Boys and their Toys

About a week ago, Dan called me from work. "So I bought a four wheeler for the kids," he said calmly. "What?" I said not so calmly. "It's just a little one that is their size, they are going to love it." After a 2 minute lecture from me about all the other things we should be spending our money on, I decided to just embrace the fact that it was already on it's way, and tried to envision all the good times the kids will have on it.

A week later, it arrived. A cute little mini four wheeler, with a lawnmower engine that goes up to 30 MPH - that's pretty fast when you're riding on this little thing (I tried it). Dan took the kids down to get a helmet and other protective equipment. When he returned he said, "See Mommy? We found one with an elephant on it." The elephant looks more like a possessed boar with giant tusks, but the kids thought it was an elephant.

So, Alexa, rearing to go, suited up and hopped on the machine. My little lady. My firstborn. Jumping fearlessly onto the four wheeler with a huge smile. I suddenly had flashes of her jumping on the back of some dude's Harley and riding off into the sunset. I comforted myself with the thought that if she knows how to operate these kinds of things now, then she'll be really cool when she gets older.

Dan got it going. After we contributed to global warming with the amount of smoke this little thing emitted, the kids were off. Dan ran behind for a while holding the tether he could pull to turn of the machine if things got out of hand. But the kids had a ball. All the cousins came up for a spin and the smiles on these kids faces were priceless. Zachary was a bit nervous at first, and finally decided to give it a try at the end of the evening. The helmet barely fit around his cheeks. He looked like he was doing the "Chubby Bunny" routine we used to do at camp when you stuffed marshmallows in your mouth and tried to say "Chubby Bunny" clearly.
My mom almost had several heart attacks. The kids cheered each other on while they took turns. And at the end of the night, there were no mosquitoes to be had in our yard after we smoked them out. Below is Alexa's first spin around the tennis court. You know this is only going to get bigger...