Yesterday, I took the day off and took my wife to SM to buy stuff for our baby. Our baby turns six months tomorrow, so we wanted to buy some stuff that would help stimulate his senses. We had a real good time trying out all the toys at Toy Kingdom. I tried a lot of the toy instruments. Electric guitars, violins and trumpets, pianos, etc. A surprising number of them played classical music.

There was a wide assortment of stuffed toys. We saw bedtime dolls that played "Hush little baby, don't you cry...", most of them pricey Mickey and Minnie dolls from Disney. There were a lot of Winnie the Pooh toys too. I played around with a plush doll made in the image of Blue, that cute inquisitive dog of Blue's Clues fame. When you squeezed the doll's tummy the ears would go up, just like in the show. Cute! I also picked up the usual stuffed characters and showed them to my wife, often trying hard to mimic the voices to get a laugh or two from her. It worked quite well with Mojo Jojo and Taz. One of the salesladies even smiled when she saw me sneaking up on my wife, a Wile E. Coyote doll in my hands. She muffled her giggles of delight when she turned to face me. My wife likes the Looney Tunes. Who wouldn't? We grew up with them We're the generation that had TV's for nannies after all. Her absolute L.T. fave would be Marvin.

On the next aisle, I found 6 inch-high Teletubby stuffed toys. I picked each one up and smiled. I'm fond of these characters. They remind me of the 2 short years that I took care of my nephew. Dylan was my dear dead brother's son. He was born a few months after my brother died. It was a joy to raise Dylan like he was my own son. My mother and I took turns caring for him when his mother took off and started a life of her own. Sad thing is his bitch of a mother spirited him away before his 2nd birthday. We haven't seen him since. Being the sentimental fool that I am, I wanted to buy one of the dolls. I put back the plush likeness of Po and told my wife he was my favorite. Letting go is so difficult.

We went around the aisles a bit more, reminiscing at the toys from our childhod that we missed. Matchbox here, Tonka toys there, a few Zoids thrown in for a good measure. After romping around like two overgrown kids, we settled on a Winnie the Pooh stacking toy and a set of those colorful rubber mats that had large alphabet cut-outs. This morning I placed the stack toy in his crib. It made me smile when my son stared at it and regarded it with awe. He must like the colors. I never thought Winnie the Pooh could ever make me happy.