Our little Handy Manny

Just the other day—Tuesday I guess it was—I was tinkering around on the computer and the boys were nonchalantly playing with the pack-n-play on the floor behind me. After a quick email check, I turned around to corral the troops for our weekly trip to Prince of Peace and found the pack-n-play tipped on its side with our entire supply of gift wrap spread out over the top in full fort-like fashion. Caleb looked up at me, his big round eyes gleaming, a proud smile on his face, and he inquired with excitement, "How do you like the house I made, Mom?"

Attempting to conceal my disdain for the now unusable gift wrap, I replied with the usual "That's awesome!" and quickly followed up with a suggestion to find alternate building materials. Naturally, inside the brain of a 4-year old, there just isn't anything else suitable for the job in that particular moment. So, in an effort to avoid an untimely uproar, I quickly reassured him that we could find him his very own roll of wrapping paper at the co-op—and thankfully we did that morning, as I would desperately need some leverage for good behavior later that day.

Finally, after four grueling hours of Kidz Klub with Janine, we headed to Peggy's to pick up the boys. I hadn't even gotten both feet in the door, when across the room I heard, "Mom, I was a good boy!" Caleb was wearing that same proud smile he had displayed earlier that morning, and he just wanted me to know that he hadn't stopped thinking about that roll of red snowflake wrapping paper that was waiting for him back home ;)

Unfortunately, we got back too late to start any projects that night, but as soon as we sat down for dinner Caleb couldn't stop talking about all the things he was going to do with his new roll of wrapping paper. The ideas poured out like a roller coaster and at some point he surprised me by noting, "We better make a list of all our ideas!" If it weren't for already having such a long day with no nap, I'm not sure he would have ever gone to sleep that night.

The next day Caleb was dressed and ready to go unusually quick. His first priority, of course, was making a list of all the things we were going to build. (Proud mama sidenote; he wrote that list all by himself, without hesitation; I simply spelled the words aloud to him!) His list was short, as he was anxious to get to work, but it included a ladder and a monkey (I was put in charge of the monkey).

He immediately began contemplating all the supplies he was going to need: a scissors from his craft drawer, some cardboard boxes from the garage and Dad's roll of duct tape. Boy were the wheels in his little head turning!! He had finally collected all his material together when we had to break for a  trip to a potential preschool. The actual building process didn't begin until much later when Dad returned from class that afternoon, but Caleb has been working on that project and nothing else ever since!

I'm not sure what happened to the ladder and monkey plan, but Caleb sure is proud of the house he built (is still building?) for Shelby.