Ben's Baby

This post is something I have been meaning to write for a long time, but it is only after I went searching for the link to it that I realised just how long I have been planning it!

Heidi over here at Homemade by Heidi once told the story about her then 6 yr old son, who I guess is now 8, and how when he was little he had a baby doll. Apparently, sadly, the doll and himself parted company rather dramatically at the time of her post that I have linked to above. (I sometimes wonder what had happened at the time for the sudden and dramatic exit, maybe some kids had said something at school?)

However this made me immediately think of my son, who is exactly the same age. He too has a baby doll, although unlike Heidi's son, our baby doll is still around on the scene.
Our baby doll is simply known as "Baby".

Ben wanted a baby doll after several education baby dolls had been delivered to our house for an Antenatal class that I was facilitating. They were in our house for about a week and when they left he informed us that he wanted them back because they were now his babies. We asked if he wanted a baby and he said yes, so we went to the store and he choose the one, (think it cost all of $7.99) he must have been about 2 or 3yrs old at the time.

This baby doll has been around for at least the last 5-6 yrs.

Ben is not into teddy bears or fluffy toys he just has baby.

Unlike his little brother, who sometimes has to clear a space to just be able to lie down in his own bed, because he has so many other people in his bed! Ben does not sleep with anything. Never has. In fact neither of my boys were blanket / snuggly baby's, neither had anything that had to be taken with them wherever they went, we never had major panics because we had lost 'xyz', or bedtimes wouldn't work because 'xyz' was in the washing or lost!

All soft squiggy toys tended to stay at home during the day and found for nighttime.

Alex has had his moments of wanting to take someone with him, but it has never been a major effort or caused major hassle. At the time of leaving then we have to make sure we have everyone with us, but sometimes they have gone to bed in the foreign place without said toy and only found them the next morning when looking for something else.

However after reading Heidi's post I realised just how lucky we have been.

Baby is in our house, sometimes she can go missing for 3-4 weeks and not a word is said, but then suddenly Ben will be under his bed for some reason, will discover her and there are big crys of joy and hugs etc and she gets pride of place back in his bed and hugged to death when he goes to bed.

If we go away, then we always ask if Baby is coming too, she always does but if she is not in the bed at bedtime, there are no tantrums etc.

I am not sure if people (friends) know about Baby? He has her with us at the caravan and I must admit that when one or 2 of the little girls have started playing with her, the boys have mentioned that that is Ben's Baby and it just seems to have been accepted in everyones stride, like it is common place for little boys to have baby dolls (Alex does have one too, although he has baby bear and a Barney who are more important to him, although he is likely to give anyone a home, including a giraffe on a keyring who is now called Tessa and who has even managed a solo trip through the New Zealand postal service after she got left at Grandma's house!)

So luckily for us, our Baby is still alive and well, still living in their room. I hope we don't have a bad break up like Heidi did, although I think I would be inclined to do exactly what Heidi did and rescue her and give her a home until that magic time to reveal her back to her beloved owner when he leasts expects it!

Interest Free Wonder

Steve and I have been discussing, for several weeks months, the benefit of buying a flat screen tv for the living room.
It is something that I know will one day happen and I am not against it, we just don't really need it at present.
However, as all the extra machines (DVD player, Blue Ray, Sky, TIVO sort of thing) in the living room slowly die and get up dated, then it becomes more obvious that our old large square box tv is just not compatible with these other machines. Well it is compatible in that they play but we have picture and sound quality issues.

So when Steve told me of a staff discount day at one of the local homeware stores, then I rushed on over and sussed out the best deals. Needless to say I stood my ground and we decided we didn't need to buy the tv that day as we would have to come up with the money up front there and then!
The reason being that this particular store is very good at having interest free deals all the time.

In 2005, just as Alex was born, we realised we needed a bed for Ben to sleep in, so we got bunk beds from said store and got them on interest free credit. 36 months actually with 12 months deferred payment. We had the boys sleeping in the beds for nearly 3 years before we finally paid for them.

Now let me just inform you, we pay the amount off before the interest free period ends, so in fact this company really doesn't like us at all! We never pay any interest because as soon as we make the purchase I divide the amount by the months and pay that monthly amount. It is always much more than their recommended minimum payment of 3%. So in the last 5 odd years of being with them they have gained no extra money from us at all. They must hate us!

