Lots and lots of stuff
Holiday times are often when I yearn for a bit more simplicity. I'm not against Easter egg hunts or giving chocolate bunnies, but it is certainly different than it was when I was a kid. My parents would usually give my sister and me one thing - a chocolate egg or a choclate bunny, and at Grandpa and Grandma's place Grandma would alway make little baskets from cottage cheese containers, fill them with plastic grass and put in a few treats.
My children between them have 2 t-rexes, 2 Winnie-the-Poohs, a bunny, a truck, 3 big eggs and dozens of smaller ones, all chocolate. We did get them some of this because we do like them to enjoy the egg hunt. But it's out of hand. Rather than having a few treats that they can enjoy, we either face constant fights as we try to distribute candy over time that really should last for several years, or we allow them to gorge and face a future of being overweight and diabetic. Probably we'll allow them to have little bits for awhile and eventually throw most of it out.
I feel like this around Christmas, too. Once all Grandparents, aunts and uncles have given gifts, it seems we have tons of cheap plastic that mean very little to anyone.
Rob has been reading the "Little House on the Prairie" series to the girls, and hearing the stories leaves me slightly in awe. Wilder speaks of having a corn cob instead of a doll, and how special it was when she got a doll for Christmas, and how her sister hand sewed a doll dress for her as the sister's Christmas gift to Wilder. My girls have lots of dolls, lots of clothes, and little that is special.
Or candy - in one story a storekeeper gives Laura and her sister candy hearts. She is so in awe of the little thing that she takes it home and puts it aside because it is too pretty to eat.
Please don't think I'm being ungrateful. I do love it that our children have so many people who love them and want to give to them. It just seems to me that sometimes less is more, that fewer things could mean that what we have is special and exciting instead of mundane and unoriginal. What is this drive we have to give things all the time? Can we actually forge a different way in this day and age?
My children between them have 2 t-rexes, 2 Winnie-the-Poohs, a bunny, a truck, 3 big eggs and dozens of smaller ones, all chocolate. We did get them some of this because we do like them to enjoy the egg hunt. But it's out of hand. Rather than having a few treats that they can enjoy, we either face constant fights as we try to distribute candy over time that really should last for several years, or we allow them to gorge and face a future of being overweight and diabetic. Probably we'll allow them to have little bits for awhile and eventually throw most of it out.
I feel like this around Christmas, too. Once all Grandparents, aunts and uncles have given gifts, it seems we have tons of cheap plastic that mean very little to anyone.
Rob has been reading the "Little House on the Prairie" series to the girls, and hearing the stories leaves me slightly in awe. Wilder speaks of having a corn cob instead of a doll, and how special it was when she got a doll for Christmas, and how her sister hand sewed a doll dress for her as the sister's Christmas gift to Wilder. My girls have lots of dolls, lots of clothes, and little that is special.
Or candy - in one story a storekeeper gives Laura and her sister candy hearts. She is so in awe of the little thing that she takes it home and puts it aside because it is too pretty to eat.
Please don't think I'm being ungrateful. I do love it that our children have so many people who love them and want to give to them. It just seems to me that sometimes less is more, that fewer things could mean that what we have is special and exciting instead of mundane and unoriginal. What is this drive we have to give things all the time? Can we actually forge a different way in this day and age?
posted by Jude | 1:11 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home