Toys Are Us!

Welcome to the house of plastic and batteries. And nary a volume control to be found. (whats up with that? Do the toymakers do this on purpose?) As far as the eye can see, every wall in every room is lined with shiny new toys. Each with their own individual tune, or trick or flashing light to tickle a childs fancy and make the parents eyes cross and start twitching.
Ignoring the information we gave him, Santa apparently decided against coal and thought my son was indeed a good boy and showered him with all kinds of goodies. His current obsession is trains. Anything and everything train. Yesterday afternoon, he zipped from room to room trying to play with everything at once. He sat in the family room for a minute to watch his new Thomas the Train DVD. Then he would bolt to the dining room where he set up his new train set. Then off to the den where he left his Rail Road crossing signal set up next to Daddy. Back and forth he went for a good hour or more. I half expected to see him stop dead in his tracks spin in circles and pass out from overload.
*never happened though*
My step brother wanted to bring the boys some gifts and called me for ideas. Knowing that the kids were spoiled silly I didnt know off hand what toys they would want that they didnt already have. (I know. We're bad.) So I suggested either books, movies or perhaps pajamas with feet. He went with the pajamas. So he arrived with the packages and gave me this look like "Why'd you make me get pajamas. Kids dont like pajamas." Well you know a 1 year old could care less, he was more interested in eating the wrapping paper and sitting in the box his pajamas came in. This was to be expected. My almost 4 year old though was funny. He looked apprehensively at his present and looked to me for approval before tearing into it. And he pulled out two pairs of footed pajamas and again looked to me for guidance on how to proceed. Kind of like "Mom, what is this shit? What the hell do I do with this?" So I looked all excited and lead the way. (and truth be told, I was excited. They both needed new footed jammies!)
"Oooh! You got new race car jammies!! Thats cool huh!?"
And he took on this brainwashed look and nodded with me, half smiling. He whispered a soft "Yeah." Then he went back to the race track that my other brother bought for him.
My step brother looked at me and said "Look, you made me into THAT Uncle. The one who brings the dumb gifts no one wants." Haha!
I was fired on the spot and he said next year he will talk to my kids directly to find out what they want.
All in all, it was a great day. My poor husband was sitting on the couch slumped over half dead. One eye was already rolled back in his head and was sleeping. He had been up until 3 am assembling this humongous train set that came in 1,698 pieces. (ok, maybe not quite that many.) Then he had to get up early for Christmas, and carefully create and watch over his turkey masterpiece. So bed time could not come fast enough. And after no naps, too much sugar and waaaaaay too much stimulation, the kids finally went to bed. And so did we.
And to all....a good night. =)