He's Counting On It

I have been playing a card game with the Gremlin recently that he received while Trick-Or-Treating. It's a game of WAR played with mini-cards with the Disney's Cars vehicles printed on them.

We'll each put one down, he'll claim he won, and then I'll ask him to count both of them out, and ask him which one he gets to last - emphasizing which is "higher" and which is "lower." He will yell (either way), and then squeal if he actually won. This has apparently rubbed off on him, as he showed in the store the other day.

The Gremlin was at Value Village the other day when he scared the Mother of the Gremlin by going into a conniption in the store. When the MOTG finally managed to calm him down, she realized the Gremlin had found the toy to end all toys:

The Rescue Hero Fire Truck

The Gremlin clutched his prize and tried not to hyperventilate while trying to put together a cohesive sentence.

"M-M-Momma! M-m-m-m-momma! I want this! Please I can get it?!"

"I don't know buddy, I don't think you have enough money..." The Gremlin's face lit up and he jumped on his opportunity.

"I do! I do! I have five dollars. This is two dot nine-nine. That is almost three. Three is less than five. I will have two dollars and one cent left over after I buy this!"

The words were barely out of his mouth when he bolted to the front of the store, the MOTG only catching up with him after he made it through the line and had his fire truck on the counter, though the cashier was staring at him a bit inquisitively.


Favorite Toy of the Week: Lego Police Helicopter (in conjunction with his other Lego fire sets) and of course the fire truck mentioned above

Snow Day!

The Gremlin recently took a snow day - after the almost 2 feet that fell up here, even two days after that snow fell there were places that still had pristine snow.

One of these places was the park on the other side of the river from us - the drifts piled up all through the equipment, and allowed the Gremlin to climb to the top of the equipment and leap from the top of the equipment into the soft drifts.

Thanks to the temperature the snow had been completely untouched, and the Gremlin took advantage. He ran from end to end, where he saw a drift, he made a leap - literally being buried in snow before he would manage to get his feet down.

Well, after a few hours of this, the Gremlin finally got enough through his system that he needed to perform one of Nature's functions. With good foresight from the Mother of the Gremlin, they were at one of the parks with a staffed Chicago Park District building - meaning there was an open bathroom nearby.

The Gremlin, going through one of his "independent" phases (that is until he decides he wants to go home and needs to be carried), stopped the MOTG from coming into the stall and locked the door. Per the Gremlin's norm of attention (none) and drive to annoy his mother (lots), he took forever.

The Gremlin emerged while his mother was distracted by 'preschool' flyers and postings, and was on his way out the front door (to the building, not the bathroom) when his mother finally got caught up to him to take his hand and lead him out. And even then she was more concerned with him "not slipping" than, well...

When they emerged from the park district building, they saw that there began a trickle - other kids had seen the Gremlin and his sporting ways, and were in the process of making their own child-sized craters in the drifts. And more were coming too - pulling into the parking spaces by the Park District building.

The MOTG - not wanting to be overbearing - let the Gremlin loose and walked over to a group of moms that held at least a few moms she'd seen before. The other moms looked away from her has she stepped up, until one finally nodded and cleared her throat.

"Ughm, is that your son in the blue out there?" The MOTG nodded - his reputation preceded him.

"Yeah, that's my AJ." The mom finally pointed at him.

"The one in his underwear?" The MOTG froze, and turned slowly.

The Gremlin was climbing between platforms at just that moment, and gave everyone a beautiful showing of his Disney Cars tighty-whities that had been pulled up after he'd gone to the bathroom over his snowpants. The MOTG turned back around to her super hero-like baby (with underwear on the outside!).

"Ha, oh yeah... uh, we've been working on him dressing himself recently. I gotta go..."