Labeling Toys

Ian is now in the habit of taking a couple of toys to school every day. I emphasize to him that if he brings them to school, he has to share them with his friends and when he's done playing with them, he has to put them in his cubby. Still, it doesn't always happen. The teachers are usually good about putting his toys in his cubby for him instead of back in the bins. On Friday, he brought in two of his Cars cars, Mater and Sheriff. They weren't in his cubby when I went to pick him up and the teacher who was there didn't know he had even brought them in. Ian and I were about to start looking through the toy bins, when his friend Taylor piped up. "Ian brought in a brown car and a black and white car today. It's in our classroom. So if you want it, it's over there." (She's in Stargazers across the hall because she turned 4 already.) I swear, these kids are so smart, they kill me.

I didn't put his name on those cars because they're distinctive and they don't have the same ones at school. Plus, they all know how obsessed Ian is with the Cars characters. I did put a label on his dinosaur Thursday morning. I took a piece of tape and wrote his name on it and wrapped it around the dinosaur's tail. Ian seemed very pleased with it. So this morning, he decided to bring in two sharks (you'll have to ask him what kind they are -- I believe one is a tiger shark and the other is a great white). He told me precisely where on each shark he wanted his name. He was watching me very intently as I put the label on the second shark. As he was watching, he said very seriously, "Sharks in the water don't have tape on them."

You can't argue with him sometimes.