In his eyes ...

Dash started preschool this month. He loves it. In the 3 short weeks he has been there, his speech has vastly improved, he has had 3 somewhat major injuries require accident reports and he now likes to pick up his toys at home. I think he likes to go and do his own thing. But yesterday while his teacher was putting him in his carseat in the pickup line - she was telling me about their project they did that day. They had cut pictures out of magazines to represent their families and  pasted them on some construction paper. Typical toddler project. She handed me Dash's picture out of his Thomas backpack. There was a picture of lady with brown hair, a man that was probably 65 years old (apparently Dash thinks Brent is really old), a picture of a little blonde toddler and 2 dogs that actually looked like our 2 dogs. There was no baby. She said she kept on giving him a baby to glue onto the picture and he refused. He started crying. He didn't want a baby in his family. I don't know why that made me so sad but it did. Dash doesn't talk all that much - so for him to say "no baby on my picture" , it means he really didn't want the baby there. The baby is not even a baby anymore, he runs, he plays, he likes to dig in the dirt too - shouldn't they be friends? Shouldn't Dash be happy to have a playmate, a partner in crime? But no - somewhere in that little almost 3 year old mind, he still sees the baby as a nuisance, someone who he really wishes wasn't around. It just made me sad for him - that by adding to our family it created some sort of resentment in Dash, I know he is only 3 and will get over it and I hope one day they will be best friends and glad to have each other but it is still disheartening to know that in his beautiful blue eyes he sees his family as mama, daddy, him and 2 crazy dogs. He didn't ask for a baby and he still doesn't like him.