Life's Little Pleasures

Lately I have been lamenting the drastic decline in the "fun factor" in my life.  I am working a Monday through Friday job, living for the weekends, sort of in the grind of day to day life with twin infants and work and wife and life in general.  I am not religious, so I don't have a god to thank for the good things in my life, but I do realize that I should shut my pie hole and realize most people wish they had my problems.  So, let me share with you one of the simple joys of my life:

This is Renys.  A Maine institution.  For those of you in Cali, think Big Lots, minus the crack heads.  It is to Marden's what Target it to Wal-mart.  Apparently this place is well known to everyone else, but I'd never been in one.  I was finished seeing patients the other day and since this was close, I thought I would swing by on my way home.  This was a good idea.

This is a box of Melissa & Doug brand blocks.  We've been looking to buy the girls some blocks that weren't made from endangered trees and coated with extra-toxic lead based paint applied with brushes made from black rhino tails.  Something that the girls can eat with only a minimal amount of increased risk for growing a third eye.  These things are made in China, but are purported to be made in factories where workers are treated well and are manufactured out of environmentally and biologically safe materials.  Which means they usually cost an arm and a leg.  Which these didn't, which is AWESOME, cause I am cheap.  The smiles these brought to the girls were soooooo worth it.  Below are the pictures that tell the tale:

Molly was killing us... while Harbour was throwing the blocks hither and yon, Molly sat there fixedly attempting to stack them, a behaviour we have not seen before.  She quickly got two, and then screwed her little face up in the most adult expression of concentration, and did finally get a third one on!  It's the little things that bring us so much joy.  I'd like to say they spelled out their names (like above), but they did not.  Guess we need to break out the baby training spatula.

The lesson here is that a cheap box of wooden blocks can bring immense happiness to a 13 month old, and that in turn makes my wife and I feel like a million dollars.

Cheers...J