It’s a puzzle!

Perhaps I am making excuses for her, but maybe I should have shown Rachel the whole picture first, rather than quizzing her on the pieces of the ‘Find the Rhyme’ jigsaw whilst we’re making it. They all seemed so obvious to me.

We started with "jam in the...?"

"Buggy" says Rachel confidently.

It was clearly a pram.

Fair enough, the next one, pig in a wig, not a term nearly 3 year olds are all that familiar with. It was ‘pig with hair’ before I explained it.

OK, an easy one now, "It is a pen and a.....?"

"Chicken" suggests Rachel, she is not asking,

Yes but no, Rachel, "it is Hen, rhymes with pen, do you see what we’re doing here?"

She starts making her own observations. "Cat in a tree"

"Rachel, it is Bee in the Tree there, Cat in the Hat. Can you hear the rhyme?"

"What about this one?" I ask

"Clown in a hat" she says.

It is a crown, not just any old hat.

"Fish in a bowl."

"Dish, fish in a dish,"  - maybe not all that obvious.

"Flower in the rain"

"It is in a shower isn’t it –not rain- look there’s train in the rain, it’s flower in the shower."

"OK, how about this one, snail on a.....?"

"Humpty Dumpty?," surely she is just messing with me now,

"On a dolphin!"

"Whale, Rachel, snail on a whale," we’ve read the book even.

"Slug in the...?"

"Cup of tea"

It is a jug, slug in the jug.

Is it possible that she is not even accidentally hitting on the right word?

I’ll make it easy for her. "Look Rachel, fly on the p., p..."

"Pizza." Really? It doesn’t look like a pizza.

"No," a little impatiently now,  "Fly on the p...."

"Pancake"

"Pie! Fly on the pie."

They don’t call them puzzles for nothing!