A 'Dollar' can carry a wealth of imagination and joy

Every year, including this year, I tell myself I’m not going to buy another electronic, moveable, talking, no imagination needed, to expensive gift for a child that right after opening it they toss it a side and play with the box it came in instead. Some how though every Christmas I give in to my adult psyche and buy the too expensive gift. This year was different I followed through on my plan—no expensive, electronic, talking, no imagination needed, gifts.

I’m almost ashamed to admit it— this year I did my Christmas shopping at the Dollar Store for the little kids (ages 2-10). I usually don’t mind shopping at the Dollar Store, I find lots of nifty things, and if I take the time to look, I can even find stuff made in the USA. But this was Christmas, and this time entering the Dollar Store, I wondered what people thought. Did they think I fell on hard times with the economics the way they are today? Would they wonder if I’m down trodden and cannot afford anything, because I over extended elsewhere, but something from the Dollar Store. Would they look down their noses at me—then I thought—probably not they are in Dollar Store too; I had to get over the expensive gift stigma.

I walked around the store, un-certain if I was going to go through with buying the children’s gifts on my list—in the Dollar Store. My inner voice telling me, “come on, it’s not right—The—Dollar—Store— at Christmas?
I picked out a few items, put them in my basket, then put them back feeling guilty about the $ amount of the gift. At one point, I even put my basket down and started to leave the store. But something beckoned be back to my basket and I continued shopping.

I tried hard not to think about the price. Would a little kid think about the price when they played with a spinning top, giggling at the colors going around? I thought of one of my favorite gifts I received one Christmas, a spinning top with red, black and white sections, a simple toy that I played with for hours.
I put five spinning tops in my basket.

Surrounded by sparkly razzled dazzle hanging on the wall, I tried to look at the items as a child. I took an action figure off the wall and fingered the small object. If I were a kid, I’m not sure I’d like this. It doesn’t feel good in my hand. I closed my eyes and tried to envision myself as a child playing with this. I decide nope this is not good. But before I could put it back, I hear a small voice.

“Hey Mrs. Lady, what ya doin? What ya got there in your hand?”

I look down at a little boy with huge brown eyes, about the age of four, who I think is a bit precocious, thank goodness.
I respond with a smile, “Well I’m looking for Christmas gifts for nieces and nephews about the same age as you and a little older.”

He spied the action figure in my hand, “They won’t like that. I don’t like it.”

“I didn’t think so; I was just going to put it back,” Slightly embarrassed that I had even considered it.

Hanging the figurine back on the wall, I ask him, “What are you doing here?”

“Chritmit schoppin.”

“Oh do you like the stuff in here?”

“Oh yeth…I like this, and this and this and this. This here is really cool,(he picked up one of the spinning tops) but I can’t have it because dad said Santa is coming soon, so really I am only pretend Chritmit schoppin, picking out all the stuff I would buy me if I were a grown-up or Santa picking out presents for me.”
I blinked my eyes, and thought, wow, what a mouthful for a kid, but holy cow the truth was told.”

I started looking for presents again, but this time I really, really, pretended I was four and buying it for myself. The next thing I knew my basket was over flowing with a load of presents for $50 that would fill five gifts bags to the brim, which made me feel like I had Santa’s own bag on Christmas.

I was at the checkout and the little boy and his dad got in line behind me.
“Hi again Mrs. Nice lady,” He stood up on his tiptoes to see what I was taking out of my basket. “Wow, what cool stuff.”

I smiled feeling as if I had just got a zillion trillion dollars worth of stuff for the best deal ever. OH wait…I reminded myself to leave my four year self in the razzle-dazzle isle and with the squashy, bally, spongy thingys.

I was actually excited about giving the gifts. If this little boy liked them, then I am certain the other children would. Especially the squashy, bally, spongy, thingy, one green, two bluish pink, one orange, and one rad pink, which I played with as I walked through the isles.

I believe Christmas is to commercialized, putting to much emphasis on the Big gifts and drilling in our brains that the most expensive gifts are the ones to buy. Big dollar gifts that make you feel you are special in the receiver eyes thus making us feel better about the debit we made buying a too expensive gift. But does a child know the difference between $1 and $100. NO. What they do know is if you really thought of them and put some feeling in to it. It is something a child can sense.

Standing there now with pride in the dollar store at the wealth of gifts I found, I remembered another idea I always wanted to do for kids at Christmas. I’ve wanted to get big huge boxes, draw on them with crayons, and write the child’s name in big letters, so they can read and point at the letters in their name, wrap that box up and give that as a gift with a box of crayons. It’s an idea born from one of my all time favorite toys I had as child, when I was about five or six. My mom gave me a huge box after she had gotten a dryer or something. I took that box with excitement, made it my own, creating my own little world out of cardboard, and crayons. That box became a house, a castle, a fortress, and ultimately the finest snow sled—EVER. So next year— I just might go for the Big Box wrapped up gift—I think it will be a success. Speaking of success, all the stuff in the gift bags, but especially the spinning tops, and squashy, bally, spongy, thingy’s—were!
The Big Box Gift—definitely an idea I’ll want to keep in mind—I’d better start stocking up on crayons now.
Hmmm what time does the Dollar Store open?

A Falconer A Father

CONGRATULATIONS JONATHAN AND WENDY!
We welcome Scarlett Clarkson to the world!
Jonathan (Interview with a Falconer) and Wendy's little girl, born this week.
May God Bless you all.
Love Kellie