Legos and Peekaboo Land'O Lakes Lady

     Mignon over at Sweet Whisper Dreams posted about Legos today. It reminded me that they were one of our girls' favorite toys. They played with Legos for days at a time, leaving them out overnight to continue building day after day. I recall stepping on them barefoot if I wasn't careful as I went about the house, especially in the dark. They enjoyed photographing their scenes and acting out little stories with them. We don't have the "girl" sets. My girls preferred pirates, cowboys and Star Wars.
     One lazy Sunday afternoon this past winter, the girls were sorting through all the sets, putting them together and taking stock of what we have. Audrey ended up building one of her sets that day, proving that Legos are a toy kids will play with right into adulthood. We still have tubs of them, sorted by color and taking up a lot of room in the basement. One of these days we'll find a new home for the plain colored blocks, but the girls seem to want to keep their themed sets. I enjoy the large Duplo blocks that are geared for the chubby little hands of toddlers. These are the perfect toy for younger children who come to visit because they're suited for both boys and girls. We have a train and circus animals with assorted blocks. I'm not patient with the tiny Legos, but I'm happy to build towers and buildings with these larger Duplo blocks for the little kids to use... or knock down.
     Several years ago, Chelsea used Legos to make this little stop animation film for one of her art classes at VCU. It's titled "Moral Disasterology" and it plays out the consequences of the mystic monkeys, "See No Evil, Speak No Evil, Hear No Evil". The first Lego man sees evil when he peeks at the Land'O Lakes peekaboo Indian* and gets his head speared by the wild man. His Lego wife begins swearing (it's beeped out) and she floats down the river meeting her disaster. A little monkey calls her "potty mouth". And finally, the last Lego couple hears evil when they can't understand what the hillbilly is saying and they are done for. As you can see, we still love our Legos.



* Steve taught us about the Land 'O Lakes peekaboo Indian a long time ago. I don't know how he learned it, but I imagine it was back in his neighborhood in the 60's. (The image that pops into my head is that Steve and his friends were like the boys in the Sandlot.) I never knew about the peekaboo Indian before Steve shared it. If the boys in my neighborhood knew about it, they kept it a secret. Be warned- it's a little bit naughty.
You take an empty Land'O Lakes butter box and using an exacto knife, cut the little box of butter the Indian lady is holding so that it opens as a flap, hinged on the top. Find the image of the Indian lady on the other side of the box and cut her knees off, a little larger than the butter flap you previously cut. You tape the knees behind the butter flap and voila- peekaboo. The knees look just like you-know-whats.
It cracked me up that Chelsea would use this in her video. The story is that her college roommate's grandmother was the model for the Land 'O Lakes Indian. Perhaps Chelsea was showing her how much we revered the lady?

In Which Miss Post Compares Children to Dogs and Calls Them "It"

"Etiquette" by Emily Post copyright 1937 p.764

Chief Virtue: Obedience

     No young human being, any more than a young dog, has the least claim to attractiveness unless it is trained to manners and obedience. The child that whines, interrupts, fusses, fidgets, and does nothing that it is told to do, has not the least power of attraction for anyone, even though it may have the features of an angel and be dressed like a picture. Another that may have no claim to beauty whatever, but that is sweet and nicely behaved, exerts charm over everyone.

     When possible, a child should be taken away the instant it becomes disobedient. It soon learns that it cannot "stay with mother" unless it is well-behaved. This means that it learns self control in babyhood. Not only must children obey, but they must never be allowed to "show off" or become pert, or to contradict or to answer back; and after having been told "no," they must never be allowed by persistent nagging to win "yes."

     A child that loses its temper, that teases, that is petulant and disobedient, and a nuisance to everybody, is merely a victim, poor little thing, of incompetent or negligent parents. Moreover, that same child when grown will be the first to resent and blame the mother's mistaken "spoiling" and lack of good sense.