Train Fanatic times infinity

Ok, Tornado Boy is the epitome of a train fanatic. He pretty much eats, breathes, sleeps trains. We are WAY past the Thomas train stage....he now is into the electric HO and O scale trains and of course riding the real things. We hit one of his major to do items while we were in Washington, DC - we rode the only high-speed train in the US - the Acela...his next item is to fly to Chicago and ride the Empire Builder all the way to Seattle. He has actually learned a History lesson concerning the Empire Builder and the man who "built" the route - James J. Hill...pretty cool stuff....anyways...back to trains.



We were very much buried under trains here at home....he is the proud owner of an O and HO scale train along with miles of Geo-Track set ups, a new Lego train set up and a Playmobile train set up. These things pretty much take up the entire floor...or should I say house!!! So, tornado boy came up with the idea of selling off all of his old Thomas Train collection (he had a HUGE amount of items) and old toys he doesn't use in order to raise money to redo his playroom and build an elevated track system for his HO scale train. Quite a mature plan for a 6 year old! Who would have thought that Thomas train items would sell like hot cakes and lo and behold, we raised more than enough money to paint, put furniture and build the track layout. Tornado Boy had everything "mapped out" in what order things needed to be accomplished.....



Step 1: Paint.....he picked the colors after switching between blue and orange and then back to blue again (THANK YOU- just couldn't imagine day-glo orange painted on all 4 walls) and painting one wall with magnetic paint so he can hang up his works of art on the wall with no more pin marks. His beloved Polar Express poster and CSX transportation map finally have a spot.


His other beloved map - railroads of the continental united states is TOO huge for the room and will stay in his bedroom.
Step 2: get furniture including his own large desk for current work and art projects
Step 3: build track supports and track along the top of the ceiling to elevate his HO scale trains. This was interesting since my husband and I are the most "UN-builder-like" people in the world....but we pulled it off with everything actually being level!!



We are only missing new wood floors (hopefully will go in within the next year or so- VERY yucky old carpet is just blech!). I also want to paint some mural items along the track line over time - mountains, buildings, trees....so there is scenary along the track line. Tornado Boy has it in his head for future train plans for his O scale train....to cut a hole in the wall to run the track from his playroom through into his bathroom and then cut another hole in the wall through to his bedroom and run the train through and then around the top of his bedroom walls. This is do-able but the thought of punching holes in the walls is a wee bit intimidating to us...but it would mean NO more tripping on trains on the floor!

First Airplane Flight - to DC

I haven't had a chance to post in what seems like forever! We all got a really nasty cold and then our family vacation came up and finally things have slowed down a little bit so I can get back to blogging!!! Tornado Boy LOVED Washington, DC! It was his first airplane flight and this was such a GIANT step for him! With all of his Sensory issues, we were so proud of how he handled the whole flight and he really enjoyed it! Of course Manny the Manatee had to ride with us on the plane!

Eating could be interesting sometime but he was a real trooper and we found several places where he was able to eat and even try some new things. He even got to eat at an icon in DC - a place called Ben's Chili Bowl.

We hit just about everything you could possibly hit in a week and had so much fun! I will say, anyone heading to DC, bring comfortable shoes! Tornado Boy had so many awesome experiences that there were too many to list. I will tell you one thing...he has to be the only 6 year old that had the Washington, DC Metro map memorized in less than 2 days. Strangers would mumble to themselves on the metro about how they didn't know how to get to so-and-so and Tornado boy would pipe up and give exact, detailed directions while they listened on with jaws dropped.


I will have to say the top highlight of the trip for him is the surprise we gave him. He is a train fanatic and is in love with the Acela High Speed train...he even has an HO version of the train at home. We went to Union Station and surprised him with a trip to Baltimore and back on the Acela. He was in HEAVEN. The price was absoltuely ridiculous for 30 minutes one way and 30 back and he was the ONLY child on both trips but he loved every second of it. He brought the GPS onboard and clocked the train going 127 mph. I laugh again, how many kids want to bring a GPS onboard any vehicle in order to clock the speed? So he can officially say that he rode the only high speed train in the United States. His next trip he wants to take is the Empire Builder route from Chicago to Seattle.


He really enjoyed the Postal Musuem and got a kick out of seeing statues of Ownie the dog...he is the official mascot of the postal service way back when and would hope board trains and planes and travel the world with the US mail. Tornado Boy learned about Ownie through one of his All About Trains videos he used to watch so he was excited to see Ownie.



