and look interesting...and I generously let EMMIE pick out not one, but three horses in giddy gratitude for even finding the damned things......a Black one...( which she called Bucky after the Police Chief's horses she got to know when she went to his Challenge Camp with Wendy, and a Brownish Horse which is also a horse she knows and named, but I can't remember the name now)

...and then a white horse she called 'Horsey'. Anyway, for Three Bucks...it didn't matter to me much when she crashed two of them together and broke one of the bases off it and a foot...almost as soon as we got into the car to drive to meet Wendy, Jordan, and the Foreign Exchange Student from Japan Wendy was hosting for the Weekend at Flashbacks for burgers.

When Emmie saw her Mama, she proudly showed her the horses with a broad smile, beaming face and gleaming eyes. I wondered if there was an adult in the world that could be so happy they could have Emmies look of complete ecstasy without being on drugs!?

Emmie showed her Mama each horse as she named each one of them for her...and then noted Bucky and "what's it's name" had 'CRASHED' and showed her where the horses foot was missing.

Wendy studied it for a few minutes and said she could use super glue to put the base of the horse and it's foot back on and promised to fix it for her. I looked at it, didn't think the 'fix' would last more than five minutes, and heard myself volunteer an alternative. Of all the things I am doing, and need to do right now...volunteering to use my time on this is just insane, but there it was...another promise blurted out foolishly.


GRAMMIE: Wendy, rather than try to superglue it back together, which probably won't work too well on those cheap semi plastic thin legs and feet of the horse, I'll just stop at the Dollar store and buy a new one when I go into town tomorrow or the next day, and maybe I'll buy a couple of 'back ups' while I'm at it... in case the horses somehow 'crash again'.

After all, they only cost a dollar each.

WENDY; Good idea. Thanks Mom.

Anyway, that was my adventure with EMILY BOO for the day, she loves her dollar horses...her cowgirl hat and her stick riding horse too...which she rides around often making all the right noises. She obviously is drawn to the goats on the ranch...and she was able to give them a 'treat' as well. It will be fun to see her reaction to other farm animals as we add them to the stable of Eddie Arnold and Eva Gabors 'Green Acres' experience as City Slickers gone Country...

(Hell, I've been President of the 'no messy pets for me' club for a decade and now I'm thinking 'minature pig'? O VEY! )

...and I have to remember to get into that Dollar store when I go to buy paint tomorrow and stock up on the 'BACK UP' horses as promised...and for a dollar each... I might just clean out the whole shelf just to make sure I can see that joy in Emmies eyes when she plays with her worthy steeds!

IT'S A FUN ADVENTURE BEING A GRAMMIE.

LOT'S MORE FUN THAN BEING A PARENT...as thought as I commended Wendy for the steep price she has to pay everytime she wants to go to a store with Emily aboard. Wendy grinned knowingly, and nodded her head with complete clarity about what I had just experienced 'shopping' with Emily Boo....the two and a half year old "Cow Girl" who doesn't like to touch.