A few of my favorite things

I want to use a few posts to talk about some of my favorite toys. Let's start with the all-time three best toys up to 3 1/2 months. But very first, we have to talk about the coolest accessory - my toy bar. Mommy and Auntie Allyn made my first one with foam from the Scrap Exchange and yarn from around the house when I was about 2 months old. It wasn't fancy, but it worked pretty well; after we threw it in the car for a visit to Grandma and Grandpa Salyers', though, it ended up a little bent and wobbly.

A week or two later, Grandpa Mago made me a swanky new toy bar that I still use every day. It's bright yellow, lightweight, and sturdy. I loved it so much that he made another one to use when I come to his and Grandma Mago's house.
Hanging from my fabulous toy bar on your right is the first of the three best toys for the first three months - Mommy and Tommy Dolphin. Mommy (mine, not Tommy's) was surfing the Web looking for the second best toy and came across this one. It had such good reviews posted from customers that she ordered it and boy, was I glad! It has one big dolphin (Mommy), whose belly is black-and-white striped, good to stare at when you're a little baby, as are her big eyes. She has a squeaker, too and her fins make crinkly noises. Off to her side is her son, Tommy Dolphin, who carries a ring that's good to move and teethe on when you get older. Very sadly, Mommy and Tommy have disappeared - we haven't been able to find them for several weeks. Even though I have a LOT of other toys, now, I still miss them.

The second "best of" toy is Sassy's Fascination Station. I got acquainted with it also at about 8 weeks when Mommy took me to see Miss Laurel, the colored light lady (Mommy calls her a craniosacral therapist). I was having trouble with arching and torticollis (but she also helped me poop with green light!) While she was working on me she often had Mommy hold a toy up for me to look at to distract me. Most of them didn't work because, let's face it, some little squeaky toy is not going to keep me from noticing that this strange lady is holding me down and twisting my

body all around. But this one . . . it did the trick (here's another view). And like Mommy and Tommy, it grows with me; it was fun when all I could do was look at it and it's now fun to move. Miss Laurel said her clients always asked her where she found it (and believe me, we looked at local stores!) but she'd had it for a few years. So Mommy went to Sassy's Web site and found it (and as I mentioned, also found Mommy and Tommy while surfing).

The third featured toy in this post I got when I was about 11 weeks old, the week I first started holding things. Mommy took me to visit Grandma and Grandpa Salyers in Ohio; Grandma's friend Nancy brought some toys over for me, which was so nice of her! Immediately, this one became my favorite. We named her Laurel the Cyber-Piggy (Laurel because of the garland around her neck). If you look at her logically, she's kind of creepy - long eyelashes and the inexplicable laurel surrounded by the tubes coming out and re-entering her on the other side. Fortunately, I don't have logic yet--all I saw were bright colors and something the perfect size for me to be able to grab onto. Oh, and she rattles, too.

Well, there you have it; my top three toys from my first three-plus months. I'd recommend them to anyone (although I don't know where Laurel Piggy came from). Next week, I'll tell you about some of my favorite toys of more recent days.