Gah! This:
should be “I *want one” :o
My brother is around that age, and I get him mangas, mostly to get him to read. They are Japenese comic books and are often based on popular anime shows (or the other way around.) I usually get my brother Dragon Ball Z mangas or Ruroni Kenshin, but there are many others. I think DBZ is the more PG rated of the two though.
He’d love it! He’s always been big on Calvin & Hobbes. I was going to get him the box set, but his dad beat me to it.
You’re probably a year or two early there, although actual mileage may vary.
I got a Big Ball Factory for myself years ago because it reminded me of a certain Sesame Street clip.
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I’ve seen a Big Air Ball Tower running in a Toys R Us and considered getting one of them, too.
How about combining K’nex with Hot Wheels? This thing looks like lots of fun!
Does he like sports? My 9 year old son is crazy for baseball cards. You could get him a big binder with 100 plastic card pages. Buy a couple of the boxes of cards, spread them out (still in their packs of 5 or 10) in front of the tree. That would occupy him for several hours organizing them into teams and putting them into the pages. They have football, hockey, and basketball cards too if baseball isn’t his thing. My son has an American League binder and a National League binder. (But then again, he’s a compete baseball nut)
We also gave him a new bike and had it assembled in front of the tree last year. And more along the sports line (since my boy is a fanatic), in the past we’ve given him the street hockey goals put together already, a tennis racquet with a bag of balls, and a scooter - not all in the same year, mind you.
Scene It has a kids trivia edition that is a blast to play.
Tops on his list this year is the Fly Pen, made by Leap Frog. It is a computer in a pen with lots of games, homework help, and the like. That’s under the tree this year with some accessories.
Drool…I’ve ogled that at Borders…tremendous gift!!
My cousin has been into “spy gear” for a while now (he’s 13). Ever since that Spy Kids movie came out, that sort of stuff has been popular. Now there’s a few more kids movies and TV shows about spies.
I think I bought him some gear from Wild Planet before but I am positive you can get this sort of thing at the local toy stores and department stores (so you don’t have to wait for shipping).
Speaking of spy gear, my kid asked for something like an electronic detector gadget for his room, I guess to know if someone has gone in it. I have no idea where he came up with this or where to find it. Any suggestions?
Depends. Does he want to be warned if someone opens the door while he’s in the room or does he want to know if someone was in the room while he wasn’t there?
I’d have to guess it’s the second one, since his room is so small that the warning of someone entering his room might come a split sceond before he heard the door open.
Of course. The more difficult one. Radio Shack has an electronic project kit that should help.
The easy part would be to hook the door to a pair of leads so as to complete a circuit while it’s closed. That circuit would be hooked to a relay and cause another circuit to trip when the door’s open. The problem is wiring the kit to prevent the alarm circuit from resetting when the door closes.
Maybe he can work out a way for one of the leads to drop off its mount when the door opens?
Not to mention it would help him become much more popular amongst his peers. 
Nine is a good age to start reading the Lemony Snicket Series of Unfortunate Events books to learn that the world, if sometimes quiet, is an unpredictable and morally ambiguous place.
We’re all over that. I’m as much into it as the kids are!