Toys, Tissues and Toilet Paper Rolls

In the last three months Noah has been visited by an aunt, 2 sets of grandparents, and Santa. He also travelled back to Australia and celebrated his birthday and Christmas, before returning home to New York, to celebrate his birthday and Christmas. In short, Noah has received many, many new toys. He has literally hundreds of hours of entertainment within the 3 small rooms of our apartment.

Trucks and cars. Balls and books. Puzzles and pianos. Maracas and tambourines. Xylophones, shakers, blocks, sorting shapes and pull toys. It goes on and on. But you get the idea. He has a lot of toys.

And yet what is it that entertains him for hours? That has him quietly playing by himself for a few precious minutes. Toilet paper. Tissues. A cardboard box. I know - it is clique'd, but it still fascinates me. This afternoon, for almost an hour a single box of tissues entertained Noah. He took each tissue out of the box, one at a time. Not rushed, not by sticking his entire hand into the box to grab a fistful. But delicately extracting each tissue, with his well practiced "pincer grip", bring it to his nose for a quick sniff or blow - depending what tickled his fancy at the time,, and then he shredded it. Sometimes he shredded the tissue with his mouth. Sometimes with his fingers. Sometimes he brought the tissue to me, so I could blow my nose, or later he held the up to the computer so Pop, Nan and Aunty Shann could blow their noses.

Toilet paper holds more alluring qualities for Noah. He has mastered the art of spinning the roll as he walks past, unravelling it with maximum efficiency. If he didn't giggle so much at his achievement, I might hardly notice for hours, he has the movement so mastered. Then when I started to move the roll away so that he could no longer reach it, he found an alternative. He discovered where the spare rolls of toilet paper are kept, and has mastered placing them on the holder to unravel them instead - these are a lot more fun given that its an entire roll, andnot just the remnants of a used roll like previously. Or he simply launches these unused rolls into the bathtub - only when full of course!

His squeals of delight during theses activities are matched only when his Dad is tickling him or chasing him around the lounge room. It is pure joy - and from such an inexpensive household item.

Vintage Toys

Noah and I enjoy several of the wonderful "Mommy & Me" classes and groups that NYC has to offer, from a relaxed mothers/play-group, to swimming, to music, to yoga. I have found it an amazing way to meet other Moms and babies that are around Noah's age, and they have really helped us settle in quickly to the city.

It was at one of the these classes today, that I came the closest to complete disaster with Noah.

The class was at another Mom's apartment. This Mom is super artistic, being an artist and her husband an art-dealer, and probably not someone I would easily be-friend if we didn't sign up for the same class and have babies of the same age. Lets face it, I was the nerd at school, slightly obsessive-compulsive, a huge advocate for order and presentation. I put clothes together according to the layout in the store, the picture in the window, or what my big sister said was "trendy" (or later my younger sister). I was not the uber-alternative artistic type, who wore wonderfully eccentric vintage clothing in her very own style. This Mom, is just that sort of person, and I admire both the aesthetic qualities in her "loft apartment" and the vintage-sophistication of her clothes (and her daughters). I have always wanted to be the care-free artistic type, but no matter how many times I take it, the Myers-Briggs keeps telling me I am not that type of personality. Oh well.

I was particular impressed with the amazing array of vintage toys set out for this Mom's daughter on the toy-bench in the living room. From a vintage rocking-horse (actually I think it might have been a husky in its former years - it is a bit hard to recognise these days), to 30 year-old Fisher-Price toys - just like what we used to have as kids. Noah, and all the kids in the group love to play at the bench. Sitting up on their knees, grabbing down the unusual toys and objects perched somewhat precariously on the bench. The old cow-bell was a hit today, along with the old-style coloured pegs and board. And this is were we struck disaster.

Noah was playing, along with the 6 other babies, not more than 2 feet from me. He kept turning around to show me his latest find - a coloured peg, the cow-bell, an old Fisher-Price radio toy. He was very proud of himself (usually because he had beaten one of the other babies to the object). Then it was time to go, and I picked him up from the floor and saw a glimpse of something white in his mouth. Now I didn't immediately freak out. He eats everything, and at the moment his favourite is fluff from the shag rug and paper. This is what I figured I would be pulling from his mouth, like I do a thousand times a day to stop him coughing up a fur-paper-ball as big as his fist. But instead, today I pulled out a small white screw! A rather obvious choking hazard.

I turned to the Mom and showed her, to warn her that there could be others around and I didn't want her daughter to eat any. Her reaction took me quite by surprise.

"Oh yes, sorry about that. I did tell some of the Moms there could be a screw lying around."

I'm sorry? You knew there was a screw and yet were quite happy for our "mouth-fixated 10 month old children" to play there? And why tell only some of us? And...the questions kept racing through my head as I absently handed her the screw and said our farewells. Apparently the screw had fallen off one of the previously-admired vintage toys when the babies were playing with it, and she hadn't been able to find it.

No. Because Noah was chewing on it!

I had been feeling bad, that poor Noah only had new toys to play with. No worn-in, old-style, vintage-cool toys like his little play-mate. I no longer have that concern. There is a place for vintage, and it is not in my sons mouth.