Mr. Hockey Lover, Tyler

I'm convinced that hockey is most likely the first thing Tyler thinks about when he wakes up and the last thing he thinks about when he goes to bed. He accosts Rick first thing as Rick walks in the door from work to play hockey with him. He has a few hockey videos that he wants to watch over and over. He's got four hockey jerseys and one hockey t-shirt that he wears throughout the day, switching them just like any child would who loves to play dress up. He has a table hockey game that he plays with for long periods of time. It's also called a rod hockey set, the kind where you control the players with rods. Yet Tyler prefers to concentrate of a few players with the puck and commentate. It's so darn cute.

All he wanted for Christmas we hockey cards. We asked him several times, "Tyler, what would you like for Christmas?" "Hockey cards." "Anything besides hockey cards?" "I want hockey cards." And hockey cards he got! We added to his already generous collection of them. He's got a three ring binder with plastic sleeves full of them. We find random cards all over our house. It's just a normal thing around here. You just expect it.

Then there are the hockey 'pages'. Rick ordered him a hockey merchandise catalog and Tyler LOVES it. I should say 'them' because we've ordered about six catalogs over the past several months since Tyler loves them to the point of destruction. I find torn and/or crumpled pages here and there and have to throw them away when he isn't looking. He will use the catalog as a reference point. More about reference points later.

He knows the logos of each team and can read them with just the word, no logo. He loves it when Rick plays hockey outside with him (boo on the fact that it gets dark too quickly),inside in the family room or out the garage. He incorporates non-hockey items into his hockey game. For example, he'll take the top of his plastic snare drum and use it as the ice for a game for his little plastic hockey players. He'll also use random balls if he can't find his little pucks. I love watching him pretend which almost always includes a comentery by him. He poses different playing positions in the glass in our entertainment center. Obviously this cracks me and Rick up.

The reference points I mentioned earlier crack us up the most. It took us a few months to figure out what he was doing. He'd set up all these things very neatly and play hockey around them in the family room or the garage. Some things he uses are: hockey cards, pages out of the hockey catalog, empty game cases from Rick's XBox, jerseys folded neatly so the logo shows (he folds them), shoes, or other random things. One day, it occurred to Rick that Tyler was using these items to represent the goals, boundaries, and other players. And perhaps the funniest part of that is Tyler gets annoyed if anyone should move one of his reference point. For example, I sat down in a chair and my foot accidentially moved a book (that likely represented a goal net) and he came up to me, moved the book back into place and said, "No, Mommy, no."

Gosh, I'm sure I've got to be leaving some things out but that pretty much covers it. Tyler is a funny kid and I love his love of hockey and the ideosyncricities that come along with it.