Tis the season
I saw my first Christmas tree in a house the other day. That officially marked the beginning of the season. Last Christmas was sort of depressing for me. I was waiting for Oscar, with no clue when I would get him home. I had hopes of traveling to Vietnam by Christmas time when I got my referral. By Thanksgiving I knew I was months away from even filing the documents I needed to file to get his visa. As a result, things were a bit dreary.
This year, though, Oscar is home and while I know I’m not supposed to overwhelm him with objects, I have a sneaking suspicion that I’m going to have a hard time controlling myself. For the first time ever, I’ve already bought gifts weeks before Thanksgiving. I am the queen of procrastination when it comes to gift buying. Sometimes I even buy the gifts after the holidays. I really don’t like shopping.
Since we worked so hard all weekend to try to get our deal signed, and things died down in the middle of the night, I had some downtime today while we waited. I used that time to do some Christmas shopping. I am getting Oscar one of those shape sorter toys, probably one of those toys you hit with a wooden hammer, two dvd’s (for me, really, as I’m growing tired of the ones we’ve been recycling at home) and that new Elmo Live thing (he’s obsessed with talking toys and even I found that thing adorable, albeit pricey). I’m betting I shouldn’t buy any more gifts than this, but you know I’m going to.
So, my question for you is this, do people honestly not buy their kids very many gifts at the holidays? When we were growing up we really only got toys at Christmas and on our birthdays. We don’t buy a lot of toys ourselves so far. Oscar has a decent collection, but nothing like what my friends’ kids have. I’m not talking about spending many hundreds of dollars on toys - not even remotely close. What’s an appropriate number of toys for a 17 month old? Will I truly be doing him harm by putting a few extra gifts under the tree?
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Etta’s Hats
Where I’ve Been
My family was the same–we only received toys or gifts for birthdays and Christmas and I think that made it extra special. Our birthdays were usually pretty cheap–a doll and an outfit maybe. Christmas we might have received a few toys when we were young (my parents didn’t have much money so that had something to do with it). If it weren’t for my dad’s family we would not have received much at all. But I don’t ever remember feeling sad about that or about feeling deprived. My family was all together and I wasn’t shuffling between parents like so many of my friends. Even to this day, my parents don’t really buy much for the one grandchild (much to everyone’s surprise) but they give her so much attention that they are the favorite grandparents. When the other set visits there is no comparison–she loves her Oma and Opa!