Year of the Barbie & Block

The Chinese give each year an animal.  Around here we give it a toy.  This year we will declare that 2013 was the year of the Barbie and Block.

My six year old received close to 10 Barbie Dolls this year.  She also got a few Ken Dolls too.  I was looking at the Barbies and it hit me - "This isn't the doll I got back in the day" - no way.  Barbie has taken on a major change of fashion.  She used to be gorgeous in evening gowns and pretty in pink.  Now she's scandalous and slutty.  Micro mini doesn't even begin to describe the length of skirt or dress that hoochie mama is sporting.  And what is up with all the damn stripper shoes?  I also noticed Barbie has gotten a little taller and all that tall went into her legs.  Poor girl, how does she balance?

My sixteen month old got all the blocks he can dream of!  They are the Mega blocks and wooden blocks and I know they will eventually lead to the tiny Legos that many have fell victim to.  You know, late at night as you are casually walking across your house and then KABOOM you cram one in your foot.  At least the blocks haven't changed much in twenty some years.

Christmas was good around Brownie World.  The daughter gifted to her family for the first time.  To her daddy - a stapler.  To her brother - a bear.  To her mother - napkins.  We all laughed and she just beamed knowing she had "purchased" these on her own.  Too bad that whole joy of giving didn't last very long with her.  It was at our 4th Christmas (we had five this year) stop that she couldn't understand why she only had two presents and not more --- you know clothing doesn't count as a Christmas gift to a six year old who has been getting Barbie after Barbie.  After a good reaming she caught on that bratty-ness led to no presents at all.


I enjoyed making our usual Christmas breakfast while the hubby assembled the toys that required batteries (but no real building this year).  We had drop ins and eventually made our way out of our home to Christmas with the assorted family members.

As you get older you see the big changes each year during the holidays.  Alzheimer's has taken away my grandma and she's just a stranger taking thirty minutes to open a present.  An uncle not with us because he ended up being admitted to the hospital on Christmas Day.  Kids getting four times the size they were just last year.  A little more white in the "adult's" hair (at Christmas you aren't an adult you are perpetually a child even when you're the one pushing 70).  A little more picky about what you're feasting on for the birthday celebration.


This year I really noticed how much my own little girl has grown.  She's taller and more into those pre-teen things that all little girls think are cool because the big girls wear them.  I am not going to lie it made me a tad sad.  Looking at my little boy I remember easily when she was that age and all into everything at Christmas - just happy as a lark.  Now she looks so big to me.

What can you do?  You cannot keep them tiny and you do not really want them to stay that way either.  You want to see them grow, succeed, and achieve.  You want to look at them and have all those memories of back when.  You want an arsenal of stories to tell when she comes home from college with a boyfriend so you can embarrass her so badly and you have him rolling on the floor in laughter.

Ah...well enough reminiscing on our Christmas.  It was merry.  I hope yours was too.