We also took a ride down the C&O Canal in an old boat much like they did in the
1870's. It was super cool seeing how the locks worked on the canal and being pulled my mules was kind of neat!



Of course we had to go see the Air and Space Museum and the Museum of Natural History.


Both were super crowded and I was so proud of Tornado boy enduring the noise level. About half way through the Museum of Natural History, he asked for his special headphones to help block out the sounds echoing off the walls of the museum. He really enjoyed seeing all of the animals at the Natural History museum.



We visited all of the monuments and he filled up his entire National Park's Passport book for the DC area.


We REALLY enjoyed visiting Rock Creek Park where he worked for several hours and earned another Junior Ranger pin and badge. He completed the whole Junior Ranger workbook and collected a bag of trash and was SO proud when the ranger pledged him in. This is his third Junior Ranger Patch that he has earned and he worked SO hard.


The park was beautiful and it was hard to believe that something so serene and calm was in the midst of a bustling place like DC!



Of course we can't forget our visit to the National Zoo! We picked a great day to go visit...it was rainy and hardly anyone was there...we came prepared with our umbrellas and it was great.

The Pandas were so special!!!



We were super sad to leave but it is always nice to come home! We said that he is ready now for a trip to see Mimi and Papa WAY over in New Zealand....our next family adventure :-)

Happy Cheese Dance

All I can say is YIPPEEEE, we have ONE new item added to Tornado Boy's PICKY list of acceptable foods! There is hope...and the clouds parted and there was light!Picture...mom doing the happy dance...yeah booyah, yeah booyah!

We are planning a trip to Washington, DC in a couple of weeks and we are all excited but, Tornado Boy's SPD dietary "wants" make traveling very interesting....he is pretty limited to what he eats and 99% of his choices are not normally found in most restaurants....food is either too yucky, too smooshy, too salty, too sour, too hot, too spicy....on and on...the joy of SPD! So we talked about making a deal...he said he would be willing to try one new food a week so that maybe we could try some new restaurants while we were in DC. So this week's new food was...tada.....grilled cheese (with the crusts off of course)....and YES it was a HIT. We had tried it a year ago and it was spit out with lots of "yucks" and gags followed after...and this from a child who would consume an entire bag of cheese sticks each day if he was allowed. Well, for some strange reason today(I will not look a gift horse in the mouth)it was "great" and "yummy" and was devoured in under 20 seconds AND more was asked for. YIPPEEE - Grilled Cheese is probably one of the most popular items on kid's menus so DC here we come.....next week - Macaroni and Cheese - keep your fingers crossed!!

Tornados DO grow up

How sad......I am one of those moms that wants to enjoy their child for as long as possible and don't want them to grow up.....but, it seems Tornadoes do grow up :-( How do I know this? This week, I was called into the bathroom by a very frightened, very concerned yell from Tornado Boy. I went into the bathroom and found my little guy completely upset with this look of fear and awe on his face. Daddy was in there with him and he asked me to "check it out" because he wasn't entirely sure. I was very confused at first until Tornado boy opened up his mouth and pointed to his bottom tooth. He looked up at me with this face of confusion and said, "I think its wiggling". We have read stories in the past about the Tooth Fairy visit and had explained the whole process of his baby and adult teeth so it wouldn't be a total shock when the time finally came.

Well....looks like the time has come....my tornado is growing up and I can't stop time like I had SO hoped for.

So, he is no longer totally wigged out - according to him he is 50% scared and 50% excited and every day now, he has a system....he calls it his wiggle time - where he takes his finger and wiggles his loose tooth....a wiggle in the morning, a wiggle after lunch and a wiggle before bed. Anyone have a secret on how to stop little boys from growing up? The tooth fairy will be visiting our house soon unless there are any secret methods anyone wants to pass on :-)

Never Under Estimate Tornados!

My husband and I had one of those "duh" moments last week when we purchased something for tornado boy. We both had no idea why we didn't think of it sooner...especially since it is pretty much what my husband does all day. It makes me ponder just how many other things I just think, "nah, that's too advanced" or "that looks too difficult" would catch his fancy.




I introduced a Circuit Kit to him in a local store and his interest was peeked immediately. So the introduction to building circuits began. This kit was right up his alley - it came with a step by step book with 101 circuits to build. To my complete astonishment, he was so fascinated and taken by them that he literally went through all 101 experiments in under 2 days. He spent the entire day with hardly any breaks going from one experiment to another.



