Wintry Summer

It is summer, right? Although it has been cold and cloudy most days, we decided to go to the beach anyway. Elliott had fun playing at Mukilteo Beach last week despite the cold wind. We walked down on the rocks and found a few tiny crabs. And he also found LOTS of tiny rocks (sand). He kept trying to grab just one grain of sand to hold onto but it didn't work out so well.

A New Expense

Elliott cut his finger on a toy this evening and it was bleeding a little. He silently and calmly walked over to Jason and showed him. It was actually bleeding enough to warrant a band-aid, his very first one.

Jason took him upstairs to wrap his finger in a band-aid....and Elliott FREAKED out. Like many other things (toy car wheels, legos, and more recently his own ears, eyes and ummmm other newly discovered body parts) he likes to try take things apart or to tear things off. ("Ears off, Mama. Eyes out Mama.") The band-aid was pretty securely wrapped around his finger and he couldn't pull it off.

Like everything else, he urgently wanted the band-aid OFF.

He cried very sadly and pathetically....and we ended up taking the band-aid off. The cut had stopped bleeding, but was still an open sore and at risk for infection so I would have preferred it to be covered.

So I came to terms again with the fact that I am going to have to do something, I said I'd never do. .....buy those darn expensive band-aids with cartoon characters on them. (I'm SURE we can find Cars band-aids!). I am such a frugal person that I actually look at the price per unit on almost everything I buy (jucie: 17 cents per pint or 25 cents per pint?). Those Disney band-aids are like three TIMES the cost of plain, store brand band-aids. Oh well. Some things are worth the extra money.

Sometimes You Have to Let Go

Elliott discovered my childhood collection of legos when we rearranged our bedroom the other day. He already plays with toddler sized duplos and we had been storing the legos for when he is older but once he discovered the box, there was no way we could hide them from Elliott anymore without him asking for them every 3 seconds.

Before going on, let me say that my parents supplied with me with a large collection of legos. I loved legos! I would play for hours and hours. In addition to the standard lego sets, I had special sets that made rooms of a house, like furniture for a lego doll house. I had a complete kitchen with cupboards, tables, chairs, and that is just the tip of the ice berg. I also had a complete living room set (even with a fireplace), classroom and nursery. These special legos had smooth pieces so my kitchen table and countertops were realistic. I NEVER took these pieces apart once we had created it. Sure, I built things with the standard lego sets and took them apart often according to whatever creative whim I had, but not with the special legos.


Literally, these legos were not broken apart for about 25 years until this past weekend when Jason and Elliott dived in. They set out to build a semi-truck. And they attacked my special lego sets for apparently essential semi-truck pieces.




This is all that is left of my kitchen. The tables and chairs are completely gone.




This is all that is left of my classroom, living room and nursery.



But this is the result....a very realistic semi-truck. I thought I was pretty good at building things with legos....but Jason, he is awesome!




And this is how Elliott feels about his semi-truck.



More joy from Elliott.



Elliott is obsessed with this semi-truck and wants to play with it constantly. Note the lego people on the top. Elliott told us it was Grandpa and Elliott. Grandpa also has a red hat and a yellow coffee cup, but Elliott likes to carry those pieces around separately.

So goodbye lego doll house furniture. You didn't have a chance in a house full of boys!

Boys and Guns

Elliott is a boy. And I've been warned that the time will come when Elliott will start to play with toy guns, even if we don't buy them, that he will make guns out of sticks, legos, or other toys.

I thought I was prepared for this, but I also thought our first encounter with toys guns would come a lot later.

Today we were at Alfy's pizza and Elliott discovered their arcade room. For the longest time he was enthralled with the driving game. But then he noticed an older boy playing a shooting game with a toy gun. Elliott was captivated. He watched this boy carefully, and sure enough, as soon as the boy was done, Elliott grabbed one of the toy guns.

I didn't have the words in my brain to react to this. Several possible responses went through my mind... "Elliott, we don't play with guns. Guns are dangerous." or "Elliott you can play with toy guns when you are older." or " Yes, you can shoot at the game, but not at people." and on and on. Truthfully, I just didn't know what to say. We don't really know how we feel about the whole toy gun thing and how we're going to parent that...after all, he already attacks Jay with a lightsaber and what is the difference?

So you can imagine my relief when Elliott turned to me in pure joy and announced he was at the gas station and stuck the gun into the wall to fill up his ''truck."

Guns, we'll deal with you later!

Wake Up Puzzle!

This morning I woke up to some odd pounding noise...for a moment I wondered which neighbor had the nerve to do construction work at 7 on a Saturday morning. Then I realized the sound was coming from Elliott's room.

Jason went to investigate and discovered the little explorer had managed to reach over the end of his crib and grab a puzzle from a bookshelf.

Elliott exclaimed "I got a puzzle!"' over and over again. This is quite significant because the only words he usually says first thing in the morning are "Mama, mama, wake up!" or "I'm hungry."

After a few moments, Jason even prompted, "Do you want to go find Mama?" to which he replied, "I got a puzzle!"

Recent Pics

The force isn't with him....yet.

On his way to China.

Handsome boy.

Happy Birthday?

I'm not sure whose birthday we were celebrating today, but this morning I heard Elliott singing ''Happy Birthday" in the living room. A few minutes later he brought me a "cake"' with two "candles." Then he blew out the candles....and ate one.