Legos and Guns

 LEGOS and GUNS. What is it about those two that appeals to boys? They build grand "daddy dragon mansions", planes, submarines, "ak40s" and turbos... They save mom, kill mom and rescue poor Indian children from communist while traveling through the jungle, no wait that was my grandmothers childhood story.

A Computerworld columnist writes:

There are a couple of truisms: Lego just goes on and on, and on… and, when it comes to guns, boys never really do grow up.  Some comments posted on the Brickarms forums: “I want human-sized Lego weapons”; “As a child, I always wished that Lego would come out with some grenades for my dudes to throw at each other”… and so on in similar vein.

Here's a snippet called Fathers & Sons from the Wall St Journal:

I can't shake the sense that boys are supposed to become manly. Rather than neutering their aggression, confidence and desire for danger, we should channel these instincts into honor, gentlemanliness and courage. Instead of inculcating timidity in our sons, it seems wiser to train them to face down bullies, which by necessity means teaching them how to throw a good uppercut. In his book "Manliness," Harvey Mansfield writes that a person manifesting this quality "not only knows what justice requires, but he acts on his knowledge, making and executing the decision that the rest of us trembled even to define." You can't build a civilization and defend it against barbarians, fascists and playground bullies, in other words, with a nation of Phil Donahues.

 Everyday they talk about saving the world and mom from doom. They talk about being like daddy, diving deep in the ocean and using guns to shoot the bad guys. Often I find myself encouraging these rough manly attributes and although that is a quality woman look for, we look more for those that are respectful, have pride, honor and courage.

My husband  thankfully has all these attributes to instill in the boys. These are things they will learn as they grow, through trial and beatings  errors but for now they need to enjoy this part. CHILDHOOD... because as we all know, it goes by too fast.

I do love watching them build castles, guns and the lot.