A Lego challenge

Let me just say that I have grown significantly in the birthday party department.  Not much has happened in the cooking and the cleaning areas of my life, but I think I have the birthday party mastered.  I would definitely be teased in a Jennifer Weiner novel.  Connecticut will do that to you.

My son opened all his presents when we got home.  The problem with an evening party is that you can't open all the presents and then say, "OK sweets, let's go get ready for bed."  Well, maybe June Clever could, but I couldn't. So by 8:30 I had had enough of Iron Man and dragged my child upstairs kicking and screaming. 

He was up at six playing with all the new toys, and I came into the kitchen just in time to see him hold up a Lego kit.  When I say "No, you are still in your pajamas, you haven't had breakfast, I need to make your lunch, and then we have to load the car for school, so wait and do that with Daddy tonight," he blinks at me but doesn't say anything.

Two minutes later I hear the tinkle of little Lego blocks falling all over my kitchen floor and he starts spreading them out in an attempt to make a truck just like the one in the picture. The other two are up now and screaming for breakfast and clothes-we need those things for school.

Count to ten Page, breathe Page, you can't have a margarita at six am, Page......I smiled and turned around.

"Honey, I promise I will help you with the Lego kit if you put it all away now and get ready for school."  He found a Tupperware container and we made sure every single block was up.  Then we put it up very high away from little brothers and got ready for another day driven by a Lego promise.

I mean, they are only blocks.  How hard could it be?

I don't remember my own brother having a lot to do with them.  I know my nephew adored them. They were created in Denmark.  The Little Mermaid and Legos-that is about all I know about the Danish.  I need to learn more-I'll get on it.

We came home around four and spread them out on the kitchen table.  All Legos are little.  But little doesn't always mean little.  Some are small, some are tiny, some are teeny, and some are lilliputian.  No wonder everyone steps on them. What does a vacuum cleaner suck up more of-Legos or Barbie shoes?  That is the question.

After about twenty minutes of my child crying over the picture and his blocks looking more like a wall than a truck, I told him to get the instruction book.  If you have never done a Lego kit before, I have to tell you the instruction booklet is designed for idiots like me.  First, it is VISUAL.  All pictures and very few words-starting with how to sort your Legos into groups that are tiny or lilliputian.  THEN you go through your booklet number by number and they show you which block to put where. You don't move to the next page until you are done with the one you are on.

The Lego kits teach SKILLS.  We had to slow down and go step by step. We had to follow directions or create more work for ourselves. We didn't move on until we were done with one piece, and if you make a mistake with your blocks sometimes you have to take a lot of other pieces off to correct it.

The only problem with Lego projects is the dishes can easily go undone while you are putting together a hundred microscopic blocks.  The two year old was watching us and singing the theme song from "Bob the Builder," but my daughter disappeared into the playroom.  I don't know what she did up there but I didn't hear anything crash. AND dear parents of the world out there reading this, I just love it when we do all the grunt work on a project.  After an hour of block sticking, our child puts on the decal stickers and the tires, then says "Look at the truck I made!"  Yeah, it is about them anyway, right?

The Lego kit is done and there are no spare blocks to be had in the house. Are we ready for another project or a trip to the Lego museum? No, not really.

But now I know how to follow directions.