It was so cool seeing a new passion spring out and see his face light up when he began to just mess with the circuits to try to make his own ideas. My husband was able to explain to him how each circuit experiment worked and he was honestly understanding it because the next day when Daddy was at work and I asked him to explain his current circuit he was working on, he blurted it out so matter of factly like he had known about circuits all his life.



Well, after 2 days, the exploration began with him building his own ideas but he noticed on the back of one of the flyers that there were BIGGER kits (which he so slyly pointed out to me). Daddy went online and found the grand daddy of circuit kits complete with a computer program so you could build some on the computer and ordered it for him. For the next several days all we kept hearing...."is it here yet?", "how many more days", "I'm SO excited"....until the box arrived. Man was this thing HUGE! Tornado Boy's eyes about popped out of his head when he saw all the cool stuff that came with it! So off he went working on the 300+ experiments that came with this box. NEVER, EVER under estimate a tornado!

10 Favorite Things About Living in Florida

We have done so many eco-adventures over the past few days that I just had to do a 10 favorite things about living in Florida!


1. We went to Cape Canaveral National Seashore to hang out at the beach and got to see the two shuttles both poised on their launchpads.



2. Here is a beautiful Zebra butterfly we saw while out exploring



3. We went on a Manatee finding mission yesterday and came across this cool canal filled with tons and tons of.....turtles!




4. One of the pretty views on our two mile hike through Turkey Creek Sanctuary



5. This fat little guy has had one too many peanuts fed to him!!


6. A view of our backyard - we had so many doves camped out.


7. Tornado Boy's butterfly garden he planted last year - it's now in full bloom.



8. We took an eco-boat trip this weekend and explored the Indian and Banana rivers - we saw several dolphins and one manatee hump :-)



9. A view of the sunset from our front window looking across the street. I swear the sky turned 10 different colors in a matter of a view minutes.


10. The angry Florida Sky right before a hail storm




I know there are many times where I moan and complain about living in Florida because for 99% of the year it is usually hot and humid and I miss having real seasons....but these 10 pics quiet the whining!

The newfound joy of Orienteering

A compass and a map are like Tornado Boy's favorite accessories....so begins the sport of Orienteering into our lives. I know that we enjoy geocaching - but it isn't "exciting" enough for our little guy so a friend told me about Orienteering. Let's just say Tornado Boy fell in love with it hook, line and sinker! We found a group that is about an hour away and they host a monthly Orienteering outing at different locations around the central part of the state. They offer all kinds of levels and certificates for the kids for completing a course. So last weekend, we decided to jump in head first and see what all the fuss was about. This group had a permanent course set up in a beautiful county park and we decided to tackle it before trying a group meet.

For those who don't know what Orienteering is about - basically you get a topographical map, a compass and you have to find your way from one "control" or marker to another until you find all of them and complete the course. So you are wandering deep into woods and forested areas trying to find the best route from marker to marker by reading the topo map. You learn what all the sections of the topographical map mean - higher areas/wooded areas/scrub areas/water.....and people compete all across the country to see who can complete courses the fastest. So the main gist...you get lost in the woods and find your way from checkpoint to checkpoint to learn how not to get lost in the woods.

My little guy was totally engrossed in this whole event and we had an absolute blast wandering through beautiful wooded areas. He was really, really good at finding his way on the map and locating the markers. We finished the course in 58 minutes and will be going back next weekend to complete the advanced course and then in May they have a large meet at another park that we hope to join.

While we were out wandering we came across the most unreal animals! We heard tons of birds, saw a rare fox squirrel, watched a "shnafalo" (armadillo) sniffle his way around, and then the best part of all - Tornado Boy was at a marker and looked up and thought he saw a bird but then figured out it wasn't a bird. It was this magnificent, giant owl way up in a tree. He was so pretty and just watched us as we putzed through the woods. When we showed the ranger a picture he said it was an immature barred owl and he was just as excited as we were and wanted to know where we spotted him so he could go look at him. I can't believe he was considered "immature" and that he was going to grow larger!

So for those families who love getting lost in the woods - you should see if you have any local Orienteering groups around your area - at least with my little tornado around I know I will never get lost in the woods!

