And, of course, can’t forget the presents

I did my after-Christmas posts the last two days. I talked about food and family. But really, can you really take the present part out of the Holidays at our house? My son is four.  This was the first year that he was ALL ABOUT SANTA.  He even tried to put out cookies and milk two weeks before Christmas. But when it came down to it, he was asleep at 5pm, on Christmas Eve. Yes, he feel asleep on Christmas Eve and did not wake up until 6:30am on Christmas morning.

He came shrieking down the hall, and opened up his presents with such glee and excitement. The Angry Household is all about Legos and Star Wars this year. But I bought the Lego Duplos. Yes, he’s 4, and almost half way to 5, but I’m tired of stepping on regular Legos. But really, I think normal Legos are too advanced for him, and the parts are too small.  It started on his birthday.

He got at least five Lego sets. These were from his preschool friends. Really, do you buy your kid a Lego set that states “For Ages 9-13″? Well these parents did. So we had teeny tiny parts everywhere. Angry Husband would put together the set, and about ten minutes later, it would be broken. Way too much disappointment going on here. So one day, I saw Angry Toddler building complicated structures at school with Duplos.  That confirmed it for me. They were not too babyish. And he didn’t think so either. He loved the castle and dinosaur sets that he received from Santa.

Did your house look like this after unwrapping everything? Well mine did. Angry Toddler ripped right through all his presents. Angry Husband not opened anything yet, and our living room looked like a storm had hit it. We made Angry Toddler fetch a trash bag from the kitchen. Ok, well maybe I’m still scared about the mouse situation in there. But he came back with a fresh bag, and helped clean up all the wrapping.

We’ve been dealing with a broken toy since Christmas toy, hello Hasbro’s Star Wars Republic AT-TE Tank Vehicle. One of the legs was broken upon removal from the box. Now more legs have started breaking.  This is a $100+ toy. There’s no way we can return it. Angry Toddler is addicted. I’m hoping to get some resolution with this after the New Year.  Angry Toddler keeps asking me if we are “going to fix the broken legs”?

But a true classic toy was received from Angry Husband’s parents. They usually mail us a UPS box of gifts. Angry Husband and I received a restaurant gift certificate and Angry Toddler received this Amaz-N-Marbles toy.  He loves building all kinds of levels and moving the marbles through the wood blocks. What a classic toy.  He has a plastic version that he plays with at school all the time.

I still need to put all the toys away. They are everywhere. I’m lazy like that. I’ve taken the tree down. The decorations are gone.  I still have the cards up, because I’m enjoying all the great moments captured on those cards.  I love to see how the families change every year, the kids are growing up.  Angry Husband scored with some new techie gifts.  I scored with a plane ticket to Blissdom, and some other great things.  But next year, I swear I’m going to shop earlier. I can’t stand this last minute running around.