A man's home may be his castle but....

to my son, a dog kennel is his castle.

I spotted him as I passed by an upstairs window yesterday afternoon. I raced downstairs to get my camera and back upstairs to catch some pics on the sly. Honestly I was laughing so hard I'm surprised the pictures turned out so clear. He was just sitting in that kennel talking to himself but I was too high up and couldn't hear what he was saying. Then Aarica came out the back door and he turned to look at her, reached over and closed the kennel door as if to keep her out. It was so funny I couldnt' stop laughing. Eventually he got out of the kennel and ran across the yard - a boy on a mission, but by the time I got downstairs and outside he was back in there and quite happily posed for some closeups of him inside. He even answered a few quick interview questions (i like to get a glimps inside that mind of his every once in awhile. it's quite entertaining)

mom: Owen sweetie, what are you doing in the kennel?

owen: playing (duh!)

mom: Cool. Who are you today? a tiger, a bear - an armoured bear? (he's big on The Golden Compass right now and he wants to be an armoured bear)

owen: No. I'm Bowser and this is my castle. (I dont' think he get's it that Bowser - from MarioBros for those not Nintendo savy, is a badguy)

Whoever said tv and video games squash a childs creativity has never had a conversation with my son. He can play for hours like this. (Honestly, this was the longest I'd seen him since he got home from school 3hours earlier) He doesnt' necessarily have an imaginary friend like his brother did at his age but he makes up games and stories with all the characters from his favorite movies and tv shows and games. He's got quite the collection of 'friends' and they play some pretty interesting things together. Some days he's a tiger or a dog, some days he's an armoured bear or a MarioBros character or Ron Stopable or any number of characters.

Often times I find myself asking 'where does this kid get this stuff from' and i'll admit sometimes it's a spinoff of something he's seen on tv or a video game but other times it's straight out of that head of his. Last week he told me that he wouldn't be home on Friday because he was performing his Sword Dance in Montreal. He said it matter of factly, like it was no big deal. To him, Montreal is just a name he's heard (probably from hockey) so he know's it's an actual place he could go to and well the sword dance thing - that's just wishful thinking because the older dancers do one and he wants to be just like them. He's one funny little kid.