Playmobil Poop Farm

You would think that buying presents for a five-year-old girl would be an easy task, but unfortunately Zoe despises most things that a typical five-year-old girl likes. Whenever we're in a store and she makes the horrid error of walking by Littlest Pet Shop, Polly Pocket, princess outfits, or Bratz dolls, she always says: "Look at all this junk. Who plays with this stuff? It's so stupid! Oooh, Xbox! Meet me over there!"

Before Christmas, we would occasionally torment her a little bit by picking up one of her wrapped presents, giving it a shake, and saying: "Hmm. This one sounds like it is definitely Barbie Fairy-Tastic Princess. Or maybe it's the Glamour Camper or Style Salon Playset!"

While her eyes filled with rage, she would yell: "No! Take it back! Barbie is junky! Please don't get me Barbies or Polly Pockets!"

Since we already have a house full of trucks, video games, sports equipment, Nerf guns, and board games, finding Christmas presents for her was a bit of a challenge. One thing that she loves is Playmobil, and since she already had the Horse Show set, I ordered the frighteningly elaborate Horse Farm.

The farm came complete with a large barn, a few horses, grooming accessories, trainers, hay, and even a barn cat to catch the barn mice! I couldn't wait to see her imagination at work, coming up with horse-themed scenarios and adventures. Charlie was nice enough to put most of the barn together, and also discovered that the playset came with plastic poop, and a shovel and pan to scoop it up. Once they started playing, sure enough every story line was based on which horse was pooping, where he was pooping, the sounds he made while pooping, and who stepped in the poop. Even the cat got in on the action by peeing on the plastic flowers.

The following day, when Zoe was playing with the barn by herself, I thought that maybe the novelty of the poop had worn off since the horse trainer dialogue seemed to include some words other than "poop." When I took a glance at the barn, I discovered that I couldn't have been more wrong:

Apparently, brown pony didn't like to be led around and told what to do by some bossy kid, so brown pony pooped. On bossy kid's face.

Even if some well-meaning relative makes the error of buying Zoe a Barbie Dream House in the future ("Because after all, Zoe's a girl, and all girls love Barbie!"), at least I know that there's one room of the pink palace that won't go to waste. Rather than Barbie spending hours in the bathroom primping in front of the mirror, though, she'll be sitting on the toilet.

While I was going through the pile of miniature plastic milk cartons, teeny tiny horse brushes, and plastic pails, and trying to figure out why there were an absurd number of "pieces required for assembly" leftover, I found a couple accessories that left me bewildered. I can identify the black barn cat and the carrots, but honestly, what the hell is the brown thing, and why would two of them be included with a Playmobil horse barn?

It Came With What?

Over the last week, my family has been a cornucopia of coughing, sore throats, fevers, one episode of barfing, H1N1, sneezing, and general discomfort. Somehow, though, I have managed to stay completely healthy despite the fact that I am constantly showered in a fine, sometimes chunky, mist of germs. It's been seven days of living in a drug-induced fog, and two of the kids have been on Motrin pretty consistently.

Zoe decided to make her medical encore in the form of an ear infection, so yesterday we finally decided to throw caution to the wind and, after fastening all of the buckles on our Hazmat suits, headed to the doctor's office.

The doctor confirmed her ear infection, pulled enough wax out of her ear to make a pillar candle (Q-tips don't fit into her petite ears. I've tried.), called in her prescription and sent us on our way.

We headed to Target to wait for the antibiotics, and I figured since the poor girl just endured a week of feeling like shit and then hearing me say "Don't touch anything or I'll have to cut your hand off" no fewer than 83 times at the clinic, I probably owed her a toy. She skipped happily to the toy department and, with frightening efficiency, chose a Playmobil equestrian playset. Since her brothers had also been sick, she picked out toys for them, too: a keychain and a microscopic Super Mario action figure.

When Zach and Charlie got home from school, she gave them their presents and waited for the thank-you's. Zach asked me if she got to pick out anything for herself, and I gestured over to the new Playmobil's. The boys walked over, looked down, and then looked at each other and started laughing. Charlie reached into the pile of plastic horse legs and fences and said... "Holy crap. It came with a whip!"