The Imagination of an Almost Three Year Old

I am about to be the mother of a three year old. Three years ago today I was a day overdue with G. She came 8 days late. So, once I realized she was going to be late I decided to read all of Jane Austen's novels before she was born. I got through 3.5 of 5 novels.

Now, G. has had these animals as her sleeping buddies for as long as she can remember:

The white rabbit is called "Bunny". He is 3 years and two months old, since I got him at a shower two months before G.'s birth. He has had multiple surgeries. G. likes to chew on him. Yes, those are patches on his feet wear she destroyed the bottoms of his feet so that the beads would fall out and then got very upset about them falling out and needed him repaired. One foot led to the other, since he had to "match". He has a new mouth and a wrinkled repaired nose.

The blue bear is called "Bear" (yes, we are so creative). I got him as a gift when I graduated high school. In our first apartment her was packed a way in a box of things we did not want to give away yet. When we moved we went through the box, and G. discovered him. He matched a bear in a book we had, and she was amazed. He has survived unscathed except for his ribbon. It used to be silver. I found him after one nap without a ribbon and a long silver thread. When I gave him that new white ribbon I had in my sewing things, Bunny got a ribbon as well.

The latest adventures of Bunny and Bear happened today. They are now babies. G. has a fluffy pink stuffed bunny and a fluffy white stuffed bear that are their parents. G. is very upset, crying tears, whenever the babies are separated from their parents. At naptime, she wanted all of them together. We don't let her sleep with any animals except Bunny and Bear, so I told her "no", but if she wished I could put Bunny and Bear in the toys with their "parents." This was not an acceptable arrangement. However, the two babies continued to cause trouble and were removed from the naptime, which is how I got the still shot above. At any rate, I felt bad suppressing the imagination, but it did seem important to convince her that they were just toys and she did not need to fuss over their "feelings" of being separated from first their "parents" and then from herself. She was out of control crying about them, so I calmed her down, got her to rest, and she is fine now. So are the stuffed toys.

My thought about this however, is that maybe I am teaching her not to be attached to material things and not to get all worked up about them? If it is taught gently and sternly and she becomes peaceful about it, I hope that it will make her a more disciplined and eventually virtuous person. Don't get me wrong, I love her imagination; it just needs a little of her self control and parental aide to allow her to nap and such so she is not crabby and fussing all day. Any thoughts?