Spaceship Train

Two Huggies boxes sit side by side, Gabe in one, Edie in the other. "Sheep Shane" Gabriel replies as he transports Edie and I on a ride through his imagination. Thanks to my wonderful toddler translating skills I know he and his sister are riding in a spaceship train. Gabe grasps the flaps of Edie's box ship and pulls her closer "Sis, sheep shane, Chooo Chooo". Edie Merely smiles at her brother, unsure of the game they are playing but ecstatic to be included none the less. Her brother's eyes take on a look of wonder as he points to some far off land in the distance, he glances at me - co pilot - "Home!" he states and off we go.

He grabs the flaps wings of his box spaceship train, manually manuevering them and stearing their ships to outerspace. "Vvvrrroooommmm", then he leans down and pushes some buttons in his huggies box cockpit. He and Edie zoom off to some alien landscape, giggling and smiling at eachother. After ten minutes of interstellar travel Edie loses her patience for the spaceship train game. Suddenly Edie stands up and Gabe panics. "SSSSIIIIISSSSSS DDDOOONN'TTTT DOWN!!!" he screams, while trying to push Edie into a sitting postion. We haven't docked!!! She's jettisoning from her space pod too soon! Edie tips her box spaceship, and crawls to safety. Gabe uprights the slightly damaged vehicle while shaking his head. Foolish move, he thinks, she could have been killed!

Gabe pushes some more buttons and raises the wings of his spaceship train. It's time to complete the journey home, with or without his sister. Then disaster strikes!! "A HOOOOO" he screams at me "uh oh". He jumps from his spaceship and runs to the desk interstellar docking station/trading post, desperately looking for some tape. I look at his space ship train and notice that "the hole" he's referring to is the handle for the diaper box...catastrophe...damage to the hull. Gabe runs back to his box ship, shrugging at me, the desk interstellar docking station/trading post has run out of tape, he'll have to make do with smoothing the flap down with his hand. He jumps back in and resumes his journey home.

But it's a long, arduous journey without any pit stops in between, and soon there's a puddle under Gabe's box and a look of disgust on his face. I grab a cloth and tell him that the box is dirty now and he has to get out so I can clean up, and just like that the spell is broken. He gets out of his box and sits on his potty...remembering what is supposed to happen when wearing big boy pants...but realizing now it's too late. His cockpit has to be thrown out much to his dismay and soon the spaceship train is all but a faded memory. Edie's box remains intact however, and soon the spaceship train becomes just a train, and I tie a string to the box steam engine, so he can pull around my tupperware his cargo. Hopefully this time Gabe's imagination will permit bathrooms on board so another box spaceship train isn't ruined!