Grandparents at Christmas

Last week, slightly overwhelmed by the length of the children's Christmas lists, we took the little darlings to Toys-r-us on the Old Kent Road, with the intention of helping them to focus their minds. Saturday morning TV has been responsible for;

'Mummy don't forget I want that,
that there,
that,
that,
and that too' - Max.

Freya joins in with

'Mummy I want it all, all of it will be mine, mine, mine, ha, ha, ha, ha'....

OK, I exaggerated there a little, but you get the idea. We told them;

'You can choose three things each, one large gift and two smaller ones, Santa can't fit everything on his sleigh, and it is not good for the environment. Blah, blah'.

In we went to 'Toys-r-us' which to be fair, is full of overweight women with 'Croyden face lifts' (high pony tails) and Juicy Couture velour track suit bottoms, pushing pink buggies with infant girls called Shenika. We immediately realised the expedition had not been thought through properly.

(Note to self; Scary place the Old Kent Road - only go there again if we would like to be murdered).

Max immediately decided that for his main gift, he would like a red 'ride in' Ferrari for £399! He clearly has no idea yet of the value of money. We explained to him that Santa would have no money left for anyone else in the whole of Dulwich if he insisted on his chosen gift - and even that argument did not phase him initially.

Eventually we managed to make The Boy Wonder see sense and he choose a megablox pirate ship instead. When we related this story to Grandpa however, you could have knocked us over with a feather:

'Let the boy have the toy, he will only be young once! I'll buy it for him. Which shop did you say had it?'

James was beside himself with rage, he apparently cried himself to sleep two Christmas's in a row because he never got an Eagle Eye Action Man as his father thought it was too expensive.

Our back garden could end up looking like 'Neverland'. Max has several other little chums who live on Court Lane - backing onto the park, and he says he wants to drive from our home to theirs when we move.

HE IS ONLY 5 YEARS OLD GRANDPA, LET HIM GET SOME EXERCISE LIKE A NORMAL CHILD.

Toys like this look so 'trailer trash', if only you knew the trouble I took to scuff up my lovely new Phil and Teds buggy to make it look second hand when I bought it. Second hand and home spun is where it is at!