As a kid, I always looked forward to making a Valentine’s box each year for school. It was one of those projects that would send my mind soaring and spark my creativity. There were no rules and no limitations, and our boxes weren’t graded. Technically all you needed to bring to school on Valentine’s Day was a boring shoebox with a slit cut in it to receive valentines and candy from classmates. Boring’s never been my thing.
One of the earliest Valentine’s boxes I can remember putting together (with the help of my mom, no doubt) was a mailbox. I remember making the curved top out of bent posterboard and glueing a red flag to to the side, announcing to the world that my box was “ready for mail!” One year I built an AT-AT (“a snow walker”) from Star Wars. Another year I built a big (over 2′ tall) robot that towered over the other kids’ puny shoeboxes with slits cut in them and hearts glued to them. Bow down to your robot master, kids. I will never forget the night mom and I built the robot Valentine’s box. I woke up the next morning and my dad had stacked cups, boxes and bowls in the shape of another robot and attached a sign that said, “I win!”
I was secretly looking forward to helping Mason with his Valentine’s box this year, and was starting to get nervous when he didn’t seem to know what I was talking about. We got no note about a party and he said he didn’t know anything about making a box. Fortunately, Thursday night we got the note that the kids were going to be making Valentine’s boxes. Sweet.
Early in the week I began brainstorming things that were “box shaped” and one of the earliest ideas I came up with was the Wii. It’s square, small, and white. That sounded easy to build, so I pitched the idea to Mason and he loved it. A couple of nights ago I poked around and found a box that was “reasonably-Wii-shaped” and brought it home. Thursday night, Susan covered the box with white paper and turned the project over to Mason and I.
Here’s the finished project, next to our own Wii (which we used as a model). Mason did all the work. All I did was point out where various things were (“You might want to add a power button,” stuff like that.) When we were done the box didn’t look that impressive so Mason suggested we make a Wiimote as well. I made the Wiimote out of spare strips of cardboard and duct-taped the thing together. After assembling it I wrapped it in a sheet of printer paper like a Christmas gift, and turned it over to Mason. Again, using a real remote as a guide, he went over the thing, drawing all the buttons and such. As a final touch we added a licorice strap.
(Mason pretending to play Wii.)
I don’t know if Mason’s school is having a contest or not, but even if they aren’t Mason had a good time decorating his box and did a really good job! I see many father/son projects in the future (see: Uncle Samtron 2000).