Things You Never Though Possible.

Jack loves sweets. What child doesn't? Cakes are probably his favorite but he asks for chocolate most often. Considering he's my child it's not surprising that Jack has a sweet tooth really. Anyone who's known me for very long knows that I can consume an inhuman amount of sweets in any one sitting. Jack is certainly heading in that same direction. Snacks and treats are always at the forefront of his thoughts.

A while back we took Jack to Cadbury World. For those of you who don't know, it's basically a tour of the Cadbury Chocolate Factory. It's good fun to walk around the factory and see how it all came about and how it's all made. There tour is mostly video guided, they give visitors a bunch of free chocolate and there's a cocoa bean ride that bares a striking resemblance to the 'Small World' ride. At the end of the tour there's a gift shop selling discount chocolate etc.

We arrived at 10am and Jack wasn't impressed. Despite our telling him otherwise he was pretty convinced that we were going to Thomas Land so you can imagine his reaction when we pulled up in front of a fairly non-desrcript factory estate.

Jack was reasonably entertained by the gift shop while we waited for Helen to get the tickets but it was clear that he wasn't hugely happy. So in an attempt to lighten his mood I bought us all a piece of chocolate. Jack was pleased with this and pretty soon had chocolate all over his face and hands.

Helen then arrived with the tickets and after a quick clean up we headed out on the tour. Jack was quite receptive to the tour, he liked all the machinery and the dancing cocoa beans. There's a ride toward the end that very closely resembles the famous Small World ride, only it's dancing cocoa beans. But Jack seemed to enjoy it. There's a few virtual reality things that he played on too. All in all we got through the tour hassle free. At the end we headed to the part of the day that I knew Jack was really interested in, the playground. It was hot so I bought each of us a carton of chocolate milk and we set about playing.

The first thing I noticed was Jacks reluctance to drink his milk. Normally with a drink of any kind he's quite happy to just gulp it all down as quickly as possible, instead he just had a few sips and then headed out to play. Helen and I drank our milks and then noticed that the Essence show (a brief history video of Cadbury and make your own chocolate) was opening. So we called Jack back and got in line where we tried to encourage him to drink his milk. After a couple of minutes in line Jack started to grow impatient. Being that we were at a chocolate factory we tried to persuade him to come with us using our biggest motivator, 'Jack they give you more chocolate on this one' to which Jack said something that I honestly never thought I'd head him say, or any other two year old for that matter. 'I don't want chocolate, I've had enough chocolate today'.

From then on the rest of the day was turbulent, the sugar probably played a pretty big part in it. We went to the Essence show and got our chocolate cup, Jack actually spit his out, but he did pick chocolate and Jelly Babies as his flavor which I would have had a hard time with too. Jack renounced his chocolaty ways and ran off to play in the playground. Five minutes later he was eating chocolate off the ground.

People Watching.

Jack and I spend a lot of time at the park. Jack loves the park, it's certainly in the top three of preferred destinations on a Monday morning. Normally 2 hours at the park means 1 hour and 55 minutes on the swing and 5 minutes trying to go on everything else as quickly as possible before we leave.

Jack people watches while on the swing, I think that's the main reason he likes it so much. Jack is very inquisitive and I think that other people, especially children fascinate him. While the other kids run around and try to kill each other, Jack sits quietly on the swings and observes and makes little comments to me about what he thinks. Normally it's little things like, "That boy's got a scooter, I've got a scooter at home." etc.

One time the park was empty except for us and a mother a daughter of about the same age. The mother was struggling to control the little girl and Jack found it truly fascinating. The mother would stop her daughter from doing something a little dangerous but the girl would simply try it again.
After a few minutes Jack turned to me and said. "Daddy, that girl isn't doing as she's told."
"No she's not." I replied.
"I always do as I'm told."
"Not always."
"Yes I do I'm a big boy."
"I'll remember you said that."
The mother and daughter carried on in the same way. The struggle moved over to the slide where the girl kept trying to climb up it the wrong way. The mother scolded her over and over again for it to which Jack said, "Daddy, that girl doesn't listen."

Jack loves when another child takes up the swing next to us. Jack will insist on swinging the same direction and frequency of the other child so that he can maximize his time getting to know them. He cheerfully introduces himself and gives a brief overview of what he is and what he's doing. "Hi, I'm Jack. I'm a boy and I'm on the swing." the conversation varies depending on the child but it usually encompasses the subjects of 'being a boy', 'this is my daddy', 'this is my toy' and 'what have you got'.

Jack learned some jargon one of the last times we were on the swing. The little boy on the swing asked his dad for an 'Uppit', his dad obliged and caught the swing in mid swing. Jack immediately demanded an Uppit of his own and has since worked it in as a regular swinging maneuver.