Fun Facts For Friday - Our Playroom Just Got Significantly Smaller

Even though the twitter hash-tag looks somewhat misleading, #kidsexchange, we look forward to this semi-annual event. And it's time for the HUGE NC Kid's Exchange this week. I dropped off all my things to sell on Monday so I could get in early yesterday and get (almost) first dibs on everything on my list.

Here's what I was going for:

Cloth diaper accessories

A tunnel for Cai to crawl through, since we know he loves it so much!

Costumes

Winter clothes for Areyna

Sweaters for the boys

Drums for Zeke

Scooter for Areyna

Christmas presents for cousins and our kids

I came back home with:

Some brand new FuzziBunz for Cai - half-off

Costumes for Areyna and Zeke

A full winter wardrobe for Areyna, including winter coat, scarf, hat and glove set and shoes.

Sweaters for the boys and hat and mitten sets

A drum set for Zeke - $130 off the original price! (we'd been scouring craigslist for MONTHS looking for a set for his birthday.

A scooter for Areyna - scooters keep our kids occupied during band rehearsals! This was a smart buy.

All my Christmas shopping done for the Via cousin side of the family and our kids!

I couldn't NOT give a special thing to our kids when we got home, so I sorted out what we'd save for Christmas and decided on 1 costume for each and 1 big thing for each to play with. We took them on a scavenger hunt around the house to find their special gifts! You should have seen their faces.

Here are their favorites from the sale that we've already gotten our money's worth out of.

1 - Zeke's drum set: He went straight to his drums before even telling us good morning this morning!

2 - Areyna's scooter

3 - A bell costume for Areyna

4 - A bigger Spiderman costume for Zeke - which means an old/new spiderman costume for Cai! (you gotta love hand-me-downs)

5 - A tunnel maze for Cai - He LOVES it! How much? Well, let's just say he wanted to crawl in the tunnel before eating breakfast...and you KNOW how much this boy likes to eat!!!

I know this sounds so stupid, but I'm just being honest.

I had such mixed emotions as we gave our kids their gifts. I mean, we hardly ever buy toys, even for birthdays, much less for no occasion at all. One, they are a lot of money and two, they already have so much! In a society that is already telling them that they "need" more stuff, it is a constant reminder that we need to teach our kids gratefulness, contentment and thankfulness.

So, last night before we went to bed we asked to kids to specifically thank God for all He had given them and today we are all going to find 3 things that we can give away to someone else that may not be so privileged.