Legos and King of the Mat

The magic is gone! Today, when I got home from work, Eric didn't rush up to me to give me a hug to welcome me home. He was upstairs reading to Natalie and didn't want to lose his place in the book. When I went upstairs, he wouldn't even get up off the floor to give me a hug because his finger was pointing to the exact spot in the book where he had left off. Sigh. My baby is growing up. A few months ago, he had a scrape or cut on his leg that he was very concerned about. When I asked him if he wanted a band-aid, he replied, "Why, it's not going to help." He is so practical now.

Some things that he still gets excited about, though, are dinosaurs and Lego sets. We've been looking for this one set for a couple of weeks or so--the Lego Jurassic World Raptor Escape set. It's sold out in the Lego online store. It doesn't even state a ship date like some of the other sets, like "will ship in 30 days". It only says, "Sold Out".  Patrick took the kiddos to the Lego Store at North Star Mall last Friday. He had been calling and found out that they would be getting a shipment in that day. No Lego Jurassic World in that shipment, but the manager did give Eric an extra raptor named "Blue". Eric was very excited when he got that.

The retail price is $39.99 and occasionally I would see it on Amazon for $60. Finally, I found it at the Walmart on Walzem, near Alex's school, so I was able to get it on Monday. Eric was SO excited. The manager at the Lego store had said that he thinks they'll have plenty of sets by mid-August (because of the lag time of making more sets). Luckily, this boy doesn't have to wait.

Something else that Eric has been very excited about lately is his jujitsu class. I was finally able to take him to class yesterday (Wednesday) because I got home early enough and because Patrick wanted to stay home and watch the USA vs. Jamaica CONCACAF Gold Cup semifinal game. I snapped a quick photo of him in his uniform right outside the Brazilian Jujitsu place where he has class.

It was cool to be able to watch Eric grapple kids around his age. He was definitely one of the smaller ones, but he seemed to hold his own. On Monday, they had played a "game" where they would grapple each other and if they won, they got to stay on the mat. Apparently, Eric defeated maybe five or six of the kids and almost won "King of the Mat". That was class #4 for him! It's definitely a great physical activity for my iPad-loving Eric. It didn't take him long to start sweating.

That is what's up with Eric. I'll try to update about the other kids in the next few days.