Christmas with Kids

A asked Santa for a Nintendo DS for Christmas which would be fine if it didn't cost about 100$. When she was making her list I said that she should put a second choice in case Santa couldn't make a DS. She put a slinky. When she got the slinky Christmas morning she said, "at least Santa got me something better than a DS". She's really good at making herself feel better.

It somehow made it worse when she was playing in the car with a set of pens she received and she yelled with apparent genuine happiness, "yay, they're non-toxic". Ugh.

F asked for a Buzz Lightyear and I got him the medium priced one. You press a button and it says stuff but that's pretty much it. When Finn asked after a few minutes, is that all it does, I did feel somewhat wishful that I'd sprung for the fancy feature rich version.

I'm well aware that this is how we as parents are manipulated into a life of consumerism but it's pretty hard not to feel a bit of guilt.