So from then on whenever we have wanted anything for the house, we choose it in the store and then wait until they have a good interest free promotion on. And oh boy have they had some good ones.
In 2006 we brought a new digital camera on 24 months interest free, I think the camera had died before we had finished paying for it.
In 2008 we brought all the new appliances for the kitchen on 40 months interest free, we are just coming to end of paying something stupid like $67 a month.
Last year it was decided that a Laptop computer was really needed for me to do my studies, seeing as I have to travel an hour to see the tutor, so we brought it when they had 48 months interest free. Think it would have been fairer to them to just give me the computer because they are making absolutely no money out of us at all, not at $50 for the next 4 yrs and no interest!

So after Christmas we saw that the company had had a special on over Christmas of 50 months interest free. 2 weekends ago it was down to 30 months and last weekend they only had a discounted price on, no interest free period. Their specials usually only last for a weekend, so if you want to get that special then you have to go there and then.
Steve said lets go, 30 months is good, but I know this store and told him to wait.........and sure enough, for this holiday weekend they have 50 months interest free till Monday.

So I have succummed and told Steve to go and get his TV this weekend, it may not get put on the wall just yet but at 50 months, it is just stupid a time not to buy it.
Think my husband will be way happy this weekend.

New Toy

I finally got my new tv for the bedroom.
Nice little flat screen thing that I can finally watch DVD's on.

The world is once again a lovely place

Christmas Presents

It sounds like all we do in this family is celebrate an occassion and then delay the actually enjoyment of it until later on?

Well for Christmas last year, Grandma and Grandad gave the boys vouchers to buy themselves something when they knew what they wanted.

Of course they had no idea that they had these vouchers and so they have been in my handbag since Christmas Day.

Finally at the weekend I decided we would take them to the shop and let them look at the toys. We didn't actually tell them they had money to spend, again they are too young to understand that yet, but it was just nice to be able to say 'Yes' when they asked if they could have something.

They perused several things and then finally I found some 'Hot Wheels' Car stuff. They had lots of track that you make loop the loops with and send the cars flying. The boys thought this was all good fun and came away with a nice little supply each.

Alex got 2 things with his money. 2 things that build into a track and have a loop the loop, one sets a plane flying as the car goes around the loop and the other the car jumps at the end of the track.

Ben managed to get something quite huge. A series of loop the loops all around itself, like a roller coaster. The car zooms through the maze of track and then shoots up a jump and lands back in the motorised starting area and then races off again, all on its own.

I managed to get a small video of it running. What is so funny is that the cat loves this toy! She happily sits there with the boys watching the cars zoom round and round. Occassionally she will put out a paw to try and catch the car, but she is content to just sit and watch.
Can't get video to load at present so will try again later

In fact when the boys finished playing the other day, she climbed on in and tried to get the cars moving again! It was so cute to watch.

Barney

Barney is back in town......well what I mean is that Alex has taken a shine to Barney the big purple dinosaur again.

He pops up every now and then.

Seems this week is one of the times for him to be noticed and played with.

WOW Toys

Several years ago I was looking for an areoplane for Ben because he was obsessed with them, we lived under the main flight path into Auckland Airport at the time, so he saw them everyday.

The only decent plane I could find was this one. A WOW toy, battery free, high quality, British designed, developmental toy which are guaranteed favorites with all pre school children.
It came with a pilot and an animal and has friction wheels, so you can run it along the ground and the propellers go round. It is a really solid toy and the best part is it requires NO batteries to make the parts move, which any mother will tell you is definitely a bonus.


This then lead us on to getting the helicopter, which is an animal rescue one, comes with several animals and the helicopter has a magnet, so you can pretend to fly down and grab the animal and fly it to safety. Again it has a friction button to make the blades go round and no batteries, in fact all WOW toys require NO batteries, so I love them.


We, over the time, have also collected the twin racing cars and the out door adventurer. Both allow much interaction and imaginative play, and everything goes together. All the people are the same size and can fit in any vehicle etc.


Alex has just found all these toys again in the toy box and now we regularly hear him playing along with them, talking to the people using lots of imaginative playing.


I think we might even have to look at getting another piece for him for Christmas as we need something aimed at his age group to get him, and although he loves all the toys Ben got for his birthday, we don't want Alex to suddenly jump 2 years in the types of toys he plays with when he is after all only 3yrs and needs to still learn what 3/4 yr olds learn at this age.