Lucy's "Helpless Land" World

Tonight Lucy told me that she likes to pretend a game called "Helpless Land" in the backyard. It's a place where people help each other. I said, "Oh, so you mean, 'Helpful Land' then?" and she said, "Yes, but I call it 'Helpless Land' because I think it's easier to say." I asked her what people do in Helpless Land, and they do helpful things like "chop wood" for other people.

She pretends that the shed in her backyard is the house that she grew up in, but the house was magically transported to Helpless Land. And in order to get between Helpless Land and the real world, you need to go through the "door" of the weeping birch branches. There is something very romantic for her about being in the branches of trees: the other day she asked me to take a picture of her nestled in the branches of a blossoming dogwood tree in our neighborhood:

When we had this conversation about Helpless Land, I told Lucy that I had a game that I used to pretend when I was a little girl. There was a section of trees behind our garage (in our Colorado house) that created a little covered shelter. I used to pretend in that I lived in the forest and that space was my home, and I would go around gathering "food" from the forest to cook in a pretend stew. Lucy was really amused at the thought, and I think she liked to be able to relate to me about pretending outside. I'm glad that our yard - and the outdoors - can be a magical and exciting place for her, especially during this quarantine period.

I think that her Helpless Land game must have involved flower petals, because I noticed a lot of them were strewn in the front yard when I looked out the window. I'm wondering if she was incorporating a flower girl into her story. Earlier this week we read a book about the character Pinkalicious becoming a flower girl. Lucy said, "Oh, I would love to be a flower girl" and then was surprised when I told her that she was a flower girl at E and T's wedding. We pulled out her basket and crown, and I let her dehead the camellia bush in the side yard so she could have some petals to throw. She was pretty excited to revive this experience that she could hardly remember, but had been romanticized for her in a story.