The Life of a Squirrel

OK - we have this squirrel that has been part of our family for quite some time. He showed up when we of course placed the "squirrel" feeders in the yard (I mean come on folks, we would be lying if we called them bird feeders since the poor birds are usually left with nothing after Sir Squirrel gets his fill). I am convinced it is the same squirrel - but who knows! This goofy squirrel likes to play a game of taking mouth fulls of food and then hanging upside down on our screened in porch and eating. He(or she) pretty much devours anything in sight and will gorge himself every day. His daily schedule consists of...eating, lounging, eating, eating some more, lounging in the sun, eating....What a life!
He has a habit of "lounging" throughout the day all over Tornado Boy's playground set like he is king of the yard. At night, I have found that the little guy has a nest in one of our palm trees up front. Tornado Boy always gets a kick out of the crazy squirrel antics complete with the squirrel flicking his tail at Mach-10 all while making this "wha, wha, whaaaaaaa" sound while being suction cupped to the screen.
Tornado Boy loves messing around with my Microsoft Publisher and with my help we put a book together a few years ago called, "The Squirrel Ate the Sandbox".


I'd like to be a squirrel just for a few hours!

The Invasion Has Begun!

Well, we have finally broken down and joined the millions of other families across the world and are now proud owners of......tah dah....the Wii. It all started with my hubby's Nintendo DS - he has it to help with stress relief in the office and once Tornado Boy saw it and what it does, he confiscated it from Daddy. Daddy then was without his DS and ended up having to go out and get Tornado Boy his own DS. Well, we usually rent DS games instead of buying them and Tornado Boy and I kept noticing all the cool Wii games for rental. We had been talking about it for quite some time...we were even surprised to learn that one set of our Grandparents had the system. We are not into many of the games that are out where you have to battle or use weapons and "fight"...and Tornado boy seems more into race and logic games which is fine with us. Well, Hubby surprised all of us by coming home with one yesterday. Tornado Boy was fit to be tied! They had it set up in no time and we all looked like crazy maniacs bopping and hopping around the living room (I don't want to know what we looked like through a window if someone could have seen us). Who knew that you could flip hamburgers and feed them to a hungry walrus - or whatever that freaky animal was supposed to be on Raving Rabbids - and I quickly found out that I have NO rhythm when it came to dancing along with lunatic rabbids. I am now being introduced to the Mario race terms - chain chomper, mean mushrooms, and bullet bills :-)

Needless to say, Tornado Boy was COMPLETELY on sensory overload by the end of the night and had a complete meltdown come bed time. But we knew it was coming - I mean what do you expect - Christmas in April! We will need to learn some tricks on how to let him play Wii but counter-balance the over sensory input.....we also will need to figure out some tactics on how to deal with his UNDYING perfectionistic issues that leave him angry or upset because he "just missed" getting a new time record or winning.


Tornado Boys fell asleep with this comment....."mommy, wouldn't it be the coolest if they made a Tornado Intercept game for the Wii?" He and daddy programmed their own Tornado Intercept computer game using the super cool kids programming program - Scratch which is made by MIT...who knows, maybe he will make his own Wii game! Here is the Scratch site for anyone else out there with their own little programmers - and best of all - it's FREE!

http://scratch.mit.edu/

You Ever Have One of Those Moments?

I know, stupid question to ask other mom's of 2e Tornado children....but, do you ever have one of those moments that just makes you smack your head and think what in the world is up with this child? I had one of those moments tonight....

.....we have recently set up this really cool camera/Internet connection with Tornado Boy's grandparents in South Carolina where we can all sit down at the computer and talk for as long as we want for FREE! No more long distance phone calls....you just need a camera on the computer, speakers and download the software and viola...we can all see and hear each other...pretty cool huh?

UNLESS, your child has chosen that time to be as totally spastic and bananas as can possibly be to the point that you have NO idea who in the world this kid is! My little tornado child decided he wanted to be a full flown EF5 tornado and rip through the entire area in under a second, screaming at the top of his lungs, showing a million items on the camera to grandma/grandpa and just acting like a total SPAZ! The icing on the cake though is when the little hooligan decided to show his grandparents his lovely new camo underwear (yes, we were running around in just a shirt and undies...his favorite attire it seems) and then he took it a step further and pulled his undies down and totally MOONED his grandparents! ACKKKKKKKKK!!! As my husband put it, "it doesn't get any better than that now does it?"

The Life and Times of living with a tornado!

