In Which I Return all Christmas Gifts and Save a Ton of Cash

I have been noticing this for a while, but nothing has made it more loud and clear than recent events. I realize that this isn't a news flash for many of you, and it really isn't to me either, but again, sometimes you just need things to be spelled out for you in order to really get the message, especially this time of year.

OK, here it is:

KIDS DON'T NEED YOU TO SPEND A LOT OF MONEY ON GIFTS FOR THEM TO BE HAPPY.

Sure gifts make them happy, but so do lots of other things. It's like that phenomenon that happens quite often when a child opens the gift, is thrilled to bits to have a gift to open, loves the gift, but then twenty minutes later is found having a blast with the box it the gift came in, while the toy lay in and amongst all the other stuff they have.

Not that this is the box the toy came in, but these new treasures were relatively free:


Here's a closer view:


The Girl's new treasure:


The Hubs gave the kids his old beat up Crackberry's that he had laying around his office that no longer work. Instead of pitching them, he gave one to The Girl, and one WITH a holster type carrying case to The Little Man. The happiness that the kids have with their new phones is more than I would have ever imagined. They have played with these things for HOURS.

People, THEY DON'T EVEN WORK. THEY ARE BUT A BLANK SCREEN.

Yet, every morning, they pick them up off their night stand and bring them with them to breakfast. The Little Man clips his to his jammies (which, practically fall off with the weight), and The Girl carries hers down with her as well. When it's time to get dressed, they have those things transferred right on over to the new outfit. I do make them leave them at home when we go out of the house, but upon returning the other night, The Little Man squealed with excitement as he was reunited with his Blackberry, crying out, "Ohhhhhh! My Blackberry! I am so happy to see you!"

I am so close to returning all the gifts we bought this year, pocketing the cash, and then dig around some more in our "junk" piles to see what other kinds of happiness we can conjure up.

Meanwhile, I got this this morning:


The Little Man did this all by himself. The little smarty pants! He knows too, sometimes free equals precious!