my baby the consumer whore

With the holidays approaching family members start to get nervous... everyone wants to know what K wants for Christmas..... let me start by saying that my child is seriously toy deprived.... she has nothing to play with... aside from the huge toy chest stuffed full of dresses, capes, and costumes, the bin full of hats, purses & accessories, barbies, my little ponies, groovy girls, blocks, cars, stuffed animals, plastic animals, polly pockets, super heroes, music instruments, art supplies, a killer train set, kitchen, baby dolls, cabbage patch dolls, tea sets, movies, board games, educational games, talking bears... are you sick yet because I am... I know we live in a consuming society but I choke on the thought of the amount of toys she has... and she has half as many as many children we know... so now that the giving season is rolling around and everyone is asking "What does K need?" my answer is nothing... so they rephrase "Okay... what does she WANT?" my answer is everything... I never know what to say.

So in the midst of all this a toy catalog (or 3) show up in the mail yesterday... she comes home from school and sees them on the coffee table where I stupidly left them just before I ran to get her... they glimmer in the dim portland light... her eyes gleam and she sets upon them like a lioness on a limping zebra... At first I almost thought it was cute... and I don't let her watch commercials on tv (because I am a consumer whore who loves TiVo) so I really don't know what she wants either... After she spends 10 minutes staring at each page in lust she asks if I can put stars by the things she wants... okay, I'm cool with that... it makes it easier for me when my mother in law asks what she wants again... I sat there with my pen, my poor sad pen and I... making stars.. at least one on each page (except the electronics... she doesn't get that yet) as many as ten on the little mermaid page. Then when I think it is through and my sad over worked pen is safe she asks if we can go through again and circle the stars of the most important ones... okay... I think it is better to narrow things down......oh my.

At this point i have a fever (not from catalog shopping from being sick) and I am tired and all I can think about is my bed where I go to lay down... she decides to lay down with me.... BUT SHE BRINGS THE CATALOGS.

The rest of the day continues the same way until Mike gets home from work. He brings dinner, we all sit and eat and just as dinner is winding down K brings out the catalogs to show daddy. After the first page he says "Look at that our little girl the consumer W--H--O--R--E" (as a parent you learn to spell the "naughty" words)... but within moments she reaches the pages with the instruments and electronics and he is sucked in as well.... looking at the glitter electric guitar, the dvd projector, video games and more... and I sit there looking at my loving and lovely consumer whores...

I won't kid you... there's a pink easy bake oven in one catalog ... it'll be under the tree with a big bow on it and a tag that reads TO: K my consumer princess LOVE: Mommy, the consumer whore

Merry frickin Christmas.