Speaking of toys, my engineering class just tested their trebuchets! The scores were something like "0, 0, 0, 3 inches, 0". As one student said, the trigger mechanism jammed. Er, mechanisms, as it happened to all three of them.

I didn't like dolls, but I had an elaborate collection of Breyer horses that I invented all sorts of dramatic scenarios for. They were usually either mustangs living wild and free, Talking Horses of Narnia, or, you know, Talking Mustangs of Wyoming, living wild and free.

Annabel isn't that into dolls so far, either, but can get elaborate games going with her stuffed animals. Her favorites are a complete set of Backyardigans beanie babies, with whom she acts out scenarios from the show, occasionally interspersed with her own inventions, such as "Backyardigans go to watch the baseball-Mariners, and then go to school the next day."

Oh, and ever since I mentioned that Tyrone on Backyardigans was a moose like the Mariner moose, she says Tyrone is going to be a baseball moose when he gets big.

Today DH tried to get her to wear a new shirt with an applique-type picture of a fawn on the front, and she refused. When they got to daycare, her friend Maya was wearing that shirt, leading us to wonder if the girls are somehow sending psychic signals to each other to avoid being dressed alike...

Bows and Arrows are frustratingly difficult to make well!!!!

I had the Breyer horses. My grandpa built a stable for them. He also made me dolls for the dollhouse my dad built.

I usually read, though.

Argh! "Why should I learn French? In 20 years, everyone will speak English anyway."

Tell them that French babies learn French, so it can't be that hard....

"Why should I learn French? In 20 years, everyone will speak English anyway."

Nonsense. Tell the silly student that it's much more likely that we'll all speak Spanish in 20 years.

I had tons of Bryer horses! A lot of them wound up with missing hooves. At my grandparents we played with them in the woods and down by the creek.

I didn't play with dolls much, probably because I had a lot of boy friends. We played hide and seek, football, kickball, dirt fight, that kind of thing.

I have all my Breyer horses in my spare room right now because I've got this plan to eBay them. The fatal flaw in my plan is that it requires some effort on my part.

Maybe in the future we'll have Roombas that randomly select our stuff and sell it on eBay....