Shadows

Prior to turning two, Baby Girl hadn't really noticed shadows much.  She'd noticed them when we were walking before, but didn't think much of them.  One night, The Hubby, Baby Girl and I were all hanging out in her room and The Hubby decided it would be fun to turn out the light and show her a shadow puppet with his hand.

But it backfired.  She was SCARED.  She cried and clung to me like it was a monster that would get her.  The Hubby and I felt AWFUL.  We turned the lights back on, but she was still shaken up.

From that moment, she started noticing shadows everywhere.  When we'd taken our walks around our neighborhood, she'd see them following us or in front of us.  We tried to turn it into a game, rather than something to be afraid of.  She'd jump on mine and tell me that she was walking on my shadow (Mommy, I walking on you shadow!).  When I was putting her to bed, she'd notice the shadow that we created on her wall from the nightlight on her monitor.

After awhile, she got used to seeing shadows and that they weren't scary.  We showed her how when she moved her arm, it moved her shadow.  We played with the shadows in her room and she started having fun with them.  I'm glad she got over it fairly quickly and it didn't turn into a full-fledged fear of the dark or anything.  It was her second fear, besides fears of loud noises (which reared its ugly head the other day when The Hubby fired up the saw to make a rake Baby Girl-sized...).  I think we can say, though, that it's been conquered.