Flight Plan

Over the last few weeks, Lamb has wanted to fly. Her mom gets helium balloons fairly often and so Lamb has been coming up to be with balloon in hand and asking me to lift her up and let go. You know, so she can fly

The faith is touching. I tried to explain that she is too big to fly with a balloon. The physics of the situation didn't quite take hold.

So I tried to hold her up and gently lower her to a safe height before letting go--you of course know she plummeted to the carpet each time, right? But every time I did this, she insisted that I should only let go really high. I'm sure to a three-year-old mind this made perfect sense.

So I finally decided on the physics demonstration to show her that a balloon could not lift her. I took her balloon, tied it to one of her little dolls, lifted it in the air, and let go as it plummeted to the carpet. See? I said. This balloon can't carry your little tiny doll! You are much bigger than your doll. Ergo (I didn't actually say "ergo" in this explanation, I hasten to add) the balloon cannot lift you.

Case closed.

Well yesterday, after well over a week since my physics demonstration should have conclusively proven that a helium balloon cannot lift a little girl, Lamb ran up to me with a balloon (just air filled, too) and a stuffed bird toy. She wanted me to lift her up and drop her?

Huh? Hadn't I proven this is not possible? Wait, Lamb thought she'd found a way around my logic by adding a bird to the mix. Hold the balloon and the bird (which flies) and surely she would fly, too.

The will to fly is clearly strong. But this plan was not going to work, I explained.

I fear what she will try next.