Since I have kids now, I buy a lot of kids' stuff. Well, I buy the clothes and Corey buys the toys. But I know all the toys--how to work them, what they do, where they come from. Once I tried to introduce Cydney Wilson to all the alien figures we have from Ben 10 and Ben 10: Alien Force. She was not a focused audience. At some point she stopped me to ask what kids of intellectual things I don't have room for in my brain since I know who all the aliens are and what makes them special.
A note about kids' clothes: THEY'RE SO CHEAP! Jake and Landen are still in 5T and XS shirts, and pants. I dread when I need a particular garment or some seasonal items because I know I'm about to spend so much I'll be paying it off for three months, but when THEY need something, it's like $10! I have noticed, though, that there is a substantial difference between the price of a shirt in a 5T and the price of the same shirt in XS. And Jake is more limbs than body, so he can't really rock the 5T anymore. I now realize that this is why the size of my Christmas loot diminished as the years went on--big kid toys are expensive.
Which brings me to the point of this--I am regularly reminded of the shit that I loved to play with when I was a kid, and I am also painfully aware how LAME that same stuff would be to kids now. Except Star Wars, which is timeless. So, I would like to petition the universe to make the following cool for the new generation, and where noted, for me as an adult.
1. Colored tights. Jake and Landen would have no use for this, but Adult Nell would. Every little girl had this outfit: red and white checked dress, bright red tights, black patent Mary Janes. I would like to bring back the bright tights as part of the whole ensemble. I know they make colored tights, but they're for punk chicks and pre-teens. I would like for colored tights to be fashionable office attire, universally.
2. Smurfs. And Rainbow Brite. Our boys watch cartoons that are so much more mature than when we were little--they make inuendos that only adults would notice. I would like to put Sponge Bob through the mean shredder at my office (the Gobbler) and never hear his name mentioned again. Papa Smurf and Gargamel--I could never tire of their shenanigans. Stupid Johnny Test and his talking dogs and his twin sisters who rule the science lab--ick. I wanted to be Rainbow Brite--friends with a sprite, living in rainbowland ruling all the colors of the Earth upon Starlite, my steed, and foiling Murky and Lurky's plans to rain gray on the world. There were boys on that show--who didn't crush on Red Butler? Don't get me started on the profundity of the Care Bear Stare.
3. Bicycles. I *think* Jake and Landen have bicycles at their grandparents', but they don't ride them. In our apartment in the city, we have no where to store bicycles and couldn't let them go far for fear of being run over in the parking lot or stolen. I used to ride my bike EVERYWHERE, all over the neighborhood, all over Jena, no supervision required. I'm sad that my kids are growing up in an urban area where they will never understand the freedom of a 10-speed.
4. Lite-brite. Corey and I scanned stores at Christmas looking for a Lite-Brite for the boys, and could not find one. They love to turn off the lights and run the battery down on their lightsaber that illuminates. They love to draw and the biggest hit of Christmas was the giant tin of Tinker Toys. Is a Lite-Brite not an absolute necessity for these two?
5. Holograms. I want everything to be hologrammed. Coke cans, blackberries, playing cards, t-shirts. I think it would make everything we bore our eyes with on a daily basis such a better visual experience--look at it from this direction, and it's one thing. Tilt it, or move your head, and it's something different!
6. I would say little green army men, but a several Christmases ago, my Uncle Joe wrote in his annual Christmas Letter a story about how my dad played for hours a day with just a bag of little green men, up until the age of 14. So that Christmas, he actually BOUGHT my dad a bag of those little green men. We've had them at my parent's house, and Jake and Landen thought they were the perfect complement to the uber set of Lincoln Logs they got from the Great Ones, so it's the gift that keeps on giving. I've yet to see them in toy stores, but you can find them at just about any drug store.
7. Easy bake ovens. Actually, this is just nostalgia. I think they still make these, but I would never buy one for the boys. They would put their toys in it. And I learned long ago that the best use for as Easy Bake Oven is as a tabletop on which to eat the Easy Bake Batter, which never made it into my own personal oven. It went directly into my mouth.
8. Fruity Marshmallow Rice Krispies. They stopped making it when I was in junior high, and I have never fully recovered. I think about that cereal every time I eat cereal. My favorite cereal in the entire world, and I would love, love, love if I could sit down with Jake and Landen on Saturday mornings, and eat this.
9. Swimming lessons. It's such a HASSLE when you want your kids to be extracurricular in the city, in a custody arrangement. Every summer, my mama hauled me to the Y in Alexandria for some swim lessons. Good thing that Cydney Wilson is a swim instructor, but it's still not the same experience as being in a swim-lesson class.
10. Chip and dip. Apparently, the rest of the world does not consider this a meal the way we did at the Wilson household. We got ranch dip that you make with the powder mix and sour cream, Ruffles, rolled-up pieces of turkey and occasionally, we'd tolerate a carrot. On special occasions, we'd have nachos made with Velveeta, or pizza sauce with pepperonis, but mostly, we had ranch dip. Every Saturday. On a big platter in front of the TV. I feel certain that if I put this down in front of Jake and Landen and tried to pass it as a meal, they'd ask where the chicken or the french fries were.
I'm going to try it. And I'll report back on how it turns out.
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