For the past couple of months, Petra has had an imaginary friend.  Her name is Daisy and if the portrait Petra has drawn is a good likeness, her face is a mass of pink scribbles and she wears a red bow in her hair on one side.

Neither Lydia nor Tage ever had an imaginary friend–or one I heard anything about, at any rate–so this is all a new experience for me.  Thankfully, the friendship isn’t of the “Oh no, you’re sitting on Daisy!” variety, because I can see how that would get real old, real fast.  In fact, Daisy never joins us at all, but instead has her exploits recounted to us afterward, in exquisite detail, by Petra.

It’s amazing to me how developed her imagination is, what a rich fantasy life she has.  And it’s delightful the way she tells Daisy stories so matter-of-factly, in the very same way that she talks about the things that happen outside of her head.  For example, she came up to me just a few minutes ago, noticed that I’m wearing my bathrobe, and said offhandedly, “Daisy has one of those at her house, too.  It’s her dad’s.  His is blue and yours is pink.”  Then she went back in the other room and started doing something else.

We’ve heard rather a lot about where Daisy lives and what kinds of things she likes to do.  For quite some time she and Petra have been planning a summer camp-out in the yard with tents and sleeping bags, and apparently there have been a number of sleepovers.  It’s just possible, it seems, that Daisy will go to Petra’s school when she goes back in the fall and both girls are looking forward to that.

I’m looking forward to it a bit myself, as I’ve grown pretty fond of Daisy and though I’ve never met her, I hope she sticks around for a while.