Bad Guys vs. Superheroes: Sandbox Edition

Anytime Jackson asks Jesse or I to play with him, we know we're going to be trapped in endless role play with bad guys and superheroes. Like any respectable Batman addict, Jackson owns the following bad guys:

• Mr. Freeze
• the Penguin
• Joker
• Catwoman
• Bane
• the Riddler

Jackson owns various playsets such as the jail, Joker's hideout, and the Batcave. However, most of his role playing is more like, "It's Bane's birthday. Let's bring him birthday cake." or "Joker needs a haircut." He has just recently become interested in actually fighting the bad guys. 

While playing bad guys and superheroes for the 483rd time, Jack and I came up with the creative idea to build each figurine a castle in the sandbox.

The superheroes teamed up and flew to one another's aid.

Jackson then knocked over the bad guys' castles before burying them in the sand.

Of course, this caused the figurines to become sandy, which required an immediate bath. Somewhere along the way Jackson also undressed and washed his clothes in the bathroom sink as well.

I love Jackson's imagination. He has driven me especially crazy this week by not listening and following directions, so it's nice to be able to spend time one-on-one simply playing in the sand. Sometimes I need to remind myself that he's just an active three year old boy that wants to play with his Mommy and Daddy.

Backyard Fun!

Our children have been blessed with all the clothes, toys, and books they could ever need during their first years. However, we really haven't had any kind of outdoor playsets or large toys that all four kids could play with. Until now!

With only a small fraction of the babies' birthday money, we were able to purchase two Little Tikes playsets off of Craigslist.

Jesse's brother and sister-in-law bought the babies the water table we had wanted.

Jesse's mom bought this extravagant climbing playset with tunnel. We chose to keep this toy inside so the babies would have a safe place to climb in their playroom/nursery.

And finally, Jesse's father built a sandbox that all four kids can enjoy.

We've been able to spend our evenings in our own backyard playing with water, sand, slides, swings, etc. I predict many afternoons will be spent playing in our backyard once the weather is cooler, Jesse goes back to work, and the babies are walking. Here are some action shots from the past few days.

In addition to all the big toys for the triplet's birthday, they were also blessed with food, wagons, electronic toys, shoes, gift cards, cups, and more.

There are so many fun things for James, Amelia, and Maddie to explore!