We have noticed an odd, and rather disturbing, phenomenon with Alexandra lately. She is a hoarder. Big time. She loves purses and bags and will stuff them with all sorts of things she finds around the house; empty candy wrappers, small books, toothbrushes, hair bows, Legos, she isn't picky. Then she carries that purse or bag around all day, protecting it likes it's the Holy Grail, letting no one even breathe on it, much less take something out of it. She insists on bringing it to the grocery store, sets it on the couch right next to her for story time, and even sleeps with it.
The strange thing is, by the next day, she has totally forgotten about the first stuffed-to-the-gills purse and has moved on to another one. But now there are two purses bulging with random stuff, and every day it just gets worse. I will generally try and empty out a few of them when she isn't looking, tossing the trash and returning other pilfered items to their rightful owners. Just to keep the craziness from getting out of control. The couple of weeks ago, though, she really had us worried. She had so many "treasures" that they wouldn't all fit in one of her many purses and bags. She had to go and get an empty toy bin to hold it all. She then proceeded to carry this up the stairs and insisted on sleeping with it. Chris said, "That is blog worthy." and ran to get the camera.
And it gets worse. Just the other day, I was up in the play area looking for perpetually missing sippy cup, when I happened to glance in the little open area between the chimney column and the wall to my craft room. To my absolute HORROR, I saw a mound of toys and other paraphernalia that was literally stacked about 6 inches high and was a good 18 inches wide. I have no idea how long she has been working on this particular collection, but I definitely see me buying a child psychology book to deal with the matter very soon. I also informed the children that if they were missing any toys, to come check Baby's hoard first. Probably save them a lot of time.
It kind of reminds me of that episode of The Brady Bunch, where the kids all get mad at each other because certain toys keep going missing. Then they discover it was Tiger the dog who had been stealing them and hiding them in his dog house all along.