Friday Photo Shootout - Under Construction

Thanks to Gordon for this week's prompt. For more FPS posts, click on the big black camera on my sidebar.

Under construction in these photos:

1. People

2. Imaginary architecture

3. Family memories

We spent a belated Christmas in Vancouver, mostly with the grandbabies. We carried our gifts along - not too many, as the young family is in danger of outgrowing its very tall house just because of the number of toys they have. We bought books for the children - Tin Tin books from my husband, Fancy Nancy and Green Eggs and Ham from me. I suffer from an irrational fear that our grandchildren will grow up to have USB ports surgically implanted (in their jaws, maybe?) and never know the pleasure of holding a real book. I was pleased to see their mom reading to them -- and to see that the books we brought along weren't the only ones they owned. (I knew that. Really I did. It's just that  electronic toys and learning tools are ubiquitous now. It's not that I feared their parents wouldn't provide books, but I was afraid that books might not be able to compete with the flashy new technology for the children's attention. Never fear. Books still work their magic.)

But the #1 hit present of the season was this one:

It consists of a bench in which there are eight holes and eight brightly coloured pegs that fit into the holes - and there is a mallet.  In a fit of gender bias, I bought Jasper a hard hat and the workbench - which, by the way, became known immediately as Bang-Bang. What happened was that Jasper played with it, Jasmine set aside her princess dress-up stuff to play with it, their mother and father and uncle played with it...Well, you get the picture. Everybody loved playing with the Bang-Bang.

The adults also had a wonderful time watching the children play Bang-Bang and seeing (particularly little Jasper's) eye-hand co-ordination improving as we watched.  Of course, for all the banging, no actual structure got built, but in the imagination of the children, it seemed whole cities grew right there on the playroom floor.

Mostly, though, what was built was one of those memories that make parents and grandparents go all soft around the eyes, the kind that will be revisited again and again over the years.

This message says "I love you."

Okay. We haven't done the Christmas thing, but it looks as if that may not happen until after dinner, so I'll check in now. We went out to lunch - to a fish and chips restaurant (not a chippy - a proper restaurant with tables and waiters and everything.) Both the children are just getting over colds, so they didn't eat much - except Jasper really liked the mushy peas. When we got home, he went down for a nap, and Jasmine (that's she in the photo) set about doing some crafts. I mentioned pinwheels, and she commented "When I was a little girl, I used to make pinwheels all by myself!" Then her mom made a pinwheel for her (I guess Jasmine had forgotten how, in all those years since she was a little girl) and she happily pranced around the room, making a breeze to turn the blades. After that, I painted her fingernails pink, so she wrote me that message. I think I'll paint her toenails tomorrow!