The Star Wars Gene

My kids have become obsessed with STAR WARS and there isn't much anyone can do about it. You see, Star Wars blood runs in my wife's side of the family. My brother-in-law is a huge Star Wars fan. He's been one since he was knee-high to an Ewok. My step-son Joey is also a huge Star Wars fan, and my two nephews are also huge Star Wars freaks! So, it was inevitable that no matter how much Disney I force fed down their throats, it was all going to take a back seat to Star Wars.

It all started shortly after Christmas. My nephews, who are slightly older than my kids, got a Playstation 2 for Christmas. Being the huge Star Wars fans that they are, they got a game known as LEGO STAR WARS for Christmas also. Lego Star Wars is a video game version of the Star Wars films all rendered in the style of Lego building blocks and with the violence and tone watered down for little kids. While Elias and Tanner were at their nephew's house one day they watched their nephews play Lego Star Wars. That's where it all began. For the next few days, Elias begged me to go to Aunt Karen's house to play Lego Star Wars. He kept asking me all kinds of questions about Star Wars and was just trying to figure out any way at all to get to his Aunt's house and play this video game. Tired of hearing about this game all the time, I figured we'd just go buy it and then it would all die out in about a week or so. That's where I was wrong, and that's where I made a great mistake!
The instruction booklet to Lego Star Wars has been carried all over this house as if it were a security blanket. "Dad, can we play Lego Star Wars now?" is uttered at least three times a day. The power of the Lego game has not died out. I've kept the video game time to a minimum but the Star Wars obsession has spilled over to toys, books and of course the movies.

They now make Star Wars figures for preschoolers. They are small chubby little figures, just the right size for little hands and they don't have parts that easily break. And yes, they also sell a line of spaceships for the little figures to fly in. And of course there's the lightsabers. Elias wanted some new lightsaber that changes colors real bad. He asked the mall Easter Bunny for one and it turns out the Easter Bunny is a big Star Wars fan and pretty much promised the kids all kinds of Star Wars stuff for Easter. So, we passed on all the candy and had a VERY Star Wars Easter at our house. The boys both got new lightsabers and they each got a ship with some figures. (In case you're wondering, Elias got a Podracer and Tanner got the Millennium Falcon.)

It continues...at the library we discovered that they had a whole shelf of kids Star Wars books. Needless to say, I've read "Luke's Fate" and "Anakin's Race For Freedom" about 50 times each in the last week. And there's the movie, which Tanner saw once and Elias has seen a handful of times. Elias is already quoting it and talking about things in the movie that only people camping outside of a movie theatre should know about.

Here's an exchange after a discovery at his cousin's house:
Elias: Did you know Burger King had a Star Wars Happy Meal?
Me: Yes
Elias: Why didn't you take me there to get one?
Me: Because they had it before you were even born.
Elias: Well, you could have got me one and saved it for me.

With a new Star Wars movie set to come out this summer, I'm sure the Force will be strong in our house. In fact, the new movie hits theatres the week before Elias' birthday. Guess what kinds of paper plates and napkins I'll be buying?