Concerts and Cars

The two most popular things in our home this summer are concerts and cars. Mason has taken to performing numerous songs on his guitar while sitting on the toy box in the living room. These songs usually include some aspect of his day, incorporating some exciting and recent event that has happened and then a series of what we like to call "Mason words". These songs last anywhere from 1 to 5 minutes and usually immediately followed by another original piece. Occasionally, we get his version of Coldplay or Weezer. After destroying the one pick he had by chewing it, he began strumming with his hands. Well, he's been playing so much that he started getting blisters on his thumb and finger. When we told him that all guitars players get this, he stopped whining and almost adopted a look of pride-like he had joined a elite group or something. It was pretty amusing! But we decided that picks would be helpful. So Mason and I had a little special mommy-son time at "The Guitar Center". It was like watching a kid in a candy store. He just went from one side to another, touching everything, playing as many instruments as he could and of course asking to buy everything! One very helpful associate showed Mason the mini guitars (which were still as big as him) and got a couple down for him to play. He sat on the ground and played, strumming his little heart out! I wish I had my camera with me!

Now, Willow likes to get in on the concert action too. Sometimes she tries to strum the guitar while Mason is playing. She usually gets a swift kick or push away from her brother. The tears ensue until I can distract her with another instrument that is just as appealing as the guitar. Those of you with two kids know that no toy is as appealing as the one the sibling has! So it usually takes some convincing that the shaker or drum or any other instrument will be just as fun as the guitar. Sometimes, Mason has a streak of selflessness and gives up his "special" and lets her play with it, trying to teach her how to strum it the right way. Watching that is pretty amusing! But once she gets going with another the instrument, the two of them make a pretty good duo, a LOUD duo, but pretty good.



Cars are the other big hit this summer, as has been for the past year. As is his custom, Mason dumps his bucket of die cast cars out on the floor and either singles out a few that he wants to play with (all the "Cars" cars) or takes all of them and lines them up on his town scene play mat. This option is the choice du jour most days. Willow of course loves to come in and pick up, i.e. destroy his neat lined up cars. The scene is not very different from the guitar. I try to convince Mason to share. He says no. I then try to convince him to pick out a couple cars that she can play with next to him. He says she can have the cars but can't play in his room. "She's gonna mess up my cars!" I try to let Willow play next to him anyways. She gets bored with her two cars when she sees the hundreds of other options nicely lined up next to her. She goes for them, he screams and cries while hitting her arms away. She begins to scream too. Before you know it, everyone is crying and pushing around fighting for the cars. Needless to say, I end up taking Willow out of Mason's room with her two cars while Mason slams the door closed and desperately tries to reassemble his nicely ordered rows of cars. We recently bought Willow her own car to play with. That was pointless- Mason hijacked it already and she still goes for the car that he has! Who knows, maybe in a couple years they'll be able to play together a little more civilly.