Charity is Hard

We have one of those wood houses with 25 numbered doors that you open each day.  Instead of filling it with candy or trinket toys (neither of which we need), I write an activity for each day that we have to follow.  Some days are big things, like going to the Botanic Gardens to see the trains exhibit.  Others are small, like wearing a Santa hat.  Yesterday said to drink a fancy hot chocolate.  Normally, I get out the fancy Irish coffee mugs, whipped cream, and sprinkles and call it good, but this time we walked over to Starbucks after school and the kids had peppermint hot chocolate.  I discovered that I really like their white chocolate mocha.

While we were there, I saw that they had a giving tree set up.  On closer inspection, the gifts were mostly for kids around Malcolm's age and many of them were for clothing items.  I decided that this might be a good time to try to teach my son (age 4) about giving and sharing and helping those who are not as fortunate as we are.  We talked about how not all kids are as lucky as he and his sister are and that we could pick out something to give someone to help them have a good Christmas.  He was excited and chose a card for a three year old boy who would like car toys.  Fantastic!

Today, the paper in the countdown calendar said to go pick out a gift for the giving tree.  After school, we headed over to Target to find a car toy that a three year old boy might like.  We stopped by the post office first, so when we got to Target it was 20 minutes before lunch time.  I knew I would be cutting it close, but both kids had a granola bar on the way to the post office and I thought that would hold them.  Besides, we didn't have any other shopping to do.  In and out.

Malcolm tested every toy in the aisle and I picked out three choices that were in our budget that I thought would work.  Malcolm looked over all three options, and even though he really wanted to get the giant $50 set, settled on the Little People Batcave.  Then, the drama started.  I hope the little boy we bought this for likes it half as much as my my son wants it (please, no one buy it for us).  Picking out a toy for someone else is good in theory, but once you find something you really like, it is very hard to not want one for yourself.  My son does not care one whit that this is a toy for a little boy who might not be getting anything else for Christmas.  Nor does he care that he has a whole house full of very nice toys to play with.  All he knows is that the Batcave looks so fun and he wants one too!  (Never-mind that he has no idea who Batman is.)  I then had to walk through Target with my half whining, half sobbing child who thinks, "It looks like so much fun!  Waa!  I want to buy one for me too!   Waa! I want to play with this!  It looks so cool!" *sniffle* *sob* 

The best part was that Dorothy was completely fine and happily sat in the cart until we were waiting to check out.  Then she started mimicing her brother.  Not because she was upset; just because she could.  So then I had two whiny children at the checkout while trying to buy a gift for charity.

I decided that dropping the present off right then would be too traumatic, so we will tackle that portion tomorrow.

Merry Christmas!  Maybe next year I'll insist on him choosing a card for someone who wants pants.