Thankful Alex

Right now, Alex is all about two things: birthday parties and Christmas. He wants every day to be one of these two days, and pretty much views all other days as simple days designed to move us that much closer to one or the other. He's been at a lot of birthday parties lately and tells us -- not what he *wants* as a birthday gift, but what kind of party he wants. It varies, and usually reflects the last party we went to... Tranformers, Peter Pipers, bowling, etc.

He also knows that Christmas, like Halloween, is special, but sometimes gets confused on the differences. For example, he told me that for Christmas he was going dressed as a dinosaur, and when I asked him what he wanted for Christmas, he replied "a knight in shining armor" (his Halloween costume).

On Thanksgiving morning, Alex and I were watching the Macy's parade and he asked if it was Christmas.
"No," I said. "Christmas isn't until the end of the month."
"I want it to be Christmas," he said.
"Well," I said, "one of the neat things about Christmas is anticipating it, and planning for it and decorating for it. Today is Thanksgiving."
"Thanksgiving?" he asked?
"On Thanksgiving," I explained, "we think of all the people we know and love, and all the things we have and can do, and think about how lucky we are to have them all. That's what it means to be thankful."
He thought for a minute and replied. "I'm thankful it is almost Christmas!"

As we watched the parade, he brought out his pouty face and said, "I've *never* met Santa!" Then, when Santa ended the parade, he said, "oooohhh, Santa!" and had a big smile. So, I figured that visiting Santa and sitting on his lap and talking about Christmas would be a big deal.

While I am in Atlanta, Daddy took the boys to see Santa. Evidently, Alex really didn't care. In fact, having to actually *spend time* with Santa while taking a photo took him away from his primary directive of riding the Christmas train. I wonder if he told the train what he wanted for Christmas?