gobble, gobble

My little friend Marley loves turkeys.  Some preschoolers are into kitties or monkeys or, you know, elephants.  But Marley has a thing for turkeys.  I'm not sure why this is so, but I have one potential theory.  When she was two, and I finally got around to doing an actual project with her, it was the old trace-your-hand-and-it's-a-turkey.  The same afternoon (I must've been so ambitious that day), I printed out some templates and we glued together turkeys with circle bodies and an array of feathers in autumnal shades.  Maybe she's just never gotten over that?  All I know is that my daughter once squealed with delight and screamed for Todd and me to "Come see!" when a Muppet turkey popped into Elmo's World.  She just about lost it when we went to a craft store before Thanksgiving and picked up several do-it-yourself foam and wooden turkeys.  When my sister Danielle brought Marley to Build-a-Bear while I was at home with a newborn Rudy in November, Marley made the employees' day with an enthusiastic stuffing of their seasonal turkey; she named it Cinderella.  

Imagine our delight this summer when we went to Davis Farmland and learned that there was a baby turkey pen.  We spent a while there; Marley crouched beside the chicken wire and spoke softly to her little friends.  And by the way, Marley always asks for turkey and cheese at the deli; she had a plateful of white and dark meat at Thanksgiving.  She doesn't seem to have made the connection yet, and I really don't want to be the one to break it to her.

 

In her spare time, when she's not working on puzzles, taking care of dolls, or drawing rainbows (or turkeys), Marley scoots along the floor gobbling.  She punctuates her sentences with a gobble or two.  She loves to squeeze herself beneath a laundry basket and pretend that she's a baby turkey in a cage; she'll plead for Todd or me to be a farmer and feed her through the narrow slats.  One morning as we were driving home from preschool, Marley told me that she wished she were a turkey flapping her wings and flying in the sky.  And turkeys can fly, you know.  Just not very high or very far.  I know this because of the turkey books we own and have gotten from the library.  Anyhow, when I told her that that sounded great, she added, smiling, "And everyone would look up and say, 'I guess that's a Beanie Turkey.'"  I have to agree.  What else could you say while witnessing such a grand spectacle?