Earth Hour Family Fun

I am so proud of my little tornado boy. Yesterday, when I explained to him what Earth Hour was about he wanted to know if other people on our street knew about this. I told him that I didn't know and then asked him what did he think we could do to let them know. He helped me make up a little flyer explaining what it was and then he very proudly went to some of the neighbors on our street and told them about Earth Hour. Tonight at 8:30, all of our lights went off and all computers and for the whole hour we played a board game by candlelight. Near the end, we took a flashlight walk down the street and he thought it was so neat to see our next door neighbors all sitting in their front room with candles and several other people he had spoken too with their lights off. He asked if we could do Earth Hour all the time instead of once a year and we all thought that was a really cool idea....so we are thinking about doing our own Earth Hour once or twice a month where we just turn off the electronics/lights for an evening and just enjoy each other by candlelight.

I know that a lot of people honestly feel that global warming is a joke or a myth made up by our government....and maybe some of the hype has gotten extreme...but I believe that we have been really rough on the Earth and that it can only take so much before we see damage that can't be undone. So, here in our little town in Florida, we proudly participated in Earth Hour in hopes of sharing our voice about concern for Mother Earth.

Earth Hour this Saturday

My family will be participating in the Earth Hour Saturday. Basically, Earth Hour is a simple movement, for one hour on Saturday 28th of March, everyone on the planet is asked to make a small sacrifice, turn off unnecessary appliances and lights at 8:30pm local time. I was fascinated to read that something like 85 countries around the world have agreed to participate by attempting to curb electricity usage. From what I have researched, Earth Hour began in Sydney, Australia in 2007 and I commend them for starting this. In this day and age, I honestly believe that we have done some serious damage to Mother Earth and all of us need to try to do things on a daily basis to help.
On the Earth Hour website they share,


" This year, Earth Hour has been transformed into the world’s first global election, between Earth and global warming.

For the first time in history, people of all ages, nationalities, race and background have the opportunity to use their light switch as their vote – Switching off your lights is a vote for Earth, or leaving them on is a vote for global warming. WWF are urging the world to VOTE EARTH and reach the target of 1 billion votes, which will be presented to world leaders at the Global Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen 2009.

This meeting will determine official government policies to take action against global warming, which will replace the Kyoto Protocol. It is the chance for the people of the world to make their voice heard.

We all have a vote, and every single vote counts. Together we can take control of the future of our planet, for future generations.

VOTE EARTH by simply switching off your lights for one hour, and join the world for Earth Hour.

Saturday, March 28, 8:30-9:30pm."

I hope that other families will take part in this across the world and stand up for Mother Earth!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CRs-7lRlPo

Secret Codes Anyone?

Tornado Boy is very intrigued by secret codes and how you can mess around with numbers. Awhile back, he came up with a game that he was Willy Wonka and his playroom was the chocolate factory and he had daddy help draw out a picture of a keyboard with all the numbers on it. When he wanted to go into his playroom, he "entered" the secret code onto his keyboard paper (that was taped to the front of the door) and he was "allowed" to enter. Of course the secret code was only for him and daddy...no mommys allowed. I can recall many, many games that involved using a secret code of some kind. He likes seeing books or papers that have a special code on it and you have to use a code sheet to decipher it. I think this love of "codes" or unusual ways of labeling things began way back. When he was 4, he noticed that some clocks had "weird numbers" on them and when we explained that those were Roman Numerals he instantly wanted to learn what all the symbols were and what numbers went with each symbol. Same goes for daddy's Scientific calculator. He LOVED exploring calculators. When most kids start to get bored, the parents pull out some kind of toy out of their purse....well our toy was the calculator. We have gone through 2 calculators that I know of just because the numbers were rubbed off from so much exploring and use. On daddy's scientific calculator he noticed all the unusual keys and he was given an impromptu introduction about binary numbers and complex numbers and he was completely fascinated that there was a whole world out there involving things other than the "normal" number system.

Last week, I noticed that Tornado Boy had a pretty quiet day and had started to bounce off the walls a bit by late afternoon. Not enough sensory input for his SPD....so I got a little creative and took his old Thomas Train table and flipped the top over, used an oversized storage bin and dumped some play sand we had into the bin and viola...instant sand box. I gave him some of his sand toys and a collection of tiny plastic cups and he very happily fed his sensory input need by digging in the sand. Daddy came home and stayed outside with Tornado boy while I started dinner. Things got very quiet.....hmmmmmm....a little leery, I peeked my head out the garage door and was totally mystified by what they were doing.

