Sunday, October 31, 2010

The Great Toy Bonanza...

Toys, Toys, Toys...everywhere. Just looking around my house; there are toys spread from one end of the lounge room all the way through the kitchen and out onto the deck! Do kids really need all these toys? With Christmas nearly upon us; a friend of mine asks these questions in this weeks blog....

Guess Blogger

Well it’s the 1st of November and we all know what that means.... don’t we?  Oh right, it’s only 54 sleeps until Christmas!  Now I don’t know about anyone else, but as much as I love Christmas, I’m becoming very boring about the presents.  I have a 3y/o and a 1y/o and we just don’t need any more bits of coloured plastic for me to trip over.  I have nowhere else to stash them, and we already bought (and filled) a bigger house!

A friend recently mentioned buying toys for his daughter at a 2nd hand market, and how she loved these toys as much as she could new ones, and within days, you couldn’t tell if they were new or not.  A great idea, great for the environment and the wallet.

Still, as much as I want to have a mountain of presents for the kids to rip into on Christmas day, I don’t want the contents to stay at my place.  So what to do?  Ma-Ma and Grandad already tip into the kids’ swimming lesson fund instead of gifts, but they can’t resist a little something to wrap up. 

And the mountain of toys aside, before the actual day there’s the nightmare of the shops (with toddlers in tow) to deal with.  For the last 2 years, a friend and I have put our kids into daycare for 1 day and shopped until we dropped, giving the boys instructions to pick up the kids and with the rule “we don’t come home until it’s done”.  Sure we probably might miss a couple of sales but we also miss the stressful, last minute rush on December 24, and last minute always means big money.

I’m considering (seriously) wrapping up some of our existing, forgotten toys for the big day.  Would the kids realise, and if they did, would they care?  Probably not.  I’m sure the Chinese economy will live on without me.

Should we make a pact?  A toy swap instead of a new toy bonanza?  Should we donate old toys to charity to make way for the new?  What do you do for Christmas and how do you deal with the shopping and the cost and the mountain of toys?  All ideas gratefully received! 

2 comments:

  1. I shop throughout the year and if I see something suitable for one of the kids, either birthday or Christmas, I buy it and keep it aside in the cupboard. This way I have nice toys for them and not useless ones bought on a last minute shopping spree. Also I store about three-quarters of their toys in boxes in the shed and rotate them monthly so when another box comes out (in exchange for the old lot to return to the shed) they have a variety and enjoy the old ones too.

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  2. OMG I love the whole rotation of the toys - hmm I've beeen doing it weekly but perhaps monthly is a better idea....and yes I also buy through out the year so come Christmas most of the pressie shopping is done yay

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