Teddies are a boy's best friend.

Jack has more than a dozen teddies. Like most children he started acquiring them the moment he was born. He's got a pretty extensive collection now-a-days, so many that I've lost count. He's a boy who loves a teddy. He takes them to bed, to nanny's, to nursery, anywhere we will let him.

His teddies all have their own names and social hierarchy. Dylan is clearly the favorite, he's also the biggest and one of the oldest, followed closely by Fozzy, Pooh-bear and Lucky. Below them it's more of a 'flavor of the month' system. He's been favoring the dogs lately, which works well with Dylan being a dog, we spend much of the early mornings getting licked profusely by the little ones.

Some of his teddies talk, mostly the dogs just bark, he'll have conversations with them, mostly about how much they miss each other when they're apart. It's important that you don't try to attempt speaking for them, Jack is the only person allowed to talk for the doggies. When ever I say anything on their behalf Jack will sternly say, No... That's not what he said. You don't talk for Dylan, only I'm the one that can talk for them... You shouldn't talk for other people's teddies.

Jack is always happy to show off his teddy collection. He'll parade one of them in front of a visitor for a while before introducing them, This is my friend. He's not so happy to share them though. If Jack sees anyone cuddling one of his teddies it's put to an abrupt halt. Jack will scold you verbally, pry the teddy from your hands and give you dirty looks for the next fifteen minutes, teddy-napping is a serious crime. The closest we get to sharing is sometimes when Jack figures Helen or I are sad he'll run to get us a teddy, at which point we're allowed up to two minutes under close supervision for the teddy to cheer us up before it's taken back, by force if necessary. After that I guess we're on our own.


On a side note. I received a green sticker on my hand while typing this blog. Here you go Daddy, you've been a good... You've worked hard. It's nice to know my hard work is appreciated.