I'm going to build this when I get home

One of my favorite things about my boys is their insatiable need to build things.  Every time---and I mean every time---we go anywhere remotely out-of-the-ordinary, they start saying (before we've even left the place), "Ooh, I'm going to build this when I get home!"  I love it because it results in them playing such funny, interesting, creative things; and because it shows such genuine enjoyment of and interest in what we're doing.  Every activity feels "worth it," because we're experiencing it not just once but multiple times. :)  

Anyway, this love of re-creation is how the carwash obsession got started (they wanted to build their own carwashes after going to a real one with Grandma) and it has led to them building everything from tumbling gyms to Squaw Peak to Disneyland to pendulums to doctor's offices to swimming pools to temples to the Red Barn/Pumpkin Patch.  

They use the blocks constantly, but they also build with anything else that's to hand (unfortunately, now that they are tall and can climb on chairs, everything is "to hand") and they build in any scale: fwuffball size, monkey size, boy size.  Sebby likes to build something on the block table and then climb up to the top bunk (in the other room) and say, "I can see it from the 'Y'!"  Anyway, I love seeing what they build.  (Even though I am sometimes roused from my bed on Saturday mornings to come admire.)  Sebby, particularly, has such attention to detail and he uses so many creative building materials that he genuinely amazes me with his re-creations.

Here are a couple of Sebastian's recent "Monkey San Francisco"s.  (Monkey San Francisco is much like the real one,  with a few additions, and name changes such as the "Monken Gate Bridge.")

3 comments

  1. Honestly that is QUITE Amazing! Future architect and/or builder in the future!

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  2. I am very respectful of this. Please understand that all boys do NOT do this. Cam liked to make little machines out of bits of junk, but both he and Murphy were computer graphics guys from the time they teethed. So this building thing - this SEEING thing they do when you go places, and then the drive to recreate, storing detail and function, shape and relative size? This is not "normal." They didn't just get this for fee along with the anatomy. This is impressive gift.

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  3. I just can't wait until they are creating worlds in the next life--I hope I can marry one of my girls off (at least) to one of your boys so I can have brilliant grandchildren. Someday.

    How sad is this--my kids build "Angry Birds" (mostly my 3-year-old) and they all laugh when they hear Elder Ardern say this: "I know our greatest happiness comes as we tune in to the Lord (see Alma 37:37) and to those things which bring a lasting reward, rather than mindlessly tuning in to countless hours of status updates, Internet farming, and catapulting angry birds at concrete walls."

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