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Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Buy the way..


The prompt…..Pet Peeves. Do I have one? Hello, I am a stay at home mother with an almost two year old BOY and I am highly irritable with a number of known obsessive compulsive habits. Uhhhh….Yep!

Oh, and I have to say why it irks me so much. Well, easy enough.

I hate greed and waste. I know that the prompt said ONE pet peeve, but just relax, Mama Kat said I could have a twofer. (insert irony)

So, Greed and Waste. They are all around me everyday and the reason they shouldn’t bug me so much is because I am just as guilty as the next person for both offenses.

How in the world has my house become a ridiculous daycare full of toys and crap? There’s crap to ride on, crap to watch, crap to splash around in the tub, crap to push around on a beautiful wooden train track, crap that talks and talks and talks, crap to throw (and this is not a limited category), crap to hide in and crap from which it is just amazingly fun to jump, crap that can assist a toddler in daily coming up with a plan to BREAK HIS BRAIN!! Oh yea, we even have crap where you sit and CRAP, both upstairs and downstairs.

Not sure why I’m surprised. I’m the one who bought him all this crap.

Why is it that when I was a child I would search thru the JC Penney Christmas Catalog in September and circle a million things I was wishing to have, branding each circle with my KB to make sure that SANTA knew it was me making the request? I cannot remember a single time when I actually received an item I circled. My parents saved up to buy Christmas gifts for each of us four kids and we were always pretty ungrateful, feeling like we didn’t get what we wanted.

Fast forward 25 years and enter one crazy obsessive Mom. I was fine with getting the matchbox cars and die-cast trains that run on plastic track, which is why I was so surprised to find my husband had purchased a wooden railway start up kit for our son this Christmas. And so my new obsession started. 

Now, do you KNOW how many Thomas the Train engines there are?? Okay and then do you know about all the play sets and destinations? And, I haven’t even started talking about all the stuff we missed that’s now retired. L

Did you know that I bought a Thomas the Train cake pan for my child’s 2nd Birthday? …..after I had already bought a McQueen pan and found out he’d changed his mind?


Rid. dic. U. lous.

So, how can we pare down and nip this out of control spoiling in the bud, so to speak? I’ve made many attempts and plans about spending smart and also just enforcing my own rules. After my most recent binge on ebay.com from a retailer named onthewallrailroad I vowed to be done buying crap for little boy. These people KNOW what they are doing. They list their auctions so they end all at the same time nightly (after little ones’ bedtime of course) Then, they offer $1 shipping for each additional item. So dangerous. To top it all off, they leave your TAB open for up to a week, just in case you find anything else you want to bid on and have shipped for $1. LORD HAVE MERCY.

So I currently have a stockpile of Thomas engines and movies and what not just waiting around for a REASON to give a gift.
This is our NEIGHBOR'S Mcqueen car, but it's just planting seeds.

It seems that when I was small, the reason came first and then I’m sure my parents reluctantly went out and spent their hard earned money getting me something they thought I’d like (never something I actually asked for). These were 2 times per year. Christmas and Birthday. For Easter we got candy and the occasional kite in our basket, but there was no Valentine treat or Halloween stuffed animal. But, do you know that in the 2 years Jack has been alive, he’s received gifts for every reason under the sun FROM MY PARENTS.

Giant stuffed St Bernard Dog for last year’s Valentines Day. A singing book for this one. About a half dozen John Deere Tractors and various caps, clothing and pjs. Mind you, I am not even mentioning the “WE were in town and have a gift for Jack, just cuz” toys and what not.

All appreciated, don’t get me wrong, It just seems like we’ve swiped the credit card, spoiled the child kind of thing here.

What is the solution??

I’d love comments on your methods. How do you keep straight with addictive collections for your sweet pea? What is your secret obsession that you can’t stop searching ebay or thrift stores to find?

Let’s just think about it for a whole week, and just become aware of how wasteful and greedy we’ve become. Most of all, are we encouraging our children to be just the same?



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5 comments:

  1. I hear you. I didn't give my kids presents at holidays because other people did. I really didn't want them to get more than three to five presents so they wouldn't get an entitlement mentality about free loot. My kids are adults. They spend like drunken sailors in a new port. And they don't have it to spend. Help me figure this one out.

    Nice blog, by the way.

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  2. Oh, Kara, I love that I know you because I know you and how this bothers you so. And, you are human and subject to the very things that irk you. :) If it makes you feel any better than us, we actually bought that darn giant car for Parker. I LOVE getting him things - it is hard to hold back. Sorry, don't have any real help for ya. :)

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  3. Hey, thought of something. I do go through and get rid of stuff while Parker isn't around. Every couple of months, I go through the toy boxes and figure out what can be donated. I try to keep the mess contained to the organizational bins we have. One Step Ahead (onestepahead.com) is GREAT for canvas toy boxes and organizational things that blend in well with the other house stuff (and great stuff for the closet too) and have a simple look.

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  4. You're probably annoyed just by the idea of buying stuff to house the stuff, right? :)

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  5. Well, yes, gathering containers to hold my stuff is beyond me right now. We are going with diaper wipe tubs and yogurt cups. Ha. Maybe someday. But, I have to say, moving every 3 years or so helps you to at least go thru and throw out stuff you've accumulated before it gets out of control. Great to see you here and thanks for your comments. :)

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