Secret Codes strike again.....Tornado boy had worked out some kind of secret code language and had daddy write it out in the sand and according to what code was written, it let him know how many small plastic cups of sand to fill for daddy's sand "order". Daddy ran with the whole idea and the two of them came up with a seriously complicated code system. I had NO idea what any of it meant and when I asked, Tornado boy looked at me so matter of factly and explained what each part of the secret code meant. Daddy would write his sand order down in code and Tornado boy had to decipher it and make the sand order. I was honestly blown away with the complexity of their game and he completely understood every aspect of it! In the picture you will see the code before it evolved to a more complex one....the first number - 6 means how many plastic cups to fill with sand, the second one - R means regular (or S for stacked) - regular meant the cups were "delivered" individually, stacked meant that they were "delivered" by stacking the cups on top of each other, the third one - O with a line over it, lets him know to over fill each cup with sand...if the O had a line right at the top that meant to level the sand off at the top of the cup, if it had a line in the middle of the O that meant half a cup of sand (and you could not "order" stacked delivery with the over-filled method - those are the rules)....the last one - G meant Grind (and N for no grind) and basically meant Tornado boy pretended to grind the sand with his hands. Daddy informed me that it grew more and more complex and involved other codes like T for delivery by train, B for delivery by boat amongst other special order descriptions.

They sat and played that game for almost 2 hours and Tornado boy had to be pulled away crying when it came time to come in for dinner. Who knows...future work at the CIA? FBI? Nah....just a very happy, very smart little boy who loves to mess around with symbols and numbers and keep what he is doing a secret!

Unusual pet for an unusual family

Ok.....we took the plunge and bought a new critter for Tornado Boy. I have spent most of my life being surrounded by warm purries and I lost my last cat, Pookie, of 18 years last year. My little guy loved Pookie and it was a very hard loss. It's hard to believe that a warm purry was by my side for 18 years and I miss her dearly. The sad thing is that little boy is allergic to dogs and cats. Due to Pookie's Diabetes, daily shots, and her age we could not bare to place her in another home when we found out he was allergic. So when she passed we have been having animal withdrawal because we can't get most "normal" animals. After much research, we came to the conclusion that "pin cushions" were safe allergy-wise for tornado boy and we took the plunge yesterday. He went and picked out the one he wanted and gleefully took him home. Our new Hedgehog is properly named "Perry the Platypus Hedgie" after the silly platypus on Phineas and Ferb. He is SO cute and NOT so cuddly but he has a great temperament. He lay sleeping in a shirt on Tornado boy in bed last night while he got his stories read and little boy looked up and so earnestly asked, "can he snuggle with me all night long". Um....no.....I don't think you would like to roll over onto a pin cushion in the middle of the night and I don't think Perry would appreciate it!
So it is a perfect fit....a very unusual pet for a very unusual family!

We Come Up With the Strangest Games!

I am proud to share that we have quite an unusual household. If anyone could be a fly on a wall they would be left scratching their head asking, "what in the world are they doing?" Tornado Boy comes up with some really creative games and this one has to be at the top! I honestly have no idea how this whole thing started.....but he came up with his own way to teach skip counting all while playing delivery car service with his remote control car. We have these strange little glass "pucks" (as he calls them)...but I think they are used in flower arrangements or decoration in glass containers. He came up with a very confusing game where I take the white pucks...they are considered payment... and he takes the different colored blue ones. We each get an old cell phone (they don't work anymore) and I put in a call to the delivery service (tornado boy and his remote control car) and let him know how many blue pucks I would like for delivery. This is where it gets confusing....He made up his own order chart and had me write it down for him (as you can see in the pic above)....1 blue puck costs 5 white pucks, 2 blue pucks costs 10 white pucks...all the way up to a super wuper shmuper load which costs 500 white pucks. Well obviously we don't have 500 pucks so he came up with the idea that the white pucks can change their values to one puck being worth 5, 10, or 100...so for the heaviest load, I would send him 5 pucks which would be equal to 5x100.
So the game goes on with me "calling" in an order on the cell phone to him at the other side of the hallway or room and telling him what size order I want. Then, he loads in the appropriate amount of pucks into a plastic bag and places it on the back of his remote control car and sends it on its way over to me on the other side. I unload my order and I put in my correct payment of white pucks and push the car back to him....and the orders continue until he gets bored and moves onto something new.
I have NO idea where this whole thing came from but he came up with every part of it all by himself....throughout the week, Tornado boy comes up with complicated games like this one almost on a daily basis.......at least we are never bored!!!