Lego Part 1

Raising kids, whether dealing with the nuance of seeing one's own blood, the quirks over jackets/pants/shorts or rain boots, or even just getting a hair cut dressed as a Spiderman can often baffle, and frustrate me.  Occasionally God knows you need something you just "get" from day one with your child, and 3.5 years into my parenting, I was lobbed a soft ball by the Big Guy.

Lego.

I was a Lego nut as a kid, and for whatever reason I got rid of them all, more likely my mom got rid of them when she moved and me the idiot college student didn't grab them before that.  But here I am 15-20 years removed from some of my finer building adventures as a kid and my 3.5 year old is jumping head first into construction.

See I never thought he quite got the building gene, he was ambivalent about mega blocks, and Duplo didn't really do it for him either.  To be honest building much of anything never really appealed to him.  But something happened last Christmas.  He was asking Santa for one thing and one thing only each and every day from Santa "I want Star Wars Legos"

I was sorta at a loss, see I love Lego, and I love Star Wars, but my son last Christmas wasn't even 3, could he even build with the blocks...I didn't want to just "impose" my interests on him, I really wanted to resist, but I bought him a small set, mostly because it had 4 storm troopers.  The present was a flop for all intensive purposes, but he loved it.  See without my help he couldn't build anything, and the mini-figures, while cool could frustrate him immensely because he couldn't put the blaster or any accessory for that matter in the guys hands.

So in order to build the model each time, or play with the guys he had to ask for my help, and I thought this made it a poorly timed gift.  Without fail though he would ask me to pull out the Legos and play with him.

We made it clear his 18 month old brother had to be asleep, but we would play Legos together and he would ask for my help to build, and I would teach him to read the directions and put the guys together like he wanted and he would play much the same way I would play as a child.  Little voices, dramatic falls, blaster sounds, it was like I was flashing back to my child hood.  I know that I very often was too "hard" on him while playing, focusing on building the set, following the directions, but kids have a funny way of blowing off their parents and my son is no exception, he ignores my bad recommendations with ease; thank God.

Looking back almost exactly one year ago, I can honestly say the timing couldn't have been better.  The toy while above his age was an activity he loved, but one that required my assistance, and now he is almost four, and can play for ages without me.  I love this independence, but I can think of a few times sitting with him, helping build and watch his imagination run knowing I was witnessing a miracle, a spark light a fire.  I am blessed to have had that time because as I write this now, his desire to get out the Legos revolves less and less about me sitting with him, and far more about the toy and playing.

 I'm glad I didn't just put them up for a year.