Spend It If You Got It...

Tonight Zo was deeply infatuated with the purchase of a stuffed Rudolph that she found at the drug store.  She's inspected her future purchase no less than ten times, and each time she's no less invested in making the purchase "someday soon", she says.  Tonight was soon enough.  So after a lengthy discussion about using her own money, and about just how much of her savings it would dig into, we set out for the store.  The only hitch was that we found something better.


Zo had her money all counted out, pretty much emptying her piggy bank, but she was determined to buy something Rudolph.  She'd been singing the song for weeks, and she'd watched the old classic television special more than once already, so we worked at making sure she was certain that spending her money was something that she really wanted to do.  She did.  At one point she placed two different collector sets on the floor in front of her at the store, and hummed and hawed her way to a decision.

"Now this one has more figures," she said thoughtfully, her fingers cupping her chin, "but this one has all of the reindeer and Santa's sled. Hmmmm, I don't know."




I was very proud of her.  She thought about it, she even weighed the benefits of one over the other, and then said with certainty that she wanted the set that was completely different from what she had set out to buy.  She grinned the whole way home.  As soon as we got in the door, she sprinted to the bath, took the fastest scrub in the history of hygiene, and has been playing happily with her figurines ever since.  She even spread out a white fleece blanket to serve as snow.  Of course, we're watching "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" for the eighth time this November, but I've never seen a happier girl.

If you spend it, they will come, so I've heard...and now we have a living room full of Yukon Cornelius', Abominable Snow Monsters, and about a dozen reindeer, including Clarice.  There are way worse ways to spend a Tuesday night than watching your daughter fall in love with Christmas.