I’ll admit it.  I’m a little neurotic about some of my kids’ toys.  I want them to be surrounded by soft, fuzzy things, too big to swallow and perfect for them to play with when nobody’s watching.

Give them a lollipop or a marker without a cap on it, and, for me, it adds a Hitchcock movie-like element of danger to the whole scene.

So, I was a little concerned when my two-year-old and 5-month old sons were presented their party favors from this weekend’s birthday celebration:  jump ropes.

Awesome.  Though it will be years before either of them have the dexterity necessary to jump rope, they now have their very own rope, that they can swing around, wrap around certain parts of their anatomy, or do whatever else their little imaginations tell them to do.

I rummaged around the house before we left it, and managed to get my hands on the list of possible party favors, apparently rejected in favor of jump ropes:

• chocolate-covered magnets
• my first boa constrictor
• pellet gun
• asbestos factory lego set
• Go, Diego, Go poultry shears
• Little Einstein petri dish; with bonus sneeze