Eric's current favorite toys from Christmas are the Mega Blocks, the extra foam blocks, the drawbridge, Boom Blox for the Wii (we haven't opened Diego yet), and whatever Kyle got for Christmas (especially the dragon/serpent). He asked to wear his new "dino shirt", so I let him wear it even though they're pajamas. Kyle likes pretty much whatever Eric is playing with.

The "blizzard" that's coming through is more like a snow storm with wind. We've gotten a little over a foot of snow so far and it's continuing to snow lightly, but our area of the world isn't seeing any interruptions. No one's out on the roads, though. Greg's snow blower didn't start yesterday so we're back to shoveling for this storm. We'll get it serviced and remember next year to service it in October instead of waiting until the first storm of the year. Rookie move, lesson learned.

Eric has been showing signs of empathy, or at least the vestigial beginnings of it. We took a few toys out of circulation to give to charity since the kids got so many gifts this year. I told Eric that we were "giving these two puzzles to kids who don't have any toys" and he started going around the house grabbing (apparently random) toys (mostly his but also some of Kyle's, ha!) "to give to boys doesn't have any toys". I decided not to vet any of what he was handing me, simply saying "That's very nice of you, Eric. We'll set them here and sort through them later." I didn't want to squelch these early expressions of generosity. Later that day, Eric was playing with Kyle's dragon serpent and had found the loop and hung it up in his room. When Kyle was having trouble settling for his nap, crying for all he was worth, Eric called me into his room and handed me the dragon saying "Kyle wants this." I thanked him, of course, and took the dragon into Kyle's room.  Awww.