Quick Fix

Last Christmas, when Olivia was only a few months old, she received a music-playing, plastic ball-shooting toy that she has grown to love more with each passing month. She is now old enough to understand how it works ("whack it!" she says when she pushes the dowel to make it start), and how to keep it moving (by collecting all the balls it spits out and shoving them back in.) What she hasn't mastered it how to fix it when it jams. Over the weekend, one of Olivia's playmates stuck a part to a different toy into the ball feeder so when she "whacked it" the thing only hummed and buzzed but spit out no balls. After a few failed attempts at starting it, Olivia said to me "Batteries!"

That IS usually the solution...