Gametes In Love

G got a new friend via post last week, courtesy of Grammie. His name is Tiggy. Tiggy Brachiasaurus. G picked out the name himself. Tiggy is now a permanent fixture in G’s bed.

Interestingly enough, though, every other friend amongst hist toy collection he is also naming Tiggy.

Someone needs to teach G the concept of unique identification. Meanwhile, meet Tiggy.

S2’s friends are finally all named. It took us awhile to agree on a name for the cow. Interestingly enough the cow is getting the name I orginally wanted to call G’s giraffe. So…. presenting:

Rory. From Roary… ‘cuz he’s a tiger
Mo. As in Mohawk… ‘cuz the zebra looks like he’s got one, AND
Spot. Spot the cow.

G got a play-kitchen for his birthday (amongst a TON of other loot. Seriously, kid is set-up for the rest of his life with toys). He LOVES this thing. Honestly, he’s spent every waking moment at home, since Saturday, at the side of the kitchen. He makes me tea, washes all of his kitchen equipment (by trying to jam it all in his little sink), and uses his utensils as projectiles (note to self: a kiddie play fork flying across the room, still hurts).

One side effect of this new toy? G wants to expand his culinary skills to bigger and more advanced pastures.

Yesterday evening he figured out how to turn on our oven. We have already knobbed up our burners, but our oven requires a minimum of 2 button presses in a specific combination to turn on. Buttons that are on opposite ends of the panel, mind you. I felt “safe” that he wasn’t going to figure it out. And he hadn’t. Until last night. Joy!

Luckily, Kitchenaid is on top of toddler curiosity, and has put a lock on the panel. We just discovered it last night. Now G is locked out of the oven baking for a while. Unfortunately, I think, so is anyone else who comes to our house and needs to cook (sorry Mom!). I genuinely think that safety gear locks out adults more than kids, but hey… at least no fires or gas alarms will go off in my home in the near future. I hope.

I scored a very well kept Lego Duplo Zoo set off the local mom’s club this week-end. Man, I love this club!

While G is still figuring out how to put the blocks together on his own (aligning the nubs actually really IS a skill), he’s been getting some help from S and I. G in this particular case is the foreman and architect directing us, worker bees, to how he wants his structure to look.

His main priority: get every single block and animal on the structure. He was not happy until every last piece was secured before him. What resulted was a structure taller than he, and he was THRILLED!!!

To celebrate the end of construction, G ran to his toy bins, got out his biggest ball and proceeded to demolish his zoo menagerie. Seriously. Until the whole thing lay leveled to the ground he kept aiming the ball at it. S and I were laughing hysterically meanwhile to see that he invested all this hard labor and direction just to play Griffin-zilla.

I have a feeling G will really enjoy tickets to a good demolition in his future.

Boxes are fun! And they have so many uses.

1) To give the appearance you’re taller you can can stand on one. If height advantage is still insufficient, add a second, or even third box.

2) They make for excellent step-stools.

3) And wonderful hiding spots

There are many things G does that I can fully see myself in. And then there are others that I just don’t know where they come from. Take his latest car toy interest. S got a big box of his own childhood toys this week-end. In the bunch was a set of small toy cars that G immediately took to. He just knew what they were and what to do, and has been “driving” them around tables, chairs and couches since then. S didn’t show him how to play with them, and I can promise you I certainly didn’t!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDa8WwzriDE]

I wonder if they have little toy cars in daycare.

In the span of 2 minutes G tonight:

1. Ran Windows Diagnostics on my machine
2. Searched for “bcbcbcbcbcccccc hg” on Yahoo! (at least he’s a company man)
3. Tried to buy “tttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt”  off of Amazon. They were fresh out.
4. Cleared my cookies. Oh, and
5. Attempted to book himself a flight on American Airlines

He’s nothing but efficient, that G! What do they teach them at daycare exactly?

I waited to post about G’s fav new toy to see if my first reaction would change.. but nope. He’s played more w/ the empty boxes over the last week. I taped up the Amazon shipping boxes and boxes from some of our gifts. They are big blocks to him – carry around the room, stack them, throw them, and CLIMB on them. He puts them next to the table or sofa and climbs up and down — with the soundtrack of him saying “UP”, “DOWN” over and over and over…

You know the story of the kid who loves to play with the wrapping paper of their birthday gift more than the gift itself? Yeah, well, G doesn’t stray far from that tale. You see, he enjoys playing with an empty plastic bin about as much as anything else.

• He pushes it around the floor and uses it as a walking toy
• He throws his toys in it
• He then pulls them out
• He flips it sideways and then sits in it
• Sometimes he plays turtle with it (with our supervision that is)

S calls it the Swiss Army Knife of toys.

So yeah. Plastic bin (from Target)? $8. Hours of toddler fun? Priceless!

I think S has a Noah complex and is in the process of building an arc. He can’t stop himself from getting the animal lovey blankies for G. And for fear of over-attachment to any one, we get our blankies two by two. We now have a menagerie of two frogs, two monkeys and as of last month, two giraffes.

Our problem (S’ self-control aside) is naming our giraffes. Froggie 1 and 2 are named Franklin 1 and Franklin 2 (respectfully), the monkeys are Moonka 1 and Moonka 2. Yet, when it comes to the giraffes though we can’t agree. I like “Spot” for a name. S digs “Nubbs” on account of the nubbins on it’s head. We’re at an impasse, so we’ve agreed to let you decide for us. Here’s where you come in:

[polldaddy poll=1687849]

We have considered the compromise of naming one Spot and the other Nubbs, but Naah — too much of an opportunity for G to question why we have different names and then catch on to the doppelganger game. Besides… one of us has to be right ;p

So pick already!