We're putting Ben down to sleep tonight, and he starts to get agitated about the light in his room being turned off, and he wants books in his bed. During a prolonged nap strike in December--lasted four weeks, but then ended abruptly--we would let him have books during daytime naps to keep him busy. But we put the kabosh on that when he started to sleep again
The light was another matter. Several weeks ago, he began to anxious at night with just a dim nightlight. We wound up solving the matter by getting a nifty looking one from Uwajimaya (a Japanese emporium and grocery store) that's rather bright even with a frosted four-watt bulb. So we still get some tsorres, but not as much.
The book thing was starting to disturb him tonight, and we were wondering if he was tired enough that he'd get quite unhappy. Instead, he thought of a solution for himself: "Bring pretend books to bed." Which is just bloody brilliant. I said, "You can bring as many pretend books to bed as you want." We started talking about which pretend books he might want to read, and he started reciting some. He's memorized at least a dozen books, and knows parts of others. It's a sing-song-y sort of recitation, with a lot of phonetic learning in it, but it's something he taught himself.
The pretend thing is new, too. Not that long ago, he started "plucking" items from books and playing with them, or handing them to us to eat, or eating himself. He knows it's pretend, and he's happy with it, driving pretend cars around or talking about things he could do with them.
Pretend books. What a fellow.