All I Want for Christmas

Casey, Mace and I spent the better part of the afternoon today at Rolly Pollies. Casey is a regular there and is under the mistaken impression that he owns it. I usually drop him off for his classes or open gym (and then go across the street to the Starbucks at Super Target), but I've been getting reports from the folks who work there that sometimes Casey and a friend of his are "a little rough" with each other.

[Note: For those of you who do not have children in the 3 to 7 age range anymore, when an employee or, even worse, owner, of a children's recreation facility -- i.e., someone who makes their living by you paying them money so that your child can play there every week for a set amount of time -- tells you that your child is "a little rough," it actually means that your child is beating the crud out of some other kid and/or vice versa. When you come in after the play period is over, and the employees are averting their eyes, but the owner is making a beeline for you to tell you that your child was "a little rough" with someone else, you need to be looking around to see who has a bloody nose or is missing chunks of hair.]

But I digress (sort of).

I decided to stay at open gym with Casey today so that I could observe how he plays with the friend. I observed that Casey tends to commandeer all the good play equipment for himself and his friend:

Just moments after snapping this picture, Casey and his friend started fighting over whether that big blue mat in the foreground was a wall (and had to remain standing up) or a bridge (and had to lay flat). The friend kept knocking the wall/bridge down ("IT'S A BRIDGE!") and Casey kept standing it up ("IT'S A WALL!!"). I intervened just before it came to actual blows, so Casey was standing on this side of the blue mat and the friend was up on top of the octagonal mat while I leaned in to say something to Casey (something very wise and motherly like, "stop yelling this instant or we're going home") when the whole thing came toppling over, pushing Casey into me, causing him to hit his cheek on my engagment ring. He fell apart and started crying like he had been stabbed in the eyeball. Finally I realized that he wasn't hurt (at all), and he was crying because his friend had destroyed the fort.

Apparently when I'm not there to head these things off, Casey and his friend each dissolve into tears and start shoving the other around over disagreements like these, which happen every 8 minutes. They seem to be a toxic mix as friends go, yet always want to play with each other. It's weird. So now I either have to always be at Rolly Pollies with Casey or we're picking out a new activity. Joe's leaning toward martial arts, but I'm thinking fencing -- he's very good with a light saber:

Mace had a great time at Rolly Pollies. He found a ball and did not let go of it for the full hour and a half that we were there:

Are noticing what I'm noticing about this picture? I can tell it's bothering you, but you don't want to say anything. You don't notice? Here I'll give you another hint:

I'll bet it's really bugging you in this one, too. It's killing me. Perhaps you're just being nice and refusing to see it. Let's just put it all out there:

Hmm. Can you guess what I want for Christmas?