Swords

Can a boy have too many swords? If you ask the boy, no. If you ask his housemates, YES! Swords encourage (demand) loud, rambunctious play. The boys chase each other everywhere screaming and making way more noise than seems necessary. We have a firm rule that you cannot strike anything with your sword other than another sword. Nonetheless occasionally overzealous play leads to bad choices that lead to the swords being confiscated which leads to angry protests. We'd throw the swords away, but that's not going to solve the real problem which is high levels of boy energy.

The boys each have short foam swords, two types of long foam swords, a plastic sword (like in the picture above--Jake has two plastic swords), and, of course, they both have made a sword from paper and cardboard.

We have to keep the swords in a safe location because the cat, too, likes swords. He gnaws on the foam ones. It traumatizes the boys. I tell them that a few "nicks" in their swords only add to the sword's authenticity; it's battle-scarred. They don't agree.

Given Bentley and Jake's love of swords and knight costumes, do you think we could convince them to be knights for Halloween? Sadly, no. Next I tried to convince them that a knight, a dragon, and a princess would be a super cute trio, but they did not catch my vision.