Allen

(CORRECTION FROM MY ORIGINAL POST... ALLEN IS ONLY 8!

THANKS FOR THE REALITY CHECK TESSA)

For probably the first time in my life, we’ve accomplished something ahead of time, rather than late.

Grandson Allen turns nine on April 9th.  School Spring Break provided a perfect opportunity to get in a birthday shopping trip on Monday.

After his mom and dad and little sister, Reagan, went home Sunday evening, we kicked back for a quiet  evening.  It turns out that Allen is a Lego officiado.  He burrowed into the trove of old toys we keep inside our end table and found pieces of Legos accumulated from various sets over the years, and built a way cool scorpion.




He explained to me that he just followed the instructions he found in one of the buckets of Legos and substituted different ones when their were pieces missing.  I was pretty darn impressed.

Monday morning we woke to the four letter word.  About four inches of it, with more falling.  Four  more inches of snow and four hours later, it finally let up.  Hey Mr. Weatherman, that was a bit more than the flurries you predicted!

The snow was not going to deter us.  But first, we needed homemade donuts for breakfast, compliments of a tube of buttermilk biscuits with holes cut in the middle fried in Canola oil.  We iced them with a light powder sugar icing.  Try this sometime.  They are so good!



Since the snow was showing no signs of letting up, we headed out for our birthday shopping trip in time for lunch at McDonalds.  The first McDonalds’ parking lot had not been bladed and the runoff of the melting snow on the was so bad that we couldn’t get to the door without getting wet feet.  But where there is a will, there is a way – especially since there is no shortage of McDonalds to choose from.  We just had to drive five  miles further into town to find a lot in better shape.

Did you know that Barnes and Noble has a good selection of Legos?  Me neither, but my son, Greg, put a little bug in my ear that this might be the direction to head. 

We hit pay dirt!  They had Atlantis, Harry Potter Diagon Alley, Star Wars, Pirates, and many more to choose from.  We had finally settled on the Pirates, when ol’ eagle eye Grandpa spotted another  table of Legos in a center aisle.  And under the table out of sight was the ultimately perfect set that made Allen drool.



“Oh Grandma, this is it!”  And so it was.

The day went way too fast and before we knew it, we had to give his bright smile back up to his mom and dad and little sister.  Poor three year old Reagan was heart broken when she had to go home without him Sunday night.  Greg and Alicia said she cried for a half hour, wanting them to go back and get him.  I can only imagine how happy she was to see him walk into the house with Greg Monday evening.
 
Allen called last night to let us know he had already put everything together.  How is that possible!  He  has more patience than I could ever hope for.

Happy Birthday Allen a little bit early!  We love you!

The snow is pretty much gone and the temperatures are supposed to climb to the mid-seventies by tomorrow.  Crazy!