4yr old constantly carrying her toy dog with her - ok or not ok?

[ClaudiaSchiffer]

My just 4 yr old dd is obsessed with carrying her toy dog with her at ALL TIMES. She takes him to the loo, to nursery, out in the car, to the supermarket, to friends etc etc. They are permanently attached.

This has been going on for the past 6 months and it seems to be getting worse - last w/end she left the dog in the car when we were in a shop and became hysterical when she realised after about 5 mins what she had done.

Does anyone have any thoughts on how to manage this? So far I've been pretty easy going about the whole thing thinking that she'll grow out of it sooner or later, but do you think we should have rules ie the dog can come with us when we go out but has to stay in the car - for instance?

My concern is that she is getting more and more obsessed with this toy and she is also encouraging her younger sis, nearly 2, to do the same thing with her bear.

Has anyone had anything similar?

Kind of...Ds (who is now 6) has Mr S (a snuggle from when he was a baby). we have rules about where Mr S can/can't go. He is left in the car, or goes in my handbag. Two reasons - one to break ds of the habit and two cos if he lost it I couldn't cope with the fallout! I also got dsto leave him behind by saying Mr S is tired and needs to go to bed etc. etc.

She'll grow out of it. Both my 2 had similar things - more like blankets which they carried round everywhere with them. At one point DD2 had 3 blankies and the shriek when she suddenly realised she'd dropped one in Sainsburys nearly emptied the place! Took ages and a very helpful assistant to find it. These snuggly things went everywhere with them from the age of 1 to 7, although as they got older they left them in the car when they went anywhere. Eventually the blankets got very old and degenerated into balls of string, so we had a ceremonial burning of them (with the girls agreement - they were 7). DD2 never looked back. DD1 became attached to one of her cuddly toys but to a much lesser degree and he lives in her bed.

I wouldn't worry about it, a lot of kids do a similar thing. Apparently I had a bear I dragged round with me everywhere by the nose (it was huge) for a few years. Eventually its nose fell off (I still have the nose). They grow out of it especially when they go to school and want to be like the big children.