Duplo Village

We have a ton of Duplo blocks. You can tell from the photo below, where Dana is sitting behind the box we keep them in. Generally the box is filled to the top.

We haven't played with them in months. The kids were bored with them, so I packed them up and put them in the closet. And forgot about them. Until last night, when Dana was having a complete meltdown at bedtime, repeatedly screaming at Daddy, "I WANT TO PLAY!" I tried to calm her but all of my normal tricks failed. Dana just screamed louder. I am sure she was thinking something along the lines of, "Can't these people HEAR me? I WANT TO PLAY!" Eventually, I whispered a grand plan to her, a plan for building a village out of Duplo blocks for the Smurfs to play in. She calmed down and listened, and was OK after that.

When she woke up this morning, she remembered our plan. So after Nora got on the bus, we hauled the giant box out of the closet and downstairs.

I am pretty sure my mom got this at a garage sale. This box contains hundreds of dollars worth of Duplos. Those puppies are expensive! Thank goodness for my mom and her garage sale prowess.

So in the process of building our first Duplo house this morning, I picked all of the stray items out of the box. We found some treasures that had been missing for a while, and some scary things, too. Things like puff corn and pretzels. At least a third of the things in the above photo have made it to the trash.

Nora got right in on the fun after school. She has always been excellent at building cool stuff, but it has been so long since she played with these. I was so impressed with her skills now that she is six. Look at that cool door she built!

They took over the kitchen table until we ate dinner. They played together so well all evening, until Dana decided she needed a bath. Nora, for the first time ever, chose to skip the tub and continue with the blocks. I love when an old toy resurfaces and seems like new again. Now, if only they would keep the riff raff out of the Duplo box...