insidious

Today, I took my youngest two children to McD's, as a celebration of Veronica's first week of preschool. She was very excited about the Barbie bracelets in the girls' Happy Meal toys, so though I would have preferred to get her a Hot Wheels car, I gave in, hoping she would, indeed, get a bracelet.

No such luck. No, instead it was a toy compact. Within 10 minutes of having opened this toy, she was asking me to change her into a dress and making motions as though she wanted to put on lipstick.

Now, here's the thing: I don't wear makeup. I have not worn makeup a single time since she was born. My mother-in-law, the only other woman she sees getting dressed on a regular basis, doesn't wear makeup around here. So to the best of my knowledge, Veronica has never seen a real woman wearing makeup. In addition, I have never bought her dress-up clothes, toy purses, toy makeup, toy (or real) high heels.

So where did she get it? How did she know that was a compact for makeup, or how to put on lipstick?

Apparently keeping little girls from makeup is as futile as keeping little